Intensive Gaming Diary

The blog about videogames.

Category: 2010s

A Book About Rovio and Angry Birds

Posted on by Viljami

The blog post right here is about a book about Angry Birds. The name of the book is The Slingshot Formula and it has been written by Pascal Clarysse. One reason for me to start reading this book was the matter that Rovio, the developer of Angry Birds, is a Finnish gaming company which is very much my dear home country. Read along as I briefly describe how the story of Angry Birds was told in this book that I finished reading just a while ago,

The book tells us readers a story of three young men, later formed to Rovio Entertainment, that take part in a mobile game development contest back in 2003. They all study then in Helsinki University of Technology (that later in 2010 became Aalto University as many big universities were combined). They actually come up with several games. Angry Birds is actually their 52nd game when it gets released back in December of the year 2009.

Angry Birds is a game that anyone can play. It might be a casual game. The developers wanted to make the game as easy to get into as possible. Then they achieved something with the game-play that had the players hooked. Angry Birds is a very popular game. It made into a worldwide pop culture icon. This was seen when there were huge collaborations with NASA and Lucasfilms Star Wars. There was eventually a movie and many other products that featured Angry Birds bird character. One popular product was a red pillow that featured the bird character of the game. Finally, in 2023, Sega acquired Rovio with a deal of 1 billion dollars.

I read the book. I liked it. With all this about a great Finnish game I have to be honest and tell you that I have never played any of Angry Birds games. I am not a huge fan. That goes to all mobile games for me. But if considered that there is a book written about a Finnish mobile game development company I might pick a book like that and just read it. I did like the book. I can recommend it to you if you are into startup companies and if you maybe want to try something like this by yourself also.

I found this book from this huge book store in Helsinki. I don’t want to advertise the place but it is my favorite book store since it has such a large selection of books to choose from. As I bought this book I also picked a book about this food delivery company Wolt and another book that was about artificial intelligence. The Slingshot Formula does cost 25 euros. It is written in English and that is the language that my copy also has been written in. It’s nice to have some language skills, isn’t it? You could probably seek it from a library if you are into borrowing books. There might also be a possibility to read this book as an electric copy.

The book is somewhat lengthy. It has a bit over 300 pages. Pascal Clarysse describes the main characters in the book with a nice detail and shares soem knowledge about different roles that these people had with Rovio and Angry Birds. There were many professionals involved from graphics design and programming all the way to musicians and also some financial specialists that made this phenomenon of the icon of Angry Birds as successful as could have been possible. Angry Birds are today known in all corners of the planet Earth and even beyond it. They actually did send an Angry Birds themed pillow into a NASA space station. Today Angry Birds is a very well-known brand and an icon.

Another Game Finished (Forza Horizon 3)

Posted on by Viljami

I have now finished another game, Forza Horizon 3, for this year (2026). I have already posted about this game earlier as I was telling you how I purchased it from a flea market for maybe three euros or something like that. I wanted to play this racing game for a reason or another. I think it’s nice to play a game that you were at least somewhat excited about when you bough it. I did notice that there is going to be another game released in this series this year. This game is Forza Horizon 6 and it will be available on May 19th this year.

“What was Forza Horizon 3 like to play?” one might ask. It is a racing game but it also has many other kinds of features that make it very diverse as a video game. It was released as an exclusive for Xbox. You basically get to explore huge amount of tasks that differ from a racing competition, finding and breaking different plagues that give you experience points and other rewards to strictly exploring the huge map and driving around discovering different places and roads. So, there is racing but with lots of other stuff to do also. The game basically doesn’t have an age limit. It is recommended for people older or as old as three years. There isn’t violence in this game. It might be a good choice for some younger audience also as a video game.

It did take me a bit over 16 hours to finish Forza Horizon 3. It was estimated, by “How Long To Beat” website, that it would take 17 hours to finish the game. There is still plenty of content to play in the game also after winning the final event against an airship. It is a bit tempting for me to keep playing this game but I think I’ll skip this and start getting ready for the next Forza Horizon game (Forza Horizon 6).

Thank you, again, my dear readers, for keeping reading this blog! I haven’t been writing too many blog posts this year but just hang in there because I think that I still have a lot to say and to write about. I have been busy playing and trying to finish some more games. I am also happy that the visitor counter tells me that there have been almost 200 000 visitors here on this website and on this blog.

There are also plenty of things waiting to get released soon. I am waiting for Resident Evil 9. We are going to see also Valve’s gaming console or computer or what ever it can be described as, to get a release soon. Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade was already launched for Nintendo Switch 2. I still have loads of games in my backlog and I have made also some recent purchases. I just have to concentrate and try to finish the next game.

The next game that I am going to soon start to play is Clair Obscur – Expedition 33. I have already installed it on my Xbox Series X. I bought, this time, the physical copy of this game. I got it for a cheap price of just some euros under 40 euros. The game has received lots of good reviews and it has received some awards also. There was some debate on if there was some artificial intelligence used while developing this game. I don’t know if this matters at all when you think about the game and its overall feel as entertainment.

There are many games getting released this year. I think that we aren’t going to see the next PlayStation console, PS6, yet, this year. Still there is something to wait for. PS5 still has some very good games to get into. We are going to see, soon, how Xbox is playing it cards in this game this year. I think it’s going to be an exciting year as the year is, right now, 2026 already. Think that for a second or two!

First Finished Game of This Year (Uncharted 4)

Posted on by Viljami

Uncharted 4 is now the first game that I have finished in the year 2026. It is actually a PlayStation exclusive. It was first released in 2016. I have to say that it still looks very nice. I especially enjoyed the scenery and some effects and use of light in this games graphical content. It took me a bit over 16 hours to complete. I didn’t play this came so intensely and it took me about three weeks to finish this game. The game was developed by Naughty Dog that you might remember making some Crash Bandicoot games for PS1 in the 90s. You might also remember this game studio from titles like Jak series for PS2 and The Last of Us series for some more modern gaming consoles.

What do I have to say about Uncharted 4 after finishing it? You cannot say that this game would be a very easy one. Some parts of it are difficult. At times it seems to be some kind of a wall climbing simulator. It might be hard to find the path to follow to advance in the game. There is some shooting elements. You do have a good selection of shooting weapons. Also you get to think about some stealth attacking tactics. Sometimes it is easier to take out an enemy or two silently so you don’t alarm all of them. You get to shoot with weapons like rocket launcher and sniper rifle and of course there does exist these mandatory shooting weapons like a hand gun and an assault rifle. There is plenty of shooting weapons to choose from.

Also the story of this game keeps you hooked to the game all the way to the ending. The characters are detailed very nicely and their relationships to each other are described entertainingly. You can also see some scenes of Crash Bandicoot in a form of a mini game as different characters play Crash Bandicoot on a PS1 during the game.

I am not a huge fan of Uncharted series. Uncharted 4 was still a nice game to finish. I picked it up because it was available for a cheap price of around 10 to 15 euros as a used copy for my PS4. This is also actually the first game of the series that I have completed. I think Naughty Dog made a good game back in 2016 and it was very enjoyable.

This was actually also the first game that I finished from the pile of PS4 games that I did write a blog post about last month. I have to once again be very honest and tell you that I am not going to try to finish all of these PS4 games. I think my focus has changed a bit from what I had earlier in my mind. I have bought many new games and once again I am in a situation that I have lots of games that I would like to play. These games include Silent Hill f, Metroid Prime 4, Killing Floor III, Shinobi – Art of Vengeance and even some more games that are piled somewhere in my collection of video games that are waiting to get played.

So, this blog post was mostly about how I have started my gaming year. It has been over three weeks since posted last time. It was time for a new post. I hope you all (my readers) have a very nice year. There are many games going to be released soon that I am waiting to get to play. Now I am going to concentrate on playing some Shinobi since I already spent an hour playing it today. I bought it for my Xbox Series X for 30 euros as a digital copy.