Temple Of Snek

Review

From the main menu screen you have Story Mode, which is currently the only mode available to you. There’s also a Classic mode, a Snek Workshop and a Mek-a-Snek, although these are locked in the beginning; you unlock them by playing the Story mode and completing an achievement. Also found here is Extras, which will detail the achievements in the game and items that you’ll collect as you progress through the game.

You begin as a freshly emerged baby snake, some three tiles in length. On the wall is an arrow indicating which way to go (it’s the only way you can go) and upon following the arrow you enter a new room. This room is lit by torches on the walls and there are a couple doorways which have iron gates stopping you from entering the adjourning rooms. This is the Snek Pit.  The game details which key bind does what (I used keyboard and mouse to play the game, but you can use a gamepad if you prefer).  One of the doorways will then open allowing you to move into the next room.

It’s from here that you will venture out. Along the floor of the room are arrows indicating which way to go to find the exit to the next room. The doorway to the next room is blocked by an iron gate, however, just before you reach the door there is a button on the floor. Moving over the button will trigger the door to open, allowing you to continue.

These buttons will have a dotted line drawn away from them to a doorway or other obstacle which indicates that the button must be activated to open the door or some other obstacle. Sometimes there are multiple buttons that must be activated at the same moment that Snek is travelling over them. If one button returns to its original position because Snek’s body is no longer moving over a button, then it will not activate. Some buttons will activate traps; these buttons will usually be a different shape from those which open gates.

As you are only small and the distance between some of the buttons which need activating is longer than you, you’re going to have to grow. You do this by eating the infidels you find around the temples, which will allow you to grow and grow. However, this then starts to make things a lot more complicated as you will have to maneuver Snek around a room with obstacles without running into any of the obstacles, activating traps, walls or even your own body. If this happens then you will go back to the last checkpoint.

Sometimes you will enter a room from a place higher up off the floor.  Once your whole body has entered the room, your body will then fall to the ground. This might be ok to begin with while in the air, but if you fall to the ground and you have gone over a trap of spikes which you then fall on, you’ll die and will have to go back to the last checkpoint again.

I found myself getting lost and going through the same rooms that I had previously visited. This did become a bit of a problem as now Snek was bigger than before, so I was unable to get out and find another way. In the end I had to hit escape and from there go back to a previous checkpoint. You can do this four times.  Luckily, I was able to get back to somewhere that I could continue from, although I got lost again shortly after.

I did find the game a bit slow and boring, but if you fancy a challenge and you have the patience then the game might be better suited to you.

The game has a level editor, Steam workshop and you can customise your Snek once you unlock the ability to.

In the settings there are options for Accessibility (Speed Slider, Metronome, One Step at a Time, Always Rest on Checkpoints, Camera Shake, Swoop and Swap, Fast Forward and Blur Effects Check Boxes and Highlight Colour), and Content (Blood, Skulls and Bones and Poop Check Boxes, Unlock Special Features and Special Events). 

There are also options for Graphics  (Resolution, Full Screen, Bordered Window and Borderless Window, V-Sync and FPS Limit Slider), Rendering (Render Quality, Render Scale, Outline Effects, Custom Snek Patterns, High Quality Snek Geometry and Animation and Brightness), Sound (Overall Volume, Game Volume and Music and UI Volume Sliders), and Controls (Key Mapping for Keyboard, Mouse and Gamepad, Use Rumble When Gamepad Is Active).

Language - English and English (Open Dyslexic Accessible Font), Spanish, French, Russian, Chinese (Simplified and Traditional). Use Unreal Text-to-Speech (English Only).

Review written by Piston Smashed™ for Zeepond.com

 Temple of Snek Steam Store Page