When we first sat down for the 2025 GMTK Game Jam, the early ideas looked nothing like the final product, ViperLOOP.

The theme, “Loop,” sent our brains spinning. We bounced around a ton of ideas: surreal observation games inspired by Exit 8, spooky loops in the spirit of PT, and even haunted house-style levels reminiscent of Super Mario in both 2D and 3D. All cool, all compelling—but also way too much for one developer and his musician wife to build within the Jam constraints.

So we hit reset. We needed something SIMPLE.

What’s more simple than Snake?

Our twist? A snake that could eat its own tail to shrink. It sounded novel; until we built it. Turns out, it wasn’t that fun to play. So we cut the self-eating, added a basic maze system, and threw in looping paths like Pac-Man’s classic tunnels.

But generating mazes dynamically? Yeah, that was a headache.

The breakthrough came when we flipped the idea on its head. What if the maze fought back? Instead of walls, we made them enemies. They’d spawn in and chase the player down. Suddenly the game had tension. It clicked.

What emerged was a weird, twitchy hybrid: the grid-based movement of Snake, the looping edges of Pac-Man, and the aggressive pressure of Space Invaders. From there, we fine-tuned enemy density, removed the walls, and dialed in the chaos.

Now that the jam’s wrapped up and the voting period is underway, we’re taking a breather… kind of. Behind the scenes, ViperLOOP is still very much alive and evolving. After the GMTK rating round ends, expect a fresh update packed with new features and refinements:

• A new diagonal chasing enemy type
• Deadly edge walls (with tight openings to teleport through)
• Reduced the rate at which the Viper speeds up
• Selectable difficulty options
• And plenty more surprises in the pipeline, we’ve got a lot more looping chaos headed your way.

Thanks to everyone who’s played, commented, and shared your thoughts.

To anyone hasn’t had the chance to play ViperLOOP yet, do yourself a favor and embrace the chaos that is ViperLOOP.

Sincerely, The ViperLOOP Team