• by Mark Walsh  @markfwal, September 14, 2011

The Walt Disney Co. bought popular kids' site Club Penguin in 2007 for $350 million to help build up its portfolio of Internet entertainment properties. Disney has since extended the franchise, built around a penguin-populated virtual world, to toys, books, console game systems and other media.  

But until now, Disney had not introduced an application to extend the Club Penguin franchise to mobile devices. On Thursday, the company rolled out "Puffle Launch,"   a mini game it introduced within the virtual world last year and is now played by 150,000 kids. (Puffles are the penguins' pets.)

Launching on Apple's iOS platform, the app sells for 99 cents in the App Store and allows players to blast Puffles from a cannon through a series of gaming challenges with 24 levels. Users can also earn virtual coins that transfer to their Club Penguin accounts. Could it be the next "Angry Birds?"

Even if Puffle Launch doesn't become a gaming phenomenon, the built-in audience for the game should give it a good start. "Despite the vast number of apps for kids, Club Penguin has a huge advantage to gaining traction in the App Store because of the massive number of Puffle fans," noted Lilly Gold, co-founder of IntuApps, a NY-based app developer.

The Puffle game is expected to be the first of more Club Penguin-related apps to come. While Disney has not disclosed the number of registered Club Penguin members, recent Web traffic figures suggest the site is no longer enjoying steep growth. Clubpenguin.com had 5 million unique visitors in August, down 19% from 6.2 million in the year-earlier period.

To the extent that mobile can help broaden interest in the property, it could help offset a declining online audience. Last year, Disney acquired Tapulous, maker of the "Tap Tap Revenge" games, to bolster its app development efforts.