Sega Surprise: Game Company Buys Finnish Developer Rovio for Almost a Billion
Sega joins in on the fun of buying a video game developer, adding Rovio Entertainment to its portfolio.
The past few years in gaming have been interesting due to the many developers being purchased by various companies. Sony bought Bungie for $3.6 Billion and Insomniac Games for $229 million. Embracer Group bought Crystal Dynamics and more from Square Enix for $300 million. The biggest and most disrupting of the current gaming climate is Microsoft’s purchase of Bethesda for $7.5 billion and the Activision Blizzard purchase for $69 billion which has been a battleground to get it finalized.
Well, it looks like the purchasing of gaming companies hasn’t slowed down. The latest one is definitely stranger than anyone expected.
Contrary to popular belief, Sega has more than Sonic
The Hedgehog and The Bird
Recently, The Wall Street Journal broke the news that Sega was looking into purchasing Rovio Entertainment for $1 billion. Well, it looks like Sega and Rovio have come to an agreement to buy Rovio Entertainment for $776 million. Both companies see this as a great fit and want to use each other to strengthen the Rovio brands using Sega’s knowledge of PC, console, and more. The CEOs of both companies had a lot to say about the sale.
via Rovio
Alexandre Pelletier-Normand, CEO of Rovio states:
“I grew up playing Sonic the Hedgehog, captivated by its state-of-the-art design. Later, when I played Angry Birds for the first time, I knew that gaming had evolved into a true mainstream phenomenon, with the power to shape modern culture.
Joining Rovio has been an honour and I am proud to have seen Angry Birds continue to grow, as we released new games, series and films. Less known but equally impressive is our industry-leading proprietary technology platform, Beacon, holding 20 years of expertise, allowing tight-knit teams to develop world-class GaaS products.
Our mission is to ‘Craft Joy’ and we are thrilled at the idea of using our expertise and tools to bring even more joy to our players, enhancing and expanding Rovio’s and Sega’s vibrant IPs.
Red and Sonic: two globally recognized and iconic characters made by two remarkably complementary companies, with a worldwide reach that spans mobile, PC/console, and beyond. Combining the strengths of Rovio and Sega presents an incredibly exciting future.”
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via Rovio
Haruki Satomi, President and Group CEO, Representative Director of Sega stated:
“Among the rapidly growing global gaming market, the mobile gaming market has especially high potential, and it has been Sega’s long-term goal to accelerate its expansion in this field. I feel blessed to be able to announce such a transaction with Rovio, a company that owns “Angry Birds”, which is loved across the world, and home to many skilled employees that support the company’s industry leading mobile game development and operating capabilities. Historically, as represented by the “Sonic the Hedgehog” series, Sega has released countless video game titles to various gaming platforms. I am confident that, through combination of both companies’ brands, characters, fanbase, as well as corporate culture and functionality, there will be significant synergies created going forward.”
Rovio Entertainment
Rovio Entertainment is a Finnish game developer that started in the early 2000s that worked on various projects for others over the years on things like the N-Gage, Nokia N900, and mostly Java ME. It wasn’t until around 2009 that they hit it big with the release of Angry Birds. The game was very simple. Pigs have stolen the birds’ eggs and they have to destroy the Pigs’ strongholds by shooting themselves via slingshot at them. Each bird could be used differently, which added just enough complexity to not get overwhelming for general audiences.
The easy and simple gameplay loop was very addictive to everyone playing it, including many who wouldn’t consider themselves gamers. This series brought Rovio to the spotlight and it spawned multiple ports, spin-offs, a sequel, TV show cartoons, and even movies.
via Rovio
They have been running into issues lately with the current versions of Angry Birds being full of microtransactions and ads that many find the games unplayable. There was a paid version you could buy called Rovio Classics: Angry Birds which was the first game without all the pesky microtransactions. It did very well for Rovio and was a huge treat for fans. Rovio then realized people would rather buy the game and play it than buy microtransactions on their other products. You would think this would be some kind of lesson on what consumers want. Instead, Rovio removed the game from Android stores to force people to use the microtransaction-heavy versions and is threatening to do the same on the iOS store.
Rovio is not really known for any other games outside of Angry Birds. They tried to sell a Flappy Bird clone called Retry in 2014, a match-3 game called Nibblers in 2015, and various other clones of other popular games. The last attempt was a game called Small Town Murders in 2020 which is a puzzle game with a mystery setting that has decent reviews. The main thing that is none of them has been the hit Angry Birds became.
via Google Play
This sale is incredibly strange compared to the others. Rovio Entertainment definitely needs Sega more than Sega needs Rovio. The sale is absolutely only for Angry Birds and what that means for its future is up in the air. Sega isn’t known for games even close to Rovio’s output, so this could mean the birds could be getting a different type of game one day or Sega properties will get the mobile treatment.
Whatever happens, it definitely is going to be weird.
“Sega does what Nintendon’t” – Old Sega Slogan
