Oil slick: Feed Me Oil continues to keep Angry Birds from App Store summit

Chillingo’s iPhone physics puzzler Feed Me Oil remains in pole position on the App Store, holding off the ever-present challenge of Rovio’s Angry Birds.

While we admired the quality of the mobile giant’s World of Goo wannabe, presenting it with a healthy 7/10 score, it seemed unlikely to top the charts for more than a week, if that.

So what’s changed?

Well, it appears that Apple’s recently adjusted algorithm for App Store success - which prizes user activity over pure download figures - is having a noticeable effect on the charts.

With safe-cracking brainteaser The Heist making for another surprise number one in the Top Paid Apps a fortnight ago, could Angry Birds’s period of dominance be at an end?

Perhaps not, given that it remains in the top ten alongside Angry Birds Rio, whose most recent update – released yesterday - could well propel Rovio’s sales phenomenon back to the summit.

This is an interesting development, nevertheless, and a sign of encouragement for iOS developers that their new titles will stand a chance of cracking the charts, which in the past have been consistently dominated by the same old titles.