Snake Dev Journal — October 22, 2024

I spent today giving Snake a fresh coat of polish. The first win was reorganising the audio controls that live in the top-right corner. Music and sound effects used to occupy separate buttons, so it was hard to tell what was active. The new single entry opens a lightweight menu, shows the current mode, and plays nicely with both keyboard and touch. A tiny UX tweak, yet it instantly makes the opening moments feel calmer.

Late morning turned into a makeover session for the hero of the board. The old snake sprite looked like a stack of rigid tiles, so I rebuilt it with clean transparent layers and tuned the animation to breathe. The body now follows a gentle sine wave, the head and tail sway just enough, and a moving highlight suggests living scales. Once it glides across the grid it finally reads as a character rather than a placeholder.

The afternoon belonged to the supporting cast. Apples and coins shed their awkward white halos and picked up a new idle routine: subtle breathing, a hint of rotation, and a spark that hovers above them. When the snake bites down, a burst of colour and star-shaped particles blossoms at the collision point. The extra feedback makes every dodge-and-chomp combination feel more rewarding.

Evening was all about mood. Our scene images looked great in isolation but overwhelmed the gameplay. Each backdrop now goes through a blur, desaturation, and vignette pass, topped with a cool vertical glow. The grid overlay stays razor sharp, so positioning remains intuitive while the snake and food stand out with stronger contrast.

I also tackled an old annoyance: the first frame used to flash the legacy background. The loader was waiting for every backdrop before rendering anything. Now the core assets boot immediately, the game starts with a neutral canvas, and the processed background fades in as soon as it is ready. Players see the intended look from their very first second in the game.

Next on the list is a round of stress tests on lower-end phones, a gentle fade for background swaps, and maybe a few playful food experiments that grant short-lived bonuses. Today reinforced a familiar lesson—when feedback and visuals are treated with care, even a casual arcade game becomes surprisingly sticky. I’m excited to hear what players think once this build goes live.