Angry Birds is coming to yet another platform — Roku, maker of the popular streaming set top box that allows people to access streaming services like Netflix and Hulu Plus. Initially, the three main versions of Angry Birds will be available: Angry Birds, Angry Birds Seasons, and Angry Birds Rio. Exactly when the games will be available and how much they’ll cost is still unknown.
I think this could be a cool differentiating feature for Roku and a good partnership for Rovio. That said, I do have a few questions:
Will Rovio be able to stay on top of updating the Roku version? In my opinion, this seems to be one of the biggest challenges facing Rovio. When people purchase a game — even if it’s only a couple bucks — they expect updates within a reasonable time frame of everyone else.
We know Rovio is working on Angry Birds Sync, so let’s hope part of this initiative will sync up updates as well. To Rovio’s defense, they can’t always control when updates will actually arrive, as is the case for the latest update to Angry Birds Rio for the Mac. Rovio stated that they delivered the update to Apple about a week ago, yet Apple has not yet pushed it out to the Mac App Store — much to the chagrin of those who play AB Rio on the Mac.
As another bonus, Roku users will also get access to an Angry Birds channel where they can watch videos and even purchase Angry Birds swag. No word on if any of the content will be exclusive to Roku or not.
