- Words from the Devs: Flight Preparations - 10 September 2026
Hi Birds!We're swooping in on the final stretch. After two years of working on Sparrow Warfare we're closing in on releasing this game into the wild. There's still much to do in our final months of work. So this post will give a short update on what we will add to the game's release version.Unlocking TilesWe have separated the challenges of progression from the unlocks in order to give you meta-progression as befits a roguelite. There are 15 packs of 3 tiles that are unlocked by meeting challenges. The challenges they are associated with range from beating the game 7 times to setting off a ton of bombs in one run. The idea is that you have to make use of all available synergies to unlock even more possibilities.Progression ModeEnemies get tougher and their number increases as you progress through the game. New tiles you unlock help you to face tougher challenges that you reach by beatin…
- Patch Notes, v0.4.68 - 20 July 2026
New featuresLevel Loader improvements — much faster loading & preview which enemies you'll face in the next level; normal and enemy tiles now shown on the loading screenSteam Deck support — icons now display correctly, gamepad presence is properly detected, and controls have been mapped for the DeckNew tutorial flow — arrow navigation is disabled on first viewing, and followers are randomly highlighted until the player clicks oneVisual ChangesOutlines and font for and health labels and telegraphing enlarged for better readabilityWildtiles now use a rainbow cycling top color so they read as visually distinct from basic tilesTiles are now larger in presentation spreadFixes & PolishFixed controller End Turn button not resetting when releasedFixed gamepad selection not working when picking tiles from hand to upgradeFixed enemy row sorting animation timingFixed incorrect level number display…
- Patch Notes, v0.4.55 - 29 June 2026
Patch notes, v0.4.55New featuresNew unlock progression system — Some tiles need you to meet goals to become available. Stats are now tracked correctly and synced to Steam.Gameplay changesChoir now grants defence instead of song.Boss rewards now fully heal your sparrow.The NONE option has been removed from the reward tile picker.Propaganda modifier gives you a Swooperoni tile at the startMany nasty combinations of modifiers have been disabledFixes & polishSnipe now correctly updates the bird counter.Wingman Maxim's name has been shortened.Harbinger and Buzz Ardrin have been visually distinguished so they're easier to tell apart when shown side by side.Save data is now erased at the end of a run (when you shouldn't be able to load again anyway).The character select and level select menus now use a horizontal scroll style. Sparrows and tiles sit lower on screen to keep the visual focus on…
- Patch Notes, v0.4.52 - 15 June 2026
4 new modifiers and a ton of animations are the prime features of this update. Enjoy! New featuresNew modifier: Propaganda — one random follower is returned at the end of each roundNew modifier: Stuck in the Mud — discarding is disabledNew modifier: No Dice — rare card probability is halvedNew modifier: Bling — start with 5 random status tiles in your deckSavegame and profile versioning addedController support — left stick up triggers the draw pile, B ends the current turnGameplay changesTutorial titles no longer show the "1/5" step numbering"Dreaming" mechanic reformulatedEar Worm now includes Alarm(ing) information"One Shot" renamed — dash removedVisual fixes & polishFollower spawns slightly earlier so it briefly appears in front of the tile it emerges fromTiles in the action spread now animate slightly while activeTiles in the action spread made largerDark explosion-like particles ad…
- Patch Notes, v0.4.46 - 27 May 2026
This patch took half a week longer than usual because I kept finding bugs when testing the build. Sorry about the delay and we will be back to more regular updates shortly.Yes I couldn't not implement new tiles so here we are: 6 new tiles, mostly for deck management. There is also game saving (and loading) for the first time – but only in the beta branch (join our Discord to sign up for it): If you quit, you should be able to continue next time you drop by. And finally there's very experimental native Steam Deck support as well as general controller support.Also here's Joe Baxter-Webb first being a little bit confused, then for a brief phase critical and finally getting completely immersed in Sparrow Warfare and forgetting to even talk to chat:New featuresSix new tiles added Phalanx (Phoenix) — attacks for the number of tiles currently in your draw pile. Fluff Up — shuffles your discard…
- Music: Soundtrack composed by Emil Smith! - 13 May 2026
Serendipity brought us to the perfect musician! We didn't even know how much of a difference it would make to have great music until we met Emil Smith. Emil has been wonderful to work with, and he has crafted 7 pieces of music that represent the different levels in the game. Each track also has an "intensity layer" that kicks in for the boss fights.Here you can see him at work with local jazz musicians making the soundtrack!It has been so fun receiving the tracks over the last few months, and bringing them into our game. You can hear 4 of the tracks already in our live demo: the Sparrow Warfare theme, and the music for the Garden, Mountain, and Jungle levels. Take a listen!The full soundtrack will be available along with the release of the game later this year.
- Patch Notes, v0.4.38 - 11 May 2026
This build has more changes under the hood than meets the eye. We've tuned gameplay a tiny bit but the focus the last 2 weeks was on getting controller support working to prepare for SteamDeck support. It's still a bit rough but the full game is playable with controller now. Gameplay changesRenamed Oversight to DreamingMake Applause aromaticBetter invincibilityNew featuresEnabled Steam CloudAdded controller supportAdded new music tracksBetter pause overlay managementSplit attack into attack + damage taken, each with their own text popupsTiles like Worldwide now show total damage dealt, not just remaining HP on the targetChange background when boss is awakeTile text now updates correctly on language changeBug fixesFixed: Weaken could not be removed from an enemy that no longer existedFixed: Snipe crashed the game when only two tiles remained in the draw pileFixed: "Slot hog" was missing…
- Development Roadmap Part II - 6 May 2026
We will finish this game by Q4 2026 and until then there's a lot to do. It's interesting to make a full game as a team of two because you can experience how your focus shifts between the areas that require the most attention over the duration of the project. It all starts out with design, finding the backstory, making a technical framework and deciding on a visual language. And then gradually over the course of the project the design job becomes "editing" (nerfing, balancing) and the programming job becomes "bug fixing". The writing job is also more concerned with creating clarity and coherence more and more instead of coming up with new lines. And you end up spending loads of time with marketing. That's where we are by now: in the phase of the project where the cornerstones are in place but we still need to make everything much better.While we have a complete design for the game and th…
- Deckbuilders Fest - Come Join The Party! - 4 May 2026
Sparrow Warfare is featured in Steam's Deckbuilder Fest this week! Have you tried it out yet? Our demo is sitting at 100% positive reviews with a strong median playtime, and now it’s even better with brand new music by the wonderful composer Emil Smith.Come check it out & let us know what you think - we love to chat all things strategy! ːsteamthumbsupː
- Patch Notes, v0.4.37 - 24 April 2026
This is easily the biggest update to the demo since we launched. It adds a whole new subsystem for building your little tile-powered engine: discarding for profit. We were looking for ways to encourage discarding tiles for a while and now we've finally found a good one: adding status tiles that sit in your hand until you find a way to remove them. And while they're sitting there (or when finally discarded) they have an active effect. For example they might heal you at the end of the turn.In order to make the game more approachable we're also kicking off things by showing you the intro and then dropping you into the tutorial now. This only happens for new players.Finally we've updated the look of the tiles to look more physical (to have more depth) and we've fixed a ton of small bugs.New wildtiles:Lullaby: Playing a Song hand weakens a random enemy.Peel: Remove all opponent shields.Recaw…
- Patch Notes, Demo Version 0.4.33 - 13 April 2026
Patch notes, v0.4.33, 2026-04-02 Making history: we've added your "run history" to the menu so you can bath in former glory. It's still very work in progress but better than all the runs being lost in time like tears in the rain. You find the button in the bottom left corner in the start menu.The rest of the fixes and enhancements should just make the game nicer and let it run more stable. Especially summing up all enemy attacks for you is a much requested feature.Gameplay changes: Added an attack amount preview to end turn buttonTiles are discarded before the enemy turn now (order is now discard > buffs > enemies > draw)Better boss animation when beatenAdded a run history that allows you to browser past runsIntro looks less unfinished nowMuch better sound mixing and volumes are actually taken into accountNew buff arrangement under birds to prevent overlappingLots of small loca fixes to…
- Patch notes, demo-0.4.31 - 25 March 2026
First patch of the demo and this time around we focussed on some graphical overhauls but also added 2 new tiles (Hightail and Lame Duck) that open up for new playstyles because they allow you to shoo birds into the discard pile or back into the draw pile respectively. We hope you like the new open skies and more than anything the new music by our fantastic composer Emil Smith.Oh and we have a first version of a new intro!We've also fixed all bugs that came in in the first week of the demo and now our backlog is quite short. Next week and this one, we focus on level 4 art, music and sound mixing, animations and the Way of Water. Details about our future release schedule is in our Development Roadmap that we posted earlier today.Enjoy the flight!MartinGameplay changes:Play button shows sum of attack and suitAdded Hightail and Lame Duck tiles for shooing opponents into pilesPump-A-Rum now…
- Development Roadmap Part I - 25 March 2026
Now that our demo has been out for two weeks it's time to lay out how we will go about openly developing this game.There are three versions of the game that we will be working with: the main game, the demo, and the playtest builds. The main game will be launched later this year and the launch version will at least contain 3 ways, daily runs and a progression mode. The demo is actually also split in two versions: beta and public.Here is what will be released to whom and when:Playtest Builds will be used to sporadically test big changes. They run completely independent from other versions using their own daily run seeds, leaderboards, and save folders. Only our existing playtesters have access to this version but we will accept new signups at some point in the future. Join our Discord to learn about that.Demos (beta) is where the next demo build goes before being published. This build is…
- Games from Ireland: "Sparrow Warfare" is one of them! - 13 March 2026
Exciting news for us! Today is the start of the "Games from Ireland" Steam event, and we're part of it with 50% of our 2-peron team being Irish! If you'd be curious about Ireland, you might like to learn a few bird names in Irish! So here are the names of a few of our Level 1 birds as Gaeilge (in Irish):blackbird = lon dubhowl = ulchabhánrobin = spideogchicken = sicíncuckoo = cuachcrow = préachánmagpie = snag breacAnd a small message from my Mom Gráinne (who has much better Gaeilge than I do!):"Dea-scéal: tá an cluiche Sparrow Warfare ar fáil anois duit le himirt inniu agus sna laethanta amach romhainn. Bain taitneamh agus spraoi as!"Check out all the wonderful games as part of the event here from 6pm CET:https://store.steampowered.com/sale/GamesfromIreland2026
- Patch notes, demo-0.4.29 - 11 March 2026
A lot of convenience comes with this update, especially for easing in new players. There's also a new modifier that was proposed by the community and is hilariously nasty. Gameplay changes:Add Misery modifier proposed (discard a random tile when you discard a tile)The “fully heal” tile now also removes burningBugfixes:Cleaned up the start menu a bit and new players get a Tutorial buttonMade the help overlay more conciseFix bug where playing X-2-4 doesn’t sort the wildtile in correctlyBetter hint texts and cleaned up help screenButtons in reward screen correctly disabled nowBadge for innate card now workingPlay button helps you a bit with summing up the tile valuesChange colour of healing telegraphing to distinguish it from attackNew skip button in introAdd to tutorial window to show previous tipsMake boss hint box smaller so that question mark doesn’t show up below end turn buttonUnstre…
- The DEMO is out now! - 6 March 2026
Yes, the time is HERE and the place is NOW! The Sparrow Warfare demo is now live and ready for your enjoyment. The demo version contains a tutorial, two different playstyles of the base game (Way of Fire and Way of Song), and also has Daily Flights: fresh daily challenges with 30+ unique modifiers and global leaderboards.You can see some examples of play here, and we’ve got a truly lovely Discord community if you’d like to drop by and say hello!
- New playtest, new wiki, new wildtiles... oh my! - 9 January 2026
It's a great start to the new year here, as we've brought out our third playtest build - and this one is bigger and better than any before! We've got daily flights with a leaderboard, in addition to a tutorial mode, and a good chunk of the base game across both the Way of Fire and the Way of Song. It's free for all to access right from the main page - tell your friends!We've also got a brand new wiki kindly hosted by wiki.gg - made by Char and a bunch of our amazing playtesters, you can find it here.And, of course, what kind of new playtest would it be if we weren't adding in more and more wildtiles?! Martin has been outdoing himself over the last 2 days, and we've got 5 new wildtiles in this current build - come on in and try them out!We've also been hard at work fixing the bugs reported from our wonderfully diligent community (we love you guys!). Here's the latest changelog from the l…
- BIG announcement dropping on December 31st! - 24 December 2025
We've got some big news... and we're trying to keep it a secret for just a few more days! As part of Cringer's annual awards show - "The Cringeys" - over on Twitch, we'll have a special announcement. Tune in on December 31st to be the first to know!And until then, we wish you a wonderful happy holidays! ːsteamhappyː
- Daily Flights - Tips & tricks for having a great flight! - 19 November 2025
We're having way too much fun with this playtest, and we're not alone! The daily leaderboard is filling up each day with competitors. If you want some pointers on what to do (or what not to do in several cases!), you might like to check out our YouTube channel, where we're posting our daily attempts!We're taking it in turns, so each day you'll see either Martin or Char flying through the Garden, the Mountain, and the Jungle!
- A new era: daily flights are here! - 12 November 2025
Hot news, sparrows! Our Playtest #2 is out now, and you can play it for the next few weeks - just click on the green playtest button on the main store page. We're introducing Daily Flights: a new mode with a unique combo of modifiers each day offering fresh challenges and global leaderboards. We also have a short tutorial level to help new players get flying fast. What are you waiting for?!If you want to see how it works before diving in, you can check out our YouTube daily flight playthroughs here:
