Angry Birds Trilogy preview Leaping out of phones and onto a TV near you

We recently had a chance to go hands-on with the console version of the Angry Birds Trilogy, which plays just like the Angry Birds you’ve already put a few hundred hours into with its iPhone or iPad incarnations. You pull back on the slingshot with the analog stick (or circle pad, if you’re playing on the 3DS), fire with a button, and then watch as the pig-built tower collapses, leaving smashed pork, splintered wood, and ruffled feathers in its wake.

And then you'll do it again and again and again and again.

But though it plays almost exactly like the Angry Birds of old, this new version sports enhanced visuals and plenty of bells and whistles. HD graphics and fully animated cutscenes bring the birds’ strange world to life, adding additional personality to the avian projectiles. The backgrounds have also been enhanced and redone to take advantage of the bolstered 1080p resolution. Flung birds scatter dandelion seeds as they pass overhead, creating beautiful environmental details that wouldn’t have been possible on the small iPhone screen (or all that noticeable on the iPad).

Though many have taken issue with this re-release based on the ($39 for console, $29 for handheld) price, we were surprised to see how much content would be included in the console release. Angry Birds, Angry Birds Seasons, and Angry Birds: Rio are all on one disk, providing over 700 levels to choose from – including several made specifically for the Trilogy. The bonus levels we saw were absolutely huge, and would’ve been nearly impossible on anything besides a TV.

Also added to the formula is a revised Mighty Eagle, who now actually smashes through the level, destroying everything in its path. This adds another element to the game: a golden feather gauge that can be filled up depending on how much damage the eagle inflicts, meaning there’s even more to do besides scrambling towards getting three stars in each of the game’s hundreds of levels. Oh, and there are leaderboards, so you can compete with your friends in hopes of demolishing their Angry Birds scores.

Kinect controls will be available, too, just in case you’re interested in changing things up even more, but we didn’t have a chance to actually try them for ourselves. That said, we’re pretty sure we’re going to enjoy using a controller more than flailing around our living room, desperately attempting to launch our bird with perfect precision.

We were skeptical at first, but by combining three games and including all of their DLC, Rovio has bundled together enough content to make the Angry Birds Trilogy something worth paying attention to, even if it is just Angry Birds on something other than your Apple product.