Angry Birds Release Date: Top Selling Mobile Game Coming to Retail and PC
Finnish game developer Rovio Entertainment signed with Focus Multimedia for the exclusive distributing rights for the retail PC versions of their wildly popular mobile “Angry Birds” series.
Distributing rights were signed for the United Kingdom, Ireland, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand. Focus secured the rights to release “Angry Birds,” “Angry Birds Rio” and “Angry Birds Seasons.”
"Boxed retail is another way to reach more audience," said Rovio's Ville Heijari to U.K. trade paper MCV. "Digital and mobile are still at the core of our business, but boxed retail is a good addition for taking the brand forward."
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"Angry Birds" is already available in the Mac App Store and as a digital download available for Windows. Rovio said the other versions of the game would also be shipped to retail stores in time for Christmas 2011, including “Angry Birds Seasons” and “Angry Birds Rio” in 2012.
“Angry Birds is everywhere, successfully penetrating ever deeper into the mainstream on a daily basis,” said Focus Multimedia’s Craig Johnson. “We’re thrilled to be Rovio’s distributor.”
Three Helsinki University of Technology students, who started development on the original iPhone game in March 2009, founded the small company in 2003.
“We were doing work for hire, so our strategy was that it will take a number of titles before we could realistically make one hit,” said Mikael Hed, CEO of Rovio. “Many of the proposals that we got were really well thought out, and then we had this one screenshot of this angry bird character just trudging around on the ground.”
"Angry Birds" was No. 1 mobile download in Finland after initial release in December 2009, then to number one in the U.K. after it was accepted to the Apple App Store. Angry Birds quickly became the number one iPhone game download in the United States.
On the strength of the skyrocketing sales, Rovio raised $42 million in Venture Capital Funding from Accel Partners, Atomico and Felicis Venture to develop further versions of the game.
The retail version drops Nov. 24.
