And the bird character Rio will also appear in the new version of the Angry Birds game. The deal with Twentieth Century Fox means that the Angry Birds game will be promoted along with the movie in TV commercials and other marketing. “We think of how Mario has been around as a game character for more than 25 years and feel like we are just getting started,” Vesterbacka said.

Rovio’s strategy is to take the hit game - where you slingshot Angry Bird characters at the fortresses of green pigs - and run with it. This all fits in with the brand expansion of Angry Birds. Rovio has been working on the Rio game for months. Now Vestersbacka says that marketing of the Rio movie will essentially give Angry Birds the equivalent of a major movie tie-in, even though the Angry Birds characters are not part of the movie itself. That was all done by word of mouth, with no money spent on advertising. Vesterbacka noted that Angry Birds is more popular in Google searches than Mickey Mouse. (The number is well above that 50 million figure now) The game has had far more staying power in the top ranks of the App Store than any other title. “This gets us massive global visibility, as if we had made our own movie.”Īngry Birds launched in December, 2009, on Apple’s App Store and it has been downloaded more than 50 million times on both the App Store and the Android platform as well. “We are like birds of a feather,” said Vesterbacka, who appeared on my panel this week at the Digital Life Design conference in Munich.

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