"What happened to Snakepong?" asked nobody. "Why can't I download it anymore?"

"Well, let me tell you," I yelled out to an empty room and got no response. "I'm making a better version that's improved in every way!" So, yeah, that's what I'm doing. Since no one really played the original, though, I'm not going to spend much time recounting what I've changed. Instead, I want to use this initial announcement post to say what Snakepong will be all about.

Goal

Inspired by the countless hours of Duck Game I've played with my friends, I set out to create a game with just as much random chaos, but that would still require skill to win. So, instead of ducks shooting each other I decided to have snakes playing a pong-like game. That snake Pong was the basis, but on top of it I've added random events and powerups that can quickly change the course of a point. These events turn the game from a skill-based glorified pong to a game about adapting to quickly changing, random scenarios better than your opponent.

Features

The base game is a better version of Pong. There are two snakes on either sides that represent the paddle, and the goal is to get the ball past the other snake and to the back wall. The main difference from Pong, however, is that you can move anywhere on your side of the field, and you can rotate, too. Free movement and rotation give a lot more control of the ball and make the game more about strategy than reaction time.

The base game also includes a risky yet powerful move of eating the ball. If you catch the ball in your mouth, you'll eat it, and you can launch it from your mouth soon after at very fast speeds. But catching the ball in your mouth requires turning the thin end of the snake toward the ball, so there's a risk of letting the ball past you when attempting the move.

Events and Powerups

Though the base game may seem cool, it's still fairly simple and not very chaotic. I needed my equivalent of Duck Game's guns, so I added the event system and the powerup system. Events have a chance of happening every round and usually change how the game is played in a major way. For example, the event "Mongoose Time" makes a Mongoose appear and attempt to kill whoever has the ball, and the event "Rotating Arena" does exactly what it says and moves the goal posts.

Powerups spawn every few seconds, and can do a variety of different things to give advantages to the receiver. They can increase the snake's speed or length, make a snake bouncier to launch the ball further, or give the snake a gun with which to shoot its opponent.

Customizability

One of my main foci for improvement from the original was customizability. Almost every aspect of the game can be changed. Don't like an event? Play without it. Want more of a specific event? Turn every other event off and set the event chance to 100%. Want more guns? Make powerups spawn more often and make them all guns! You can set the maximum score and the frequencies of any event or powerup to adjust the game just how you and your opponent want it. And, of course, controls are customizable to any key on the keyboard as well.

Local and Online Multiplayer

One of the main things I've added in this redone version is online multiplayer. Customizable games should now be fully playable online with friends or with strangers. Of course, adding working multiplayer is extremely difficult and annoying, so there are currently some bugs, but cleaning those up will be one of my main foci before release.

Meanwhile, of course, local multiplayer is still a complete go. It's the main gamemode on which every other gamemode is based.

Singleplayer Campaign

The final thing for me to add is a singleplayer campaign. I've made a decent AI to play against, so matches versus that AI will be the basis for the singleplayer campaign. As of now, the full details of the campaign are yet to be developed, but one main feature of it has been made: the roulette wheel.

This wheel randomly generates matches against AI with randomized settings, challenges, and goals. The settings are the same as those you can customize for multiplayer mode, and mostly change the frequencies of events. Challenges are handicaps to you or buffs to the opponent, and goals are special tasks to complete before the game ends, like shooting your opponent enough times or having a high rally. 

I'm Interested! What Should I Do?

Awesome! If you're interested, for now just follow my itch page here and my Twitter here. As soon as anything else with the game becomes publicly available, you'll see updates in both of those places. Thanks for reading; hope you're interested!

And lastly, here are a few rounds of the game: