A Unique Take on Animal Chaos
Good games often hide their emotional layers behind enjoyable gameplay, but the best ones let you be a little bit of a troublemaker while doing it. Bad Magpie, the debut game from London-based indie studio Milktooth, continues the tradition of players controlling animals causing minor chaos, similar to Untitled Goose Game. These are fun experiences that let you let loose and make life slightly worse for others. However, Bad Magpie has a thematic thread that connects to a very human experience.
The idea for Bad Magpie came from a place of sadness. One of the developers was going through heartbreak, while another had experienced a family loss. They wanted to create a game that wasn’t an allegory for grief but focused on the avoidance that comes from it—not facing up to an emotional truth.
The concept of a magpie, a corvid known for its playfulness and tool use, collecting shiny things to avoid abandonment was compelling for the team at Milktooth. There’s a saying in British folklore, “One for sorrow, two for joy,” which inspired the game’s narrative. The idea is what if a magpie had these weird attachment issues?
Gameplay and Visuals
Hours after Xbox’s trailer showcase during the Summer Game Fest 2026, I had the chance to try out about 15 minutes of Bad Magpie. This gave me a taste of the gameplay and a hint of the emotional beats to come.
The game starts on a quiet road leading to a schoolyard. The first task was to walk up to a rock and peck it until it caught fire, burning the grass around it and setting a log I picked up aflame so I could torch some path-blocking planks to enter a playground.
The game has a stylish look with a painterly aesthetic that matches the playful antics of the mischievous bird. It’s hard not to feel a bit fond of the varmint, as it looks so cute short-hopping around.
The goal in the demo was to collect colorful crystals hidden in trees and hard-to-reach places that required some light environmental puzzle-solving. Most often, this meant using vandalism or other tricks, such as breaking bottles or screaming at mice through a megaphone.
There were some delightful set pieces in the demo, like digitalizing the magpie to walk through several monitors, recovering the megaphone, and unrolling a giant piano pad that required dropping books on specific keys to play a particular chord. It’s lighthearted fun as the magpie is on a mission to collect crystals for a big, shiny star—a purpose that fills the void of abandonment if you’re paying attention.
Balancing delightful gameplay with emotional stakes is a tightrope to walk. Milktooth aimed to deliver this without being too heavy-handed about the serious themes. This is what sets them apart from many animal games. They pitched the game as Untitled Goose Game meets Shadow of the Colossus. According to Daisy Fernandez, design director at Milktooth, “Because yeah, menacing evil bird, but what if emotional stakes were underneath it?”
In this comparison, the star you’re collecting crystals for is the colossus. You collect shiny trinkets for the star and are immediately sent out to get another one, an interaction that feels increasingly shallow and sad. It’s a perfect distraction because it’s never satisfying.
“You’re trying to fulfill some kind of relationship or antisocial activity that never has a positive endpoint, but always makes you feel distracted in an avoidant way,” Fernandez said. “It’s the dawning sense of what you’re doing isn’t going somewhere good—there’s a kind of sadness that’s imbued in the menace.”
Emotional Depth and Player Experience
Since the game is nonlinear, the expectation is that as players collect more trinkets however they choose, the underlying themes will start to settle in. It’s a low-pressure way to convey a deeper humane experience that players might share with the calamity corvid they’ve been controlling.
“To just see someone have some sort of catharsis when they play it, and be surprised at the depth of it, to feel they recognize themselves and their avoidance in the bird, and see some sort of resolution that leaves them feeling less alone—that’s what I think they all are looking for,” Fernandez said.
Bad Magpie offers a unique blend of lighthearted gameplay and emotional depth, making it a standout title in the world of indie games. The game’s ability to balance fun with meaningful themes is a testament to the creativity and insight of the Milktooth team. As players explore the world of Bad Magpie, they may find themselves reflecting on their own experiences with avoidance and emotional struggles, all while enjoying the charming antics of a mischievous magpie.