Angry Internet Birds

I know how this works. I'm going to mention Angry Birds and you're going to say how much you despise it and how games x, y, z and xyz are much better. Fine, got it, understand, you don't need to tell me after all. I'm going to mention it anyway, because it's vaguely surprisingly to hear that the weirdly sterile iOS catapult game has turned up on PC.

It's via Intel's AppUp Center wotsit, which is basically the iPhone App Store but for PCs (it'll work on any Windows machine but is really geared towards netbooks and lower-end hardware). And with far more frightening prices, it appears. Angry Birds, for example: free on Android, 99 cents on iPhone, $5 on PC? Pfft. This is a little like saying this nice green hat costs $7, but if you want it in orange it's $28.

I'm not prepared to pay that, so clearly I haven't tried the PC version of the game, but its mobile ubiquity means I've got a pretty damned good idea of what it's like.

Curious to see AppUp stepping up to high profile titles, though. I remain convinced we're due to see a whole glut of such stores - there's Google's take on the digital games store too, though apparently customer numbers aren't exactly sky-high there.

Anyway, Angry Birds. It's not to my taste – give me Crush The Castle instead any day – but there's probably a reason it's been such a frightening success in phoneland. If you want to lure your significant other/dubious relative into PC gaming, perhaps this could be an effective start.

It's still the blandest game in the whole wide world, though. Oh God, I've joined in, haven't I?