Mobile Games | In the middle of the night, Jaakko Iisalo sketched six little birds on the computer screen: That’s how the story of Angry Birds began

Ten a year ago they were swarming everywhere.

Funny bird figures with their beaks flapping and green pigs were printed on clothes, on the side of food, sheets, dishes and balloons – among other things.

The Angry Birds mobile game and its angry birds quickly became a massive phenomenon after its release. But the characters definitely didn’t just stay on the phone screen.

For example, an Angry Birds themed area was opened in Särkänniemi in 2012, with one adventure track being an exact copy of one of the game’s fields. The games were also made into two animated films in 2016 and 2019.

First the idea for angry birds was born in the middle of the night, recalls the game designer Jaakko Iisalo.

It was the beginning of 2009. Rovio had subcontracted games for other companies, including Nokia. However, I couldn’t find my own hit game. A couple of years earlier, Apple had released the first iPhone, and Rovio thought that it would be the way to success. It would only take one striking game to stand out from the crowd in Apple’s app store.

At the time, Iisalo was Rovio’s only game designer, and his task was to come up with a bunch of different concepts for a new game.

“I was at home in my study and just trying to come up with all kinds of ideas. I remember the vision came at night like lightning from a clear sky. It must have been past midnight. It was just one idea that came, and very quickly I made a concept image with Photoshop,” says Iisalo.

On the left side of the screen, Iisalo drew six birds of different sizes that had no wings or legs. A couple of red, one purple and a few green. Already in the first picture, the dark corners of the birds were deaf, just like the final characters of the game.

The birds that ended up in the finished game and became famous are quite similar to Iisalo’s first sketches, but green pigs did not exist at that time. On the right side of the picture, Iisalo sketched a castle made of different colored bricks.

“I have always drawn a lot of animal figures. I didn’t even realize it myself, but my mother said at the time that you were already drawing these in elementary school. I had in mind specifically that there is some emotion involved. That those birds are creepy. I had a vision that there was a flock of angry birds that were rolling down the blocks.”

Iisalo presented the bird idea to the company’s management among other ideas. He doesn’t remember that it would have caused any reactions.

“Niklas Hedwho was the producer, must have liked it.”

However, there was something so different about the idea that Rovio decided to start developing it into a game. At that point, I got involved in the design of the characters Tuomas Erikonenwho was responsible for the visual world of Angry Birds.

Erikoinen started refining Iisalo’s idea and made different versions of the birds. He sought inspiration from random Googling.

“You can get ideas for abstract character design from a little bit of everything, even from birds drawn by others or from the real world. I don’t remember exactly what I would have taken the model from, but pelicans and other funny-looking birds got to be seen.”

It was by no means certain that the birds would have remained angry even in the final game. Erikoinen says that Angry Birds was originally just the working name of the game.

“One thing we thought about was whether to make the birds happy or angry or even pirates. In the end, we decided to go with angry birds.”

When thinking about the appearance of the birds, it was also necessary to take into account what the shape language of the characters tells about their playful qualities.

For example, Erikoinen made the yellow bird in the game triangular because it is fast. As if an arrow that pierces when it hits the target, says Erikoinen. Usually, when someone mentions Angry Birds, the yellow bird comes to Erikinen’s mind first.

“It probably has the most of my own handprint.”

Correspondingly, the biggest bird among the characters, the big red Terence, is also game-wise heavy and when it hits the target, it causes extensive destruction.

Angry The idea of ​​Birds is simple. In the game, the pigs have stolen the eggs of the birds and the birds go to battle against them. The player’s goal is to destroy the fortresses and the pigs hiding in their shelters by throwing different birds at the pigs with a slingshot.

The green pigs came into the game when the birds had to come up with an opponent.

“Birds needed a main enemy, and for some reason the enemy became pigs. They serve as motivation for the players,” says Erikoinen.

Iisalo says that the pigs were born “out of necessity”, when something just had to be invented.

“I drew schematically what animal figures came to mind. I tried to soften the figure a little and made the ears round so that it wouldn’t remind me of a pig. But still, everyone just said that it’s a pig.”

First The Angry Birds game was released in December 2009 and quickly became a worldwide hit.

With the popularity, Rovio’s turnover and profit began to grow at a dizzying pace. In 2011, the company made a profit of 48 million euros with a turnover of 75 million euros. The following year, the operating profit continued to grow.

In 2013, game characters were everywhere. The company had about 500 partners who manufactured more than 30,000 products with pictures of birds. Ancillary products brought in 45 percent of the company’s turnover.

HS Nyt did a story at the time, in which the reporter i.e. for a week with only Angry Birds products.

“It felt strange. Making the game was a little tinkering in the office, and suddenly they [hahmoja] it was everywhere,” says Iisalo.

Iisalo says that he became aware of the extent of the Angry Birds phenomenon while on vacation in Malaysia, where children were wearing Angry Birds shirts. There were many copies of the game’s accessories in circulation.

The special one has a similar story to tell.

“During the first year, the phenomenon was hardly visible to us at all. Angry Birds was a big deal in Japan and Asia. I realized it myself when I went to Sweden for the first time at a game conference and people got excited when I told them that I was making Angry Birds,” he says.

Although Iisalo and Erikoinen are behind the familiar characters, Tuomas Erikoinen emphasizes that much more is needed to create a genius label.

“There is a lot of talk in the gaming industry idea guy and that a simple one without the right kind of factors still does not produce any kind of result. The genius label is created when, in addition to the inventor of the idea, there is a good team and the right kind of attitude.”

Numerous sequels to the original Angry Birds game have been published and the game company Rovio has been listed on the stock market, but the game’s characters are no longer found everywhere. In place of the Angry Birds area in Särkänniemi, the Kärsänniemi area for children, named after the amusement park’s own mascot, opened this summer.

The birds are still not disappearing. Namely, at the beginning of June reported, that a new animated series is being made about the characters, commissioned by the entertainment giant Amazon.

Correction 10.7. 8:35 a.m.: The story previously incorrectly stated that the first Angry Birds movie was made in 2012. The movie came out in 2016.