The new 2048 game is being called the Flappy Bird because scores of users are becoming addicted to playing it.
Both games are deceptively simple--except that they’re both extremely difficult to beat.
Gabriele Cirulli, the game’s creator, appears to recognize the way people are quickly getting obsessed, saying via Twitter “Just realized I am also my own productivity’s worst nightmare.”
The 19-year-old Italian said that he hasn’t even been able to beat the game, which is inspired by an app 1024! and another web game with the name 2048.
“I still haven’t managed to get anywhere close to a 1024 tile at my own game,” he said on Twitter. “I doubt I’ll ever beat it, which is ironic,”
The game presents players with a grid of 16 squares, two of them with the number 2.
Pressing keyboard arrow keys moves the squares around and causes new ones to pop up, something the Wall Street Journal said is “almost like Candy crush for math geeks.”
Developers have even taken the game, which is open source, and made a Flappy 2048 on Github.
Unlike Flappy Bird, Cirulli hasn’t made an app for his game, saying that he doesn’t want to monetize it like that. An app in the app store is not from Cirulli, he says.
“No, not planning on releasing an app on android,” he said on Twitter. “The idea is to keep strengthening http://git.io/2048 instead.”
The open source software has also inspired other versions, like a play on the popular Doge meme called doge2048.
