'Angry Birds' Exceeds 500 Million Downloads: Awesome or Overrated?

Rovio's popular mobile game, "Angry Birds," has reportedly pushed more than 500 million downloads. To give you some perspective on just how big a number that is, in 2009 Nintendo reported that it had sold about 500 million NES games total. However, the "Angry Birds" figure is misleading, and we'll explain why.

First, glancing through Wikipedia's list of best-selling video games, we couldn't find a single game that's reached as many people as "Angry Birds" has. Even the highest-selling games on the list didn't come close: mobile "Tetris" (100 million), "Wii Sports" (77 million; it came with the system), "Super Mario Bros." for NES (40 million).

But "Angry Birds" has only pushed 500 million downloads. Actual sales hover closer to 15 million, about the same as "The Sims" or "World of Warcraft." Not only that, but the "Angry Birds" figure includes three different versions (original, "Rio," "Seasons"), and each version costs $0.99. If "The Sims" cost $0.99 total, we'd probably buy it, too. "Angry Birds" is also available on multiple platforms, including PC.

Rovio CEO Mikael Hed said, "This is a fantastic landmark achievement for us, and we're extremely delighted to see such an incredible amount of people enjoying our games. We remain committed to creating more fun experiences and bringing exceptional quality to Angry Birds fans everywhere."