Chirp

Although animals do not seem able to discriminate against their own kind for things like color or body shape, survival comes before everything else, which is why compassion is not always present either. Hence, you’ll often see bird chicks fight and kill each other in order to remain an only child and receive more food from their parents.

Chirp is a platformer in which you have to help a poor chick find a purpose for his life away from his family. The game focuses on tough gameplay mechanics that force you to replay the same sections multiple times, although there are also a few simple puzzles you have to tackle every now and again. However, the most difficult thing of all is gliding to avoid deadly traps.

As such, the story is obviously not very important, but it’s very nicely told and quite interesting. It all starts when the duckling is mocked by its siblings and decides to run away, although the world out there is quite unforgiving. The duckling meets a variety of other creatures of the forest along the way, most of which provide it with valuable advice on how to survive.

The main gameplay gimmick is the “flight” ability, which is actually a succession of three quick jumps. The faster you tap the jump button, the higher the chick gets, which allows it to glide over long distances. Sometimes, it’s not enough to jump very high, on the other hand, because it’s also important to be aware of your surroundings. Hence, you might hit your head on something by jumping too high, which is not desirable.

The graphics are not bad either, but you need to be a fan of the retro current in order to enjoy the pixelated environments and everything else that comes with the territory. It must be said that the landscapes can become repetitive after a while, especially since nothing really changes in the background. Thankfully you’ll be too busy trying to avoid the traps to notice this most of the time.

Chirp is not far away from Flappy Bird when it comes to frustration levels, but it’s definitely more polished and much more engaging. It also features a pretty touching story.