Nguyen Ha Dong, the Vietnamese dev now in the spotlight for making Flappy Bird, has decided not to comment to allegations that the game has risen to the top of the iOS App Store fraudulently, using bots.
Indeed, depending on who you’ve read, Flappy Bird is either a genuine social phenomenon, or a complete fabrication and a fraud. Nguyen admitted in an earlier interview that he did not use any actual social promotions, and does not own the Flappy Bird accounts that have sprouted up on Facebook and Twitter.
First, let’s look at the theory that this is all legit. It seems part of the game’s success was a seemingly spontaneous viral which drove fans to write the best reviews for the game. Positive and negative reviews abound and are text heavy, and the common thread of thought is how the game is frustrating and addicting. Gamers who remember when Tetris 1st came out on the Game Boy will experience déjà vu reading about how the game is pervading many of their lives.
Now, for the theory that it could be a hack. The person who’s posited this theory has no clear evidence, but is an experienced iOS marketer and app maker himself. He looked at the rank history for Flappy Bird, as well as Nguyen’s other games, Super Ball Juggling and Shuriken Block. He points out the way the games jumped in popularity is unusual compared to the behavior of other games.
Furthermore, he read through the reviews, and found a lot of repetitions of words like ‘glitch’, ‘pipe’, and ‘addicting’. He also pointed out how the content of many five star reviews runs contrary to the rating itself.
He ends this by pointing out that he has seen this activity in suspicious apps before, and explains how this behavior can be automated.
Having put his work on the firing line, it’s interesting that Nguyen does not want to comment. Here’s his official response:
I respect all other people opinions. I won't give any comment to this article. I'd like to make my games in peace.
Personally, I don’t find it completely unbelievable that this could be a genuine viral phenomena. We may have gotten too used to seeing calculated hits using social engineering tricks, like Draw Something and Candy Crush Saga to remember how games like Tetris, Street Fighter 2, Pokemon, Bejeweled, etc. went viral, before the term was even invented. Ultimately, the industry is unpredictable, and Flappy Bird stands as a reminder of how a hit can be not made.
