Suddenly Bird
Suddenly Bird is an interesting time capsule into how much Playdate games have changed in such a short amount of time. First, it was created as part of the monthlong Yellow Square Jam back in October 2023. The jam version was updated and expanded upon and it didn’t actually hit Catalog in its current, full version until August 2025. It’s not even available on Itch anymore, which is fine but I also find it interesting! Angel Pop was another game that was so expanded from the original concept that the developer also took the jam version off Itch (and it was also part of the Yellow Square Jam!), only leaving the complete artist’s vision version on Catalog.
Since it has been so long since it first released as a jam game, many of the games I get to compare Suddenly Bird to may have been inspired by it, actually, despite hitting Catalog before it. Except WarioWare. WarioWare was first.
Suddenly Bird is a side-scrolling platformer where you deliver packages along a 2D street full of jumps and other obstacles. It’s a bit like Top Binz!, where you’re picking up randomly dropped garbage and recycling bins left out in front of people’s houses, but instead of driving back and forth to find the random drops, the dispatcher at the bottom of the screen tells you what house you need to hit next to deliver your package (they’re in numerical order so easy to navigate to). The running and jumping (and the character sprite) reminded me of Scenic Route Software’s You’re Gonna Miss the Bus!, which somehow also originally released in October 2023 – what a prolific month for the Playdate! A key difference here, though, is that sometimes while you’re delivering packages, you’ll suddenly turn into a bird.
It’s temporary, though – you just have to do some “bird things” to change back to a human. This means a short, bird-related, WarioWare-esque minigame that you need to nail in one try while your level timer continues to tick down. There’s a lot of “nail it in one try” in this game. Each level, you have to deliver around 6-8 packages, and one missed jump, collision with an obstacle, or failed minigame and you’ll have to do the whole level over again. They’re not super long levels, but once you get to the stage with the eagles, you’ll learn to hate them as much as The Big Lebowski hates the Eagles. Nothing like delivering seven of eight packages before having to start all the way over. I definitely had to set the Playdate down a few times so I didn’t throw it at the wall. It’s not unfair, but each new world has a learning curve as you come to grips with its unique challenges.
The game is a pretty solid length, too – six worlds, each with their own silly theme, and each has eight levels. One thing it needs more of, though, is the bird-themed minigames. You’ll be playing these once or twice per stage as you suddenly transform into a bird, and there are only eight different minigames. With 48 levels, you’ll be playing the bird games about 100 times, and with only 8 different ones, you’ll repeat them a LOT. They’re short, but I’d really love to see a wider variety. The minigames are crank-based or use the microphone or the gyroscope, and no two are the same. I would totally play a twitchy game collection that’s JUST the minigames if there were more of them, kind of like a Rachel’s Game Pack but bird-based. The dodging minigame is the hardest, but once you figure out the trick, you can do the same movement pattern to avoid the obstacles each time like in Pac-Man.
There is a secret mode after you complete the main game, but I was just happy to beat the whole thing! There were some minor glitches like the achievements that pop up will occasionally show the text from the last achievement you got before, but no deal-breakers. It’s a tough platformer with a great sense of completion, and it might be exactly what you’re looking for on the Playdate right now.
(Jam version released October 29, 2023, on Itch as part of Yellow Square Jam – no longer available. Full game released August 19, 2025, on Catalog. Copy provided by developer.)