How we handle
what you hand us.
We're a small bench of makers, and we try to keep our privacy footprint as small as our team. This page explains, in plain words, what information touches our website and our games, why, and what you can ask us to do with it.
Last updated: October 1, 2026
Who's at the bench
"Sparrowforge," "we," and "us" mean Sparrowforge Games, the independent studio behind Tinwing Pass, Bellows & Brambles, and the works still on the anvil, The Brass Cartographer and Hammerlight. This policy covers sparrowforgegames.com and the games we publish ourselves.
If you have a question about anything here, write to us at [email protected]. A real person on the team will read it.
The short version
- We collect very little, and only what we need to make, sell, support, and improve our games.
- We don't sell your personal information, and we don't run loot boxes or ad networks inside our games.
- Your saves are yours. In our released games, progress lives on your device or with your platform's cloud-save service.
- You can ask us what we hold about you, or ask us to delete it, any time.
What we gather
Most of what reaches us falls into a few simple piles:
| What | Where it comes from | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Things you tell us | Emails to our inbox, playtest or newsletter sign-ups | Your name, email address, and whatever you choose to write |
| Basic visit details | Our web server, automatically | IP address, browser type, pages requested, and the time of the visit |
| Game reports | Our games, only where noted below | Crash details, game version, and hardware/OS summary |
| Purchase confirmations | The store you bought from | That a copy was bought or a key was redeemed (never your card details) |
Our website doesn't use advertising cookies or cross-site tracking. If we ever add privacy-friendly visitor statistics, we'll describe them on this page first.
Inside our games
Tinwing Pass (PC and Nintendo Switch) and Bellows & Brambles (PC and Mac) are single-player games. They don't require a Sparrowforge account and don't send your gameplay to us. Save files stay on your machine, or sync through your platform's own cloud-save feature if you've turned that on, under that platform's terms.
On PC and Mac, if a game crashes, it may offer to send us a crash report. That report holds technical details (the error, game version, operating system, and graphics hardware) so we can find the crack in the casting. It's sent only if you agree.
For upcoming games like The Brass Cartographer and Hammerlight, we'll update this page before launch if they handle any information differently.
What we use it for
- To answer your letters, support requests, and press or business enquiries.
- To fix bugs and make the games run better on more machines.
- To run playtests and send updates you've asked for.
- To keep the website running and protect it from abuse.
- To meet our legal and accounting obligations.
Where privacy laws ask for a legal basis, we rely on your consent (for newsletters, playtests, and crash reports), on what's needed to provide what you've asked for, and on our legitimate interest in keeping our games and site working well.
Playtests & letters from the workshop
We playtest early and often. If you sign up to test a build, we'll keep your name, email, and the platform you play on, plus any feedback you send. Playtest builds may log extra gameplay details (like where players get stuck) to help us temper the design; we'll tell you plainly in the sign-up if a build does this.
If you join our mailing list, we'll only send news about our games. Every email has an unsubscribe link, or you can simply write to us and we'll take you off.
How long we keep it
We keep things only as long as they're useful, then sweep the floor:
- Emails and support conversations: up to 2 years after our last exchange.
- Playtest sign-ups and feedback: until the game ships, plus up to 12 months.
- Mailing list: until you unsubscribe.
- Crash reports and web server logs: up to 90 days.
Records we must keep for tax or legal reasons are kept for as long as the law requires.
Your say in the matter
Depending on where you live (for example, under the GDPR in Europe and the UK, or the CCPA in California), you may have the right to:
- see a copy of the information we hold about you;
- correct it if it's wrong;
- have it deleted;
- object to or limit how we use it, or take back consent you gave;
- receive it in a portable format;
- complain to your local data protection authority.
We're happy to honour these requests wherever you live. Just email us. We may ask a question or two to confirm it's really you, and we'll reply within 30 days.
Young adventurers
Our games are made to be enjoyed by players of many ages, but our website, mailing list, and playtests are not aimed at children under 13 (or the minimum age in your country), and we don't knowingly collect their personal information. If you believe a child has sent us details, please let us know and we'll delete them.
Keeping it safe
We use sensible safeguards: encrypted connections (HTTPS), access only for the team members who need it, and reputable providers. No workshop is perfectly sealed, so we can't promise absolute security, but if something ever goes wrong that affects you, we'll tell you and do what the law requires.
When this page changes
As new games come off the anvil, this policy may change too. We'll update the date at the top, and for meaningful changes we'll give notice on our site or by email if you're on our list.
Questions, requests, or a friendly hello:
[email protected]