Rotate
Classic rules, but the whole arena turns a quarter turn every 15 seconds. Up stays up on your screen.
- Goal
- Eat the most food before the clock runs out
- Run length
- 45 seconds
- Speed
- 4.5 → 7 moves a second
- Ranked by
- food eaten
- Twist
- The arena turns 90° every 15 s
Rotate keeps Classic's rules: 45 seconds, the usual speed ramp, and food is the score. Every 15 seconds the whole arena turns 90 degrees, with a whoosh as it goes. The board itself does not change, only how it sits on your screen.
Up stays up
Your controls follow the screen, not the arena. A swipe up always sends the snake towards the top of your screen, whichever way the arena is facing. That is the key to the mode: you never have to translate directions in your head. You only have to read where things are now.
Re-read the board after every turn
When the arena turns, everything you had mapped moves with it. The food you were heading "right" towards is now above or below you. The common mistake is to keep the old plan in your fingers for a move or two after the turn. Instead, treat each turn as a fresh look: find your head, find the nearest food, then move.
The turns come on a steady clock, so you can see one coming. Avoid being in a tight spot at the moment it happens. Just before a turn, give yourself a straight line with clear space ahead, so you have a moment to re-read the board.
Learn the shape, not the directions
The warm-up shows you the board, the walls and the food order, which are the same for everyone. Remember them by landmark ("the food after the narrow gap") rather than by direction ("top left"), because direction will change during the run.
Faster and fewer food rounds
A faster round moves everything 12% quicker, so you have fewer moves to recover after each turn. With fewer food there is one item less on the board at a time, which means longer trips, and a turn is more likely to land mid-trip.
A mistake to avoid
Turning on instinct right after the rotation. Take one straight move to read the board, then turn. A wasted move costs far less than a crash.