Arcade, snake-like game

Forums > Find a game > Arcade, snake-like game

aditsu (13) on 4/8/2018 6:34 PM · Permalink · Report

There's a game I used to play in the early 90's, I think it was on ZX Spectrum, but it's also possible that it was a DOS game. My memory of it is a bit fuzzy.

It involved one or more snakes/worms/centipedes that you control on a 2d map, it may have been a hexagonal grid. The snake things were made of round segments. I don't remember the gameplay very well, but I think it had a kind of maze, and some pacman-like elements. Also, the game got faster and faster the more you advanced, reaching really crazy speeds.

There was also an aspect of competing against another snake thing, either controlled by the computer or another player (don't remember very well).

The graphics were fairly simple but nice, with two main colors, something like black on light yellow.

Also, I think the game name was a single word, and not a normal English word, but possibly a modification of one, or possibly just some random name like "Marklar".

I hope someone can identify it :)

Alaka (106522) on 4/8/2018 9:18 PM · Permalink · Report

Did you look at this Nibbler variants group?

aditsu (13) on 4/8/2018 10:16 PM · Permalink · Report

I'm afraid it doesn't look like any of them, but I see some similarities.

I think in that game there were some moving enemies, and your snake could get cut into pieces, but I don't remember the exact details.

Victor Vance (18115) on 4/8/2018 10:48 PM · Permalink · Report

Could it be "Laser Snaker": http://www.mobygames.com/game/zx-spectrum/laser-snaker ?

It is not a single word game but your description seems to match it (i haven´t played it yet).

aditsu (13) on 4/8/2018 11:37 PM · edited · Permalink · Report

Nope, that Lazer Snaker looks too much like a classic snake game, and it has a totally different design and feel.

But after a lot of searching and looking through related stuff, I think I found it. First I remembered that the name was somewhat related to "serpent". Then I found this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZUvGcRKziU . I think this is it, but it's a pretty bad demo, and can't find much else.. well, it seems to be downloadable from worldofspectrum, but then I need to set up an emulator.

Edit: Yep, that's the game, Serpenti. I managed to play it a bit in an online emulator. Looks like it doesn't have a hexagonal grid.

Victor Vance (18115) on 4/9/2018 10:54 PM · Permalink · Report

[Q --start aditsu wrote--]Yep, that's the game, Serpenti. I managed to play it a bit in an online emulator. Looks like it doesn't have a hexagonal grid. [/Q --end aditsu wrote--]

It seems we still miss this game here. Would you like to contribute it to MobyGames?

aditsu (13) on 4/18/2018 6:43 PM · Permalink · Report

I can try to add it, but the publisher is unknown. The only name that appears in the game is "APP". I don't know how to fill the form.

vedder (70974) on 4/18/2018 7:53 PM · Permalink · Report

In the page where it asks for the publisher there is a checkbox which you can check if there's no (known) publisher. Check that and it will let you continue to the next step in the wizard without having to fill something in. A release year is still required though.

aditsu (13) on 4/19/2018 1:33 AM · Permalink · Report

I don't see any such checkbox. I only see a checkbox that says "Check this if the game was not published or developed by a company". I guess that's for games that were published/developed by individual people or government institutions.

Rwolf (22839) on 4/19/2018 1:57 PM · edited · Permalink · Report

That is the one to tick.

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I dug around a bit in the code.

The developers initials are probably the 'APP' listed in the game screen and highscore list, but I haven't found a likely person.

An in-game text (when winning) says "You are the serpentine hero", and asks for your initials for the list, but the possible alternate title "serpentine" did not appear in any searches I made either. Another string said 'serpc' which didn't give me any useful clues either.

(There was an Italian magazine that published a cassette with a "Serpenti" titled game in 1984, but that was another renamed game, "snake pit" from what I understand, and it looked much different in the scanned images.)

aditsu (13) on 4/19/2018 8:08 PM · Permalink · Report

That checkbox seems wrong, but whatever, I ticked it and submitted the game.

And "serpentine" is just a word (meaning "like a snake")

Rwolf (22839) on 4/20/2018 8:24 AM · Permalink · Report

Ah, but the thing is the filename 'serpenti.tap' may well be a 8.3 DOS thing forced on when someone in 2000 made an archive copy of the original tape. Sinclair ZX filenames could be very long and descriptive, but when making copies of them for archiving you had to rename them, if you had such limitations. (Sometimes the archive kept a text file with the original name for cross-reference, but this is not the case here). That is why I mentioned the possible alternate title of 'Serpentine', seen in the game code string.

ricky trnr on 5/22/2018 6:54 AM · edited · Permalink · Report

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