How to win at Snake

A fascinating GIF shows one Snake player eating all the pellets and "winning" the game.

For all the time we spent playing Snake by the green glow of the Nokia 5510's screen back in the day, it somehow never occurred to us to consider what the endgame might look like, so impossible did it seem.

As it turns out, though, you can in fact finish the game, as evidenced by a GIF that appeared on a Russian forum on Monday. The GIF has been significantly sped up (you can watch it in real time if you can be bothered) — cut down from 13 minutes and 17 seconds to 2 minutes and 6 seconds.

The snake passes through 6372 cells and consumes 100 pellets, extending its length by 796 cells to a total of 801. It moves at a speed of 10 cells per second. The text at the end apparently reads, "And now we'll show a cartoon film. Connection to server ... No connection. Thanks. Everybody's free."

It's a little anticlimactic. Sure, we had no expectations, but maybe some pixel fireworks would have been appropriate for a game we thought unbeatable. Although, maybe to a Russian audience, it's the perfect ending.

The game is obviously not the same version as the one played on Nokia phones (which may still be unbeatable), but if seeing the above GIF has triggered a nostalgic urge to play Snake, you can pick up a simulation of the game as seen on a Nokia phone for free on both iPhone and Android.

Via kotaku.com