Fidgits

A gentle reaction game for children about feeding baby birds, adapted from an alphabet and keyboard tutor. Twenty-six fidgits, square little birds each wearing a letter from A to Z, sit on three branches under the night sky. One at a time a fidgit gets hungry, opens its beak and sings its own note. Fly the mother bird to it and press the button to feed it a worm before its patience runs out; the quicker the supper, the more it scores. Feed the wrong fidgit and it squawks, and the hungry one loses patience. A fidgit kept waiting too long is a missed supper, and three missed suppers end the game. Ten suppers make a round, and over eight rounds the fidgits grow less patient and sing sooner. Finish all eight to win.

Controls: The stick flies the mother bird from fidgit to fidgit: left and right along a branch, up and down to the nearest fidgit on the next branch (hold to repeat). Either button feeds. On the title, up and down choose and a button starts. Either controller works.

ColecoVision version credited in the source to Claude (an AI made by Anthropic) for Amy Studio, in Amy, the language by Amy Bienvenu, 2026: a reimagined adaptation of the published rules. From Ahoy! No. 20, August 1985, page 39: original Commodore 64 program by Walter E. Meyers. One of the programs described in Orson Scott Card's May 1985 column Creating Your Own Games on the VIC and 64. This is a modern homebrew adaptation, not a commercial Coleco release.