Friday, August 12, 2011

Angry Birds

At a family dinner party tonight, I had the pleasure of playing Angry Birds for the first time. It began when I saw my 12-year-old second cousin playing on an iPod (or something iPod-like) and asked him what game it was. When he told me it was Angry Birds, I said I'd heard of it but had never played it.

12-year-old cousin upon learning I'd never played Angry Birds:
"Oh, you've never played before? It's so fun, but so addicting. Here, try it--see? This is how it works..."
12-year-old cousin after I totally botch a level and lament my lack of talent:
"It's OK, it's OK, it's just a game. You can do it again--here. I don't like the fail screen, so you can just go here and press that before it comes up and start the level over again that way."

At this point, we've caught the attention of my 21-year-old cousin, so he comes to see what we're doing.

21-year-old cousin upon learning I'd never played Angry Birds:
"What?! How have you never played Angry Birds before?!! You can play it on a computer! Or don't you have a friend with an iPad or iPhone? You must have a friend with an iPad or an iPhone, and if they have it, they must have Angry Birds! *Shakes head* Never played Angry Birds!"
21-year-old cousin after I totally botch a level and lament my lack of talent:
"You're terrible at this! That's shameful. Here, let me do it, it's so easy, see, you just go like this...."

Is it just me, or does something seem a little backwards in attitude and maturity level between my two cousins?

Anyway, now I've been introduced to Angry Birds, and also to some other game that involved feeding candy to a little green monster while collecting stars. I tried to explain the two games to my mom on the car ride back, but as I was describing them it occurred to me that they don't actually make sense: "You slingshot these birds, so they...blow stuff up. The red ones are regular, but the blue ones, if you click again, then they, uh, split into three birds. Yeah." "You have a little green monster and you have to feed him this candy. But you do it by cutting certain strings so it swings the right way, and sometimes you get it caught in a bubble so it starts to float."

Well, they don't have to make sense to be fun. I can see how they might become addicting if I used a handheld device that ran it, but as it is...I'll stick to my RPGs.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

There are a billion games that are exactly like Angry Birds I don't understand why this one is more popular.

Eleni said...

Hi Rouise!
Yeah, I can see how games like that could be addicting, especially if it's the one game you really pay attention to on your phone--just play a few games here and there whenever you have a minute. But I'm not rushing to find it online or anything.

Anonymous said...

But I did think this is cute:
http://brassyapple.blogspot.com/2011/07/angry-birds-diy-set-up.html

Eleni said...

Haha, that is nice. As long as the kids know only to aim at the blocks :)

C said...

I have purposely not put Angry Birds on my iPhone.

Eleni said...

I don't know what other games there are for iPhones, but I probably wouldn't put it on mine, either. I've never really gotten hooked on any small games like that (I get hooked on more epic games :).