bird

Angry Birds Friends flocks to iOS and Android

Angry Birds Friends has hatched from Facebook into a full-fledged iOS and Android app.

Available as of Thursday at both Apple's App Store and Google Play, the free game offers a socially-network twist. You compete against your Facebook friends as you try to take down those bad piggies.

All the points you rack up by slinging those angry birds are compared with those of your Facebook friends to see who emerges the winner.

Angry Birds Friends offers new tournaments each Monday promising new challenges, daily rewards, and a chance to take home the gold trophy.

Your tournament gameplay automatically … Read more

New Angry Birds clone does a lot of things right, but lacks polish

Stay Alight! (iPhone|iPad) is a destruction game that is somewhat similar to Angry Birds, but in this game, you play as Mr. Bulb and it's your job to take out the monster microbes.

Instead of flinging objects like you would in Angry Birds, with this game you're shooting an energy projectile that bounces off walls. So to get the best trajectory and power, you'll need to both think about where your targets are and how the projectile will bounce through the level to hit as many monster microbes as possible. Like many games in this genre, … Read more

Mozilla Thunderbird for Mac Review

Working with multiple e-mail addresses and inboxes often requires a management client. Mozilla Thunderbird for Mac, despite its dated look, performs well as an open-source e-mail manager.

As an open-source project, this program is available as freeware with no restrictions or payments required. Download and installation occurred quickly and without any problems. After initial setup, which prompted us as to whether the program should be the default email client, Mozilla Thunderbird for Mac welcomed us with a well-designed main interface. Aesthetically, the graphics were dated and would have been appropriate for a program several years old, as opposed to a … Read more

Angry Birds creator Rovio says sales doubled last year

Who says the Angry Birds phenomenon is slowing down?

Gamers may be tiring out from the many iterations of the flying birds, but they continue to rake in the big bucks for Rovio.

The Finnish company said today that for calendar year 2012 it posted sales of 152 million euros ($194.8 million), or a little more than double its revenue from the preceding year. Its earnings before interest and taxes were 76.8 million euros ($98.4 million), up 64 percent from 2011.

The company was helped by the launch of four titles in the year: Angry Birds Space, … Read more

Grieving for Google Reader's death

CNET Update feeds your need:

Emotions are high over Google Reader shutting down July 1. Thousands have signed online petitions begging Google to reconsider closing the RSS feed reader. Digg announced it is working on a replacement for Google Reader, but if it doesn't come soon enough, here are some replacements you can try now.

Also in Thursday's tech news roundup:

- Facebook redesigns Timeline profile pages

- Twitter adds line breaks, gets hit with ugly stick

- Netflix connects with Facebook to share what you're watching

- Angry Birds cartoon launches onto TV this weekend

Watch … Read more

Angry Birds cartoon to fly onto games and TV this weekend

Angry Birds fans soon will be able to watch their favorite birds and piggies duke it out in a series of weekly cartoons.

"Angry Birds Toons" will take flight on broadcast TV this Saturday, as well as on all Angry Birds apps and certain video-on-demand services this Sunday, game maker Rovio said today. The series will feature 52 episodes, with a new one launched each week.

Comcast subscribers can catch "Angry Birds Toons" through Xfinity on Demand, the Xfinity Web site, or the Xfinity TV Player app. The animated adventures also will appear on TV networks … Read more

Original Angry Birds free for iPhone, iPad customers

The most popular mobile-gaming franchise in the world is now a bit easier for you to get your hands on.

Customers who head over to the App Store today will find that the iPhone and iPad versions of Angry Birds are available for free. Previously, the iPhone version was on sale for 99 cents. Angry Birds HD for the iPad was available for $2.99. Rovio previously offered free versions of the titles, but those were limited to only a few levels. Those now appear to be gone from the App Store.

Angry Birds was the game that kicked off … Read more

Match tiles in Angry Birds Adventure

The popularity of Angry Birds is almost stratospheric at this point, so rip-off games make sense. This non-Rovio-approved app puts some of your favorite birds in their least exciting adventure yet. When it works, Angry Birds Adventure has you match tiles with the characters to clear the board. Sadly, you'll be lucky to even make it through a single game as the app tends to crash.

This app only takes a few seconds to download to your phone as it's quite small in size. Once it's there, you won't see any opening sequence or tutorial, you'… Read more

'Angry Birds Toons' cartoon series to launch March 16

First it was stuffed animals, then T-shirts, and now it's a cartoon Web series -- the Angry Birds franchise just continues to grow.

Rovio announced today that the first episode of the weekly Angry Birds cartoon show, "Angry Birds Toons," is set to air on March 16. Viewers will be able to watch what is happening "deep in the heart of Piggy Island" and find out whether those merciless piggies ever get hold of the birds' eggs.

The game maker hinted at turning the wildly popular game into an animated series last April. In addition … Read more