Temple Run 2 has stormed into the record books, becoming the fastest growing mobile game of all time after clocking up 50 million downloads in just 13 days. The previous holder of the record was Angry Birds Spaced, which needed 35 days to reach the same milestone.
The magnitude of Temple Run 2’s success in such a short space of time hasn’t been lost on Keith Shepherd, co-founder of Imangi, the company behind the game. “Temple Run has evolved into something so much bigger than us,” Shepherd said in a release on Thursday. “The game has performed beyond our wildest dreams, and we are thrilled that gamers and fans have embraced Temple Run 2 in such a short period of time.”
The free game hit the iOS app store first, racing to the top of the iTunes chart last week within eight hours of its release. Within 24 hours it had chalked up an impressive six million downloads and after only four days the company was celebrating 20 million downloads.
A week after landing on iOS, Android users had a chance to load it up on their devices, helping it to sprint to its record-breaking 50 million download figure this week.
The addictive game requires you to build up points by running….endlessly. Lots of jumping and sliding while collecting gold coins along the way is also involved, and with the sequel you can swing on a rope and ride in a mine cart, too.
Just as with Angry Birds and all the merchandise it spawned, those who find themselves completely consumed by the game can now fill their lives with Temple Run comics, board games, shirts, mugs, water bottles and more. Last year Imangi’s original Temple Run game caught the attention of Disney/Pixar, with the companies teaming up to launch Temple Run: Brave, a 99-cent spinoff game involving, you guessed it, a whole load more running, jumping and sliding.
All of Imangi’s offerings are the work of a three-person team comprising Keith, his wife Natalia Luckyanova and artist Kiril Tchangov. The company started out in 2008 and is currently based in Washington DC.
