Gaming for Android has long been the topic of conversation, and typically they have been negative conversations at that. Plain and simple, gaming on Android has been lacking, until very recently anyway. The announcement of several quality games over the past few months from several studios, not to mention 3D involvement from guys like Gameloft, and the beginning of a real gaming portfolio for our favorite platform. The only thing that was missing from this environment for this mix to be treated like console gaming was the hype and excitement that comes with the launch of a major title. Well, Rovio and their distribution partner GetJar delivered Android’s most anticipated Android release yet with Angry Birds Full – and that’s just where the story starts!
For many, the release was not unlike waiting outside your favorite electronics store for the midnight release of a super hyped game. You’ve played the demo a hundred thousand times, we all have. When Patrick of GetJar announced that there would be a special free release of a brand new game at 5AM, combine that with news sources that were announcing Angry Bird’s impending release, it was a powder-keg. Tons of people sat online at 4:55AM and steadily hit refresh on their browsers until finally, the download was available. According to GetJar, over 100,000 downloads occurred within the first four hours of launch. 100,000 phones were reaching out to a server to request a 12mb file within a four hour timespan. That is well over a Terrabyte of transferred data within an extremely short time span. Right around eight or nine in the morning, the wave of problems came rushing in. All of a sudden, no one could get the game. Tons of people were furious at GetJar and Rovio for not delivering – a problem which was rectified as quickly as possible, and was immediately followed by the Android Market getting the title.
Even late this afternoon, the Rovio website still had little more on their homepage that “Oops! Due to the enormous traffic generated by the Android launch of Angry Birds, rovio.com is down.” In the mean time, the angry customers began to question Rovio’s decision to wait until later to add the application to the Market. While yes, it’s true that the onslaught of Market replacements has been somewhat lacking (and the Android Market already handles a pretty significant volume as it is), there’s no evidence to support that Google would have been able to handle this. The biggest reason I say that is because it’s never happened before. Yes, of course Google is capable of using their seemingly infinite pile of money to make sure the Market survives such an attack, the evidence that the Market has not always been there for us also exists. Remember Psx4droid, the playstation emulator by ZodTTD? His release was plagued with problems that took Google days to resolve, or even acknowledge. It’s entirely possible that the Market would have had even more problems than GetJar had during their release.
One thing has been made extremely clear by this event – the bar has been set. Console style game launches are not only possible on Android, but extremely successful, and I think this experience, despite its flaws, will open the doors to bigger and better launch titles, and show the entire gaming community that Android is alive and ready to play!
