Lots of weird and wonderful apps pass through Apple’s App Store, and that seems to be especially true here in Japan. We’ve already written about a few of them in fact. But one game popped on our radar over the past few weeks, an unusual title by the name of Egg and Seed.

While there is a sort of background story behind the game, it is pretty trivial and obviously contrived. As the human race faces extinction, you play the role of a special ‘super egg’ which has to avoid viruses and liaise with as many swimming sperm as you can. Sounds like a party, right?

The purpose is simply to have as many babies as possible, and continue to try to beat your high score if you can. I myself had 80 babies just this morning, so I challenge you to top that if you can.

Like any game this strange, I couldn’t help but wonder what was going through the heads of the folks who creates it. A response to Japan’s supposed no-sex crisis perhaps? I decided to get in touch with the developers to ask. It turns out that, for Ryo Shirakawa and ‘Ika’ [1], this game (their first and only game) was merely a trial to learn game programming. But after making it initially, they found they could make it better by adding a few extra features and functions. Unlike many made-in-Japan games, it’s ready to go for international users too, with an easy interface and a great app description on the App Store.

Surprisingly the end result, Egg and Seed, after briefly breaking into Japan’s top ten app rankings, still sits among the country’s top ten games in the action and adventure categories (see chart below), a pleasant result for what looks like a mere side project from its developers. The control mechanism for this one is smart, and I look forward to future games from these guys whenever they decide to get really serious.

The game is available over on the App Store if you’d like to give it a try.