Bird by Example
What is Bird by Example?
Bird by Example is — and I say this with great passion — an RPG sandbox where all the occupying NPCs are grotesque birds who mimic your behavior with deep learning algorithms. Nothing is scripted! Everything is emergent! Be the bird you want to see in the world!
Steam has asked me to be more explicit with the game’s features:
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world
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objects
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jump
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crawl
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punch
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squawk
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bite
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physics objects
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other*
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stories??**
It’s an artificial intelligence sandbox acted out by birds with concerning musculature! Help them see, help them love, help them eat a big fat bug! Right now at this very second, the metaphysical bounds of this game hold a throng of hungry birds who wish nothing more than to be like you! Like Mama!
_*: Imprint psuedo-neurologically upon independent bird agents, using recurrent neural networks, gradient descent, and a custom-built system of semiotic metadata evocation (to afford transferrable behavior between distinct objects and agents which share characteristics along an n-dimensional space).
**: Isn’t life a story? Aren’t we all little stories, flying on this crazy rock?_
You said this was a game? Who’s Mama? I’m Mama? Who are you again?
Please pay attention. These birds are equipped with artificial neural networks that optimize themselves against your own actions! Using trendy deep learning algorithms found in a black box at the bottom of the sea, and something called ‘gradient descent’, they will try to become mathematically perfect distillations of you! It’s very computationally expensive and very math!
But what do you actually do?
Explore, follow self-imposed rules, and cultivate your flock! Tutor a bird to act just like you! By simply doing things, they will learn from you by witnessing your play! Bite an orange and you may start to see other birds doing similarly! Squawk at a another bird and watch your flock erupt into squawkage!
Oh! That’s interesting. So they have brains!?
Woah, strong word! Let’s avoid that word!
Have you ever played a game, and thought: “This is fun, but I live in such fear that I cannot enjoy it…”
Yes, I do live a life of fear! And thank you for blowing off my silly and ethically challenging question!
Yes, you do live in fear! You’re like any brain-wielding creature! But in Bird by Example there will be nothing to be afraid of! In bird world there is nothing to be afraid of! Nothing to be afraid of! Turn that brain off!
Okay. And the game is fun? It’s a game?
You must teach the rest of the birds basic life skills! If not, they will all starve to death!
Wait, you coded these birds to feel hungry but didn’t teach them how to eat?
That feature was out of scope! Please!!! Hungry!!!
Hold on… What’s a bird?
A bird is a fictional creature which came to me in a dream on a particularly cold night in February. I woke up in a sweat the next morning and quickly tried to recreate the apparition from memory. The results? Remarkable.
Earliest known footage of a “Bird” from that morning.
They were perfect. All they needed was a name.
The word ‘Bird’ is a mix of the word ‘word’ and the letter ‘b’ This is because I needed a word — or “wird” — to describe the birds. Sadly, a word using ‘a’ was already taken. It’s like gamertags!
I experimented for many weeks with flight, but no matter how much I stretched out their arms they would not.
Whatever. Doesn’t matter.
BOT.vinnik Chess: Opening Traps
Moves a bunch of pieces around the board very quickly without giving you much time to take in what is happening on the board, nor explaining why, tells you it’s a popular move (which one? all of them? black or white?). Then demands you “Find the BEST move!”. Well that depends doesn’t it? What am I trying to achieve? So I start moving what ‘I think’ is the best move. Nope, that was wrong and it doesn’t mind telling you in no uncertain terms. I try another. Wrong again! Only this time i’m being patronised. WTH?! Instead of berating me for getting it wrong, tell me what my objective is and explain why moving a certain piece is preferable over moving another. I might actually learn something useful within Chess and not what a waste of oxygen I am.
– Real player with 3.1 hrs in game
Cool game !
It is a great way to test your chess knowledge,
in my case it was a fun way to learn all the opening traps!
If you like chess this is a must have,
Very recommended!
– Real player with 2.1 hrs in game
Renditions of the Awakening
In active development since 2016, this is a first-person strategy game about summoning demons and toppling a civilization one castle at a time in order to re-live the story of the man who already did that. Gain the trust of that man - your jailor - by embellishing the details if you wish but the one thing you must do is become the new king while taking no lives with your own hands.
Some demons are stealthy; others not so much. Summon an army, manage them well and control the flow of information across the battlefield to catch Keeps and Castles unawares or poorly defended. But beware, the summoning process compels them to follow you around but that’s all - they still retain their own fickle personalities and will quit your service in the worst way possible if ever they stop having enough fun.
Godly Corp
What a great hidden gem!
A game where you play as a tentacle monster working in an office already promisses originality.
I was reluctant at first, not beeing an avid indie games player, but after playing it for a bit, it really grew on me.
The controls take a while to master, which is a good thing: the feeling of achievement after beating harder levels on hard difficulty is truly great!
The game isn’t very long, about 2 - 4 hours on average to play through all levels. It isn’t a bad thing though, because you can always keep trying to beat the previous high score or other players' scores on theglobal leaderboard.
– Real player with 11.9 hrs in game
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The Short of it: Not exactly my cup of tea in the long run, but I get why it’s popular. It can be funny, frustrating, and challenging. I think the humour is its best quality. It truly tests your multi-tasking limits.
Reminds me of: If you liked any of those surgeon simulator type games, you’ll probably like Godly Corp.
– Real player with 11.1 hrs in game
MY WOLF - Desktop Wild Pet
The game is passive, meaning it plays in the background on your desktop in negative space automatically. It adds a lot of fun to downtime staring at my desktop, that is now live with a virtual pet! He’s with me for all my research, my work, and when I sign off for the night. The wolf grows on me, as I follow them around endlessly through the fields.
A great virtual companion for PC users. Great for people who like classic or creative desktops or screensavers. Makes Windows desktop a game itself. I hope for more updates and content, I hope for custom wolves too.
– Real player with 1102.3 hrs in game
Surprisingly good and rather cute! This has the potential for a lot of promise.. No sound yet etc but it runs really well.. And now my wolf is getting older, he takes longer to stand up, can’t be bothered to chase the toys as much! He also learned to run from bears instead of try and fight, he can now defeat hostile wolves, got himself a playmate.. Even starts bugging me if i haven’t given him enough mouse pointer attention! It’s working across my weird three screen setup, not perfectly due to the FOV but that’s more my fault, as the main one is 4K and the others are 1080p.. But on a 1080 Ti its running rather well like that! For the cost and hopefully more development i’d recommend it! This has some great potential to be really interesting. Encountered the odd stuck bug but just restart it and its fine.. Be good if you could have more than one wolf though or an entire pack! :D An option to toggle slightly fancier graphics would be nice, maybe a ‘fix’ for people running weird screen setups? And as i type my wolf has done a poop and is now chasing off a hostile one! I need to stop watching it so much…
– Real player with 143.1 hrs in game
Death Squared
I freaking love this game. Writing a review partially because this game deserves an “overwhelmingly positive” and I’d like to help take it there. I’ve played with 4-5 people in the party mode for a dozen or so levels, and done half the main levels so far playin' with my dad. In terms of a puzzle game, yes, does the job, makes you think, then makes you think in a completely different way, very satisfying.
I think what most makes this game stand out for me is the fun in the actual death and failure, especially playing with someone else. Sometimes you get some deaths in just for fun and to see the animation and dialogue…and to annoy your partner, of course….
– Real player with 18.6 hrs in game
A simple idea well executed, a funny co-op puzzle experience.
Co-op puzzle
In Death Squared you must cooperatively solve puzzles. Each player has a cube-character that can only move, there is no other function. Each player has to move to their respective endpoint to solve the puzzle. Along the way you have to stand on switches to change the level, dodge lasers tied to one character, stand on each other’s head to serve as bridge, not die, and most importantly not kill the other! This is a typical game to just start playing! Play only co-op though. You can control two characters with a keyboard, so a perfect snuggle game! Although… it will most probably start a fight…
– Real player with 15.5 hrs in game
Do I smell Pizza?
Hilarious theme!!
The fat boy walking up and down with his food towers and vomiting on rats while dodging friendly fire brings a compelling twist to tower defense and adds a new layer of dynamism that can’t be found in the original genre.
Recommended!
– Real player with 14.6 hrs in game
“Chubby doesn’t share food”, even more, when it’s pizza! This game has so nice animations that make the character super fun. The towers are healthy or vegan food that attacks the enemy (chubby’s family?). You must kill the rats while the towers defend the path to the pizza.
It’s not an easy game, the first level itself is a challenge.
Cheap and fun!
– Real player with 4.0 hrs in game
PSweet
A very very interesting experience haha
– Real player with 37.9 hrs in game
buy if you want to feel sad
– Real player with 15.9 hrs in game
BOT.vinnik Chess: Late USSR Championships
Improve your chess knowledge and learn some history with commented puzzles out of anthological matches from the late USSR Chess Championships (1970s, and 80s)
■ Learn the theory behind the strategy
■ 150+ theory backed “best-move” chess puzzles
■ Famous matches organized by chess Masters in 16 chapters to elevate your knowledge
■ Made for chess enthusiasts by chess enthusiast
■ Have fun with BOT.vinnik’s peculiar sense of humor!
Kill It With Fire: HEATWAVE
This is my arachnophobia therapy… well, kinda. ;) Not a game for you if you love spiders or are a PETA member, everyone else should be able to get a good amount of enjoyment out of this.
One new level (including reworked versions of the two in Ignition), three new species (all of them nightmare fuel), and a couple more weapons - the pan rules, I hope we’ll be able to hit those jumping spiders out of the air with it. Maybe it’s already possible, I flinched every time to be honest.
Had this on my radar since the r/indiegaming post in (IIRC) Febuary, was already planning on buying this after playing Ignition, this was enough to ignore my “no pre-orders” rule.
– Real player with 2.7 hrs in game
I don’t know how to explain it, but this game was really awesome. You’re basically wandering around a house, finding and killing spiders. The spiders are also diverse, meaning there are actually multiple types. You can obtain several different type of ‘weapons’ to use, such as Clipboard, Revolver, Hair Spray & Lighter, Frying Pan, Shotgun. These aren’t the only items, and this doesn’t even include ‘Upgrades’ for them.
Throughout the game, you will have multiple objectives (written on the clipboard). I do have concerns of repetition and redundancy, however, each stage (before release) did have it’s own unique objectives. I’m definitely looking forward to this game’s release!
– Real player with 2.0 hrs in game