NUK: How has the game design changed from that original demo to now?

SL: When I presented the initial idea we were planning to make Noodle grow as you collect things, but as we started experimenting we realised that the length that he is now is the optimum length. It’s currently 35 spheres long and we’ve experimented with everything between one sphere, which is basically a head and a tail, up to maybe 70 spheres just to find when the climbing feels best. We realised that as soon as you’re much shorter you can’t climb anymore, so we almost had to build a separate game for when you’re short, when you can’t climb.

We didn’t have the time and the budget, initially, to realise that in a good way so it would not have felt good enough to include. And the same thing applies when you make him longer; even five spheres more, the element of gravity pulling your tail becomes more and more present so it just becomes a nuisance; this long thing you’re constantly dragging around with you.

NUK: How did you settle on the cartoony aesthetic for Snake Pass?

SL: Initially, because I have this biology background, I based Noodle on one of my pet snakes, so it looked realistic. The game literally started with a white plain with a snake on it. So when I had the realistic snake I was leaning towards a realistic type of game where you kill stuff, strangle stuff; a stealth approach in a natural environment. But when we started showing demos to people they were genuinely creeped out. People have an inherent fear of snakes and when we realised that stopped them from picking up the game, we decided ‘this snake needs to be as cute and approachable as possible’. I always wanted to make a Rare type of game, so it was a perfect fit in hindsight.