Chillingo – Publisher of Angry Birds for iPhone – Acquired by EA
This isn’t entirely related to Android, but kind of is. Chillingo – publishers of some of the most popular apps on iOS, such as Angry Birds and Cut the Rope – are reportedly being bought by EA for $20 million. Earlier reports errantly stated that they were the developers behind Angry Birds and owned the Angry Birds IP, but this isn’t the case. (In fact, Chillingo had nothing to do with Angry Birds coming to Android.)
Today’s news holds a lot of implications for Android, though. We know EA’s looking to get deeper into the Android market with new games coming out for their top franchises (with big-name offerings like Need For Speed, The Sims, and more all currently available), and today’s acquisition could see them taking a very sharp stab in that “casual, unusual, unique, and quirky” category of games that has everyone going crazy these days.
Pre-acquisition, Chillingo boasted one of the biggest catalogs of published titles for iOS platforms. Not only is their portfolio bulging with titles, a lot of them are extremely high quality gaming experiences. It’s because of their expertise in investing in great titles that EA decided to buy them out in the first place. With this acquisition, we only hope to see more great games make their way from iOS over to Android, and EA’s now in a great position to make that happen.
[via Reuters]