Wooga surpasses Playdom, PopCap to become number four studio

Who saw this one coming? No one, that's who. Wooga announced on its company blog that it is officially the fourth most popular social game studio in the world, according to AppData. At 20.4 million monthly players, the Berlin-based developer is now more popular than both Playdom and PopCap of Social City and Bejeweled Blitz fame, respectively. And Wooga, who recently released a social puzzler called Diamond Dash, isn't stopping anytime soon.

"Capturing 20 million active Users in just 20 months and surpassing Playdom to become number four in the world is a stunning accomplishment," said Jens Begemann, Wooga founder & CEO. "We will remain focused on producing high quality games with a unique game experience for the future. With our ambitious team, we aim to become number two by the end of this year."

To add insult to injury put things into perspective, Wooga went to mention that it has just 70 employees compared to Playdom's 300 plus, not to mention that its owned by Disney. A little cocky, and rightfully so, Wooga is quickly becoming a powerful force in the social gaming industry. What's even more exciting is to see how PopCap and Playdom will respond. As the competition comes to a head, it's only a matter of time before one of these developers truly disrupts Zynga's choke hold on the market.

[Image Credit: Wooga]

Are you a fan of Wooga's games on Facebook? Do you think the company can take the number two spot by the end of 2011?

Rovio: Angry Birds will take the Super Mario route in future games

Oh, Angry Birds, the places you'll go. The oft-outspoken CMO (and Mighty Eagle) of Rovio, Peter Vesterbacka, recently dropped details on the future of its flagship Angry Birds franchise, saying that the characters will do more than just crash into things. In fact, Vesterbacka seems to think that the famous avian projectiles will be syndicated across game genres.

"When Mario drives a car, it becomes Mario Kart," Vesterbacka said during a panel talk at Nokia World, according to Pocket Gamer. "When Mario flies to space it's Mario Galaxy. Our birds will do things, and go to unexpected places." The CMO went on to his often lofty comparisons between Finnish Rovio and American entertainment powerhouses like Disney and Nintendo.

Of course, that includes immense advertising and marketing through a plethora of Angry Birds products. "We have a movie planned. Hopefully we will do a bit better than the Super Mario movie," Vesterbacka joked. In this regard, Rovio doesn't even see itself as a game company, but again, an entertainment business in vein of Disney. Though, in order to do that, Rovio will have to diversify.

Pocket Gamer reports that Vesterbacka expects Rovio to create new characters in the Angry Birds franchise. While Vesterbacka mentioned the idea directly, it's easy to see that the Finnish company is already headed in the direction. With the Halloween update to Angry Birds Seasons, a new bird was released to the game, and it's likely just the beginning. We're still waiting to see whether Angry Birds can hang for another two years in time for its big screen debut and $1 billion initial public offering.

[Image Credit: Pocket Gamer]

Do you think that Rovio can continue to extend Angry Birds for much longer? What type of game would you like to see Angry Birds become next?