Snake Haul: Loot Run

About this game

Loot is at the top of the screen. Your bank is at the bottom. Everything between them is hunting you.

Drag your thumb. The creature follows. Whatever it touches sticks to its tail, and the tail comes with you the whole way home.

HOW A RUN GOES

Dive into the pink band and sweep up loot.
Cross the gold band without a jet locking on.
Cross the line into green and the whole tail cashes in at once.

Then do it again, deeper.

THE PART THAT MAKES IT A GAME

A full tail is slow. Every ball you pick up makes the turn wider, so the run that pays the most is also the run you can steer the least. Loot rots where it lies, and the good stuff rots fastest.

Jets patrol the middle. You can see exactly how far each one can see, drawn as a circle on the field, so getting caught is a decision and not a surprise. Clip your tail on one and it snaps in half. Hit one nose first and you lose the run's whole haul.

Stand still and it gets worse. Do nothing for long enough and a plague creeps down from the top and eats the loot before you can reach it. Banking is the only thing that pushes it back.

FOUR THINGS WORTH GRABBING

Magnet, and every loose ball in reach comes to you.
Blast, and every jet on screen is shoved off your back.
Freeze, and they all stop where they stand.
Cleanse, and the plague gives ground.

None of them is explained. You pick one up and you see what it does.

BUILT FOR THE PHONE YOU HAVE

One thumb. Portrait. No tutorial, no text to read, nothing to learn but the field in front of you. Small download, and it runs on old hardware.

Coin buys upgrades inside a run and they are gone when it ends. Cores are yours for good, and the track you spend them on does not run out. Every level after the second rolls one of ten twists, so the shape of the field keeps moving under you.

Go and get it. Get it home.

A small game that runs on the phone you already have.

Portrait. One thumb, and no tutorial, because there is nothing to read: the loot is at the top, your bank is at the bottom, and the things flying about in the middle want the loot back.

DRAG. COLLECT. GO HOME.

Put your thumb on the screen and the creature follows it. Anything it touches sticks to its tail. Take the tail across the line at the bottom and the whole thing turns into coin at once.

Then go up and do it again, deeper, with more of them chasing you.

WHY IT IS THIS SMALL

Everything on screen is drawn rather than downloaded. No cutscenes, no voice packs, no thirty-megabyte splash video. It starts fast and it stays smooth on old hardware.

Runs are two or three minutes. It fits in a queue, a bus stop, a lift.

WHAT MAKES IT HARD

A full tail is a slow tail. Carrying more pays more and steers worse, and the plague creeps while you stay out, so the trip home has a clock on it.

Jets patrol the middle of the field. Each one draws the exact circle it can see you inside, so you can read the whole board before you commit. Touch one with your tail and the tail snaps. Meet one head on and the haul is gone.

Stand around doing nothing and a plague comes down from the top and eats the loot before you can get to it.

IT DOES NOT RUN OUT

Coin upgrades last one run. Cores are permanent, and the track you spend them on keeps going long after you stop. Ten level twists rotate through — more jets, bigger loot, fog, a rush, a quiet one — so the field keeps changing shape.

Four pickups do the loud things: pull everything to you, shove every jet away, freeze them where they stand, push the plague back. Nothing tells you which is which. You find out by grabbing one.

Small game. Long game.

You are three balls from a full tail and the bank is a long way down.

There is a gold one, off to the left, worth more than the rest put together. It is also the one that rots first, and there is a jet between you and it.

You know what you are going to do.

THE TRADE

Every ball on your tail makes you heavier. A short tail turns on a coin. A full one swings wide and takes the corner you meant to cut. The haul that pays for the level is the haul you can barely drive.

So every trip is the same argument with yourself. Go home now with enough. Or go up one more time and come back rich, if you come back.

WHAT IT COSTS WHEN YOU GET IT WRONG

Clip a jet with your tail and it snaps. Everything past the cut scatters across the field behind you, still yours to pick up, if you dare turn round with a jet on you.

Take one nose first and it is worse. That is a life, and the entire haul, and the walk back down with nothing.

Three of those and the run is over. Every coin upgrade you bought goes with it.

WHAT YOU KEEP

Cores. You earn them for how deep you got, they survive the run that killed you, and the track you spend them on has no end. Come back stronger, meet a level that does not care, and go again.

THE FIELD FIGHTS TOO

Loot rots in your hands. Stand still and a plague eats the top of the screen, taking the loot with it. Every level past the second rolls a twist: more jets, faster jets, fog, a rush, a lull.

One thumb, portrait, no tutorial. Small download, runs on old phones.

Go up. Come back heavy.

There is no last level. There is only how deep you got before they caught you.

Grab loot at the top of the field, drag it home to the bottom, bank it. Clear the level's quota and the next one is harder in a way you have not seen yet.

THE RUN

Your thumb steers. The creature follows it, and everything it touches sticks to its tail. A long tail is worth more and turns worse. Jets patrol the middle and each draws the circle it can see you inside. Three catches and the run is over.

Two or three minutes, start to finish.

THE PART THAT KEEPS GOING

Coin you earn inside a run buys upgrades for that run only. Lose, and every one of them is gone. Rebuilding from nothing is the game.

Cores are different. You earn them for depth, they survive death, and they buy permanent things: start a level higher, carry more balls, see further, hit harder, be seen from less far. That track does not have a last node. Rank after rank, for as long as you keep going.

It is deliberately a treadmill you cannot finish. Difficulty climbs faster than you do, forever, by design — so getting stronger changes how deep you reach and never turns the game off.

TEN WAYS A LEVEL CAN GO WRONG

Every level past the second rolls a twist, and the shop names it before you commit your coin. More jets. Faster jets. Bigger loot, briefer. Fog. A rush. A long haul. A quiet one, if you are lucky.

WHAT YOU FIND OUT THERE

Four rare pickups, none of them explained. One pulls every loose ball onto your tail. One shoves every jet off you. One freezes them where they stand. One pushes back the plague that eats the top of the field whenever you go too long without banking.

BUILT SMALL ON PURPOSE

One thumb, portrait, no tutorial, nothing to read. Small download, and it runs on old phones.

How deep can you get?

You have played a snake game. This one asks a question the others do not: now that you are carrying all of it, can you get home?

The loot is at the top of the screen. Your bank is at the bottom. In between is open ground with hunters on it, and the only way to turn loot into anything is to cross that ground with a full tail.

WHAT IS FAMILIAR

You drag. It follows. It grows. The tail trails behind the head, and where the head goes the tail goes a moment later.

WHAT IS NOT

The tail is cargo, not score. It is only worth something once you have carried it to the bottom of the screen and banked it. Until then it is just weight, and weight is the problem: the fuller you are, the wider you turn.

You do not die by hitting yourself. You die because something else hit you. Jets patrol the middle band, each drawing the exact circle it can see you inside. Clip one with your tail and the tail snaps in half. Meet one nose to nose and you lose a life and everything you were carrying.

Loot rots where it lies. The valuable stuff rots fastest, so the ball you most want is the ball you have least time to reach.

Wait too long and a plague comes down from the top of the field and eats the loot where it lies. Banking is the only thing that drives it back.

THINGS TO GRAB

Magnet: every loose ball in range joins the tail.
Blast: every jet on screen is shoved off you.
Freeze: they stop where they stand.
Cleanse: the plague gives ground.

You are not told what any of them do. You grab one and you learn.

HOW IT PLAYS

One thumb. Portrait. No tutorial and nothing to read. Runs last two or three minutes. Coin upgrades die with the run; permanent cores do not, and the track you spend them on never runs out.

Small download, and it runs on old phones.

Fill the tail. Get it home.

Fifteen seconds of a real run