Angry Birds Journey

Angry Birds Journey, a puzzle game from Rovio Entertainment, came out in 2022 as the nineteenth main game in the Angry Birds series. It keeps the familiar slingshot mechanic from earlier entries, where players fling birds at structures to hit targets. The story involves a group of birds hunting for the Egg Wonders, powerful egg-shaped objects, and trying to activate them before the green pigs can.

The game launched globally on app stores on January 20, 2022, after a lengthy soft-launch period. Critical response has been mixed.

In terms of gameplay, Journey uses the same slingshot-based puzzles seen in previous Angry Birds games from seven years earlier. Birds become available gradually as players progress. New features include a rating system that gives only one star per level instead of the usual three, and new objects like jelly blocks. Players have a limited amount of time to play levels, but can earn extra time by completing them. Finishing levels also unlocks story elements and in-game currency. When play time runs out, players must buy more with either in-game or real money.

Lead designer Sandro Kvlividze said the goal was to return to Rovio’s roots while making the game more accessible than any earlier installment. Development started in 2019, with the first prototype finished by March of that year. In March 2020, the game soft-launched as *Angry Birds Casual* in select regions. Nine months later, in January 2021, it soft-launched again under its current name. The worldwide release on the App Store and Google Play followed on January 20, 2022.

Reviews have been mixed. Gavin Sheehan of Bleeding Cool called it a reworked, streamlined modern *Angry Birds* experience, perfect as a casual pick-up-and-play puzzle game. Charlie Wacholz of Android Central criticized the microtransactions, saying the game follows a pattern similar to *Candy Crush* and described the overall experience as “unnecessarily unpleasant.”