After becoming an overnight hit reaching millions of download figures on the App Store and Google Play, Flappy Bird has been taken offline by its creator citing he can’t take the pressure anymore.
Despite being launched in May last year, the incredibly basic smartphone game that features a simple but ruthless tapping mechanic to navigate through an endless series of pipes became enormously popular last month with download figures reaching the millions.
Now however, its Vietnamese creator Dong Nguyen, as promised, has removed the game from the app store after he posted a series of tweets stating he couldn’t handle the pressure and notoriety the game has caused him.
In his tweet, he said: “I am sorry ‘Flappy Bird’ users, 22 hours from now, I will take ‘Flappy Bird’ down. I cannot take this anymore.”
Earlier that day he indicated that the stress involved with so much attention, despite making him a reported US$50,000 a day, was becoming too much to bear.
“I can call ‘Flappy Bird’ is [sic] a success of mine. But it also ruins my simple life. So now I hate it.”
He has also come out to say there have been no legal issues about the game being taken down, as some websites had suggested clear similarity in game design with early Mario games.
While people with copies of the game on their smartphones will still be allowed to continue playing it – if they can handle the game’s frustrating nature – some smartphones with the game already installed have begun selling on eBay with one at the time of writing having a highest bid of nearly US$100,000.
