About this game
Fetchmead is a bird game. You stand in a meadow and birds fly over. You have a net on a hoop, and you throw it. The net takes about a second to get there. So you throw it at where the bird is going to be, not where it is. That is the whole skill.
Everything you throw lands in the grass. Your dog runs out and brings it back: the bird, if you caught one, and the net either way. You cannot throw a net the dog has not brought back. A quicker dog means more nets in your hand.
There are thirteen kinds of bird. Some come on day one. Some you may not see for many runs. Every bird you net goes in your field guide, and the guide is what you keep.
How to play
- Name your dog. The kennel asks once. The name goes on the screen, and on the card at the end.
- Lead the bird. Look a little ahead of it and click. A bird flying across you needs more lead than one coming towards you. A bird that swerves is the hardest throw in the game.
- Wait for the dog. It fetches what you threw and comes back. At the start it sits and waits for you to take the bird. Press E. A cleverer dog drops it at your feet, and the best one puts it straight in your hands.
- Spend your coins at camp. Each bird is worth coins. Between days, buy a faster dog, a bigger mouth, more nets or a wider net. A day's catch roughly pays for the next thing.
- Net the geese. From day three a goose lands at the edge of the meadow and walks straight at you. It does not swerve, so it is an easy throw. But if it reaches you, the run is over. Keep one net back.
- Bring down the Storm crane. Every fifth day it crosses the meadow six times. It takes three nets, and it flies slower after each one. If you miss all six passes, it is the one that got away.
Controls
| Input | What it does |
|---|---|
| Mouse | look around |
| Left click | throw the net along your look |
| E or Space | take what the dog brought back |
| W A S D or ← ↑ → ↓ | walk |
| Esc or the pause button | pause, and the way back to Playpit |
| Fullscreen | hides the browser so the game has the whole screen. Press it again to bring the browser back |
The thirteen birds
The guide has four tiers. Common birds fly straight and slow: the Meadow sparrow, the Hedge finch, the Brown thrush. Uncommon ones are quicker, and the goose is one of them. Rare birds swerve, or fly high, or both. The three legendary birds are the Storm crane, which you fight, and two others that turn up once in a long run if they turn up at all.
A rarer bird is not just a rarer roll. It is a harder throw. That is on purpose: the birds you have not found yet are the ones your hand is not good enough for yet.
Your field guide
When the goose gets you, you get a picture. It shows all thirteen birds. The ones you found are in colour. The ones you have not are shadows. It says the rarest thing you caught, the rarest thing that got away, how many days you lasted, and your dog's name.
Send it to a friend and the link opens your meadow: the same birds on the same days. They can go and net the one that got away from you. Your dog's name is on the picture and in the message, and nowhere else. It never goes in the link.
Tips for your first run
- Throw less. Three nets in the grass is three nets you cannot throw. Wait to see if the first one lands before you throw the next.
- Buy the faster dog first. Coins come in as the dog delivers, and a faster dog is back with the net sooner. Everything else follows from that.
- On goose days, keep one net back. A goose takes twelve seconds to reach you. That is plenty, if you have a net in your hand when it lands.
- If the game offers a skip, think. Catch most of a day and you can skip two days ahead. You get no coins for the days you skip, and the day you land on is harder.
- Feathers are for next time. Every run ends. The feathers you earn buy a spare net, a quicker dog, or a run that starts on day three.
Good to know
- Nobody shoots anything. The net is a hoop on a rope, the birds fly off when a net misses, and the dog carries them back in the net.
- There is nothing to buy with real money, no account and no chat. Feathers and the dog's name stay in this browser. A shared link carries the meadow number and what you found.
- You need a computer with a mouse and a keyboard. Looking around uses the mouse, and phones cannot do that.
- A day is a minute or two. A run is as many days as you last.
More games played from your own eyes: Swivelhead is crossing the road on foot, Wheelabout is the same roads from the driver's seat, and Hushrow is a shift in a library where you argue with the shelves.
