![Commodore 64 Longplay [017] Snare (EU)](/images/yt/oi/commodore-64-longplay-0017-snare-eu-77pza.jpg)
Commodore 64 Longplay [017] Snare (EU)
76http://www.longplays.org
Played by: MadMatty
Snare - developed by Rob Stevens and published by Thalamus in 1989 for the Commodore 64.
“The Snare: a twenty level deadly maze built in a temporal cavity by billionaire Andre Thelman who ten years ago entered his creation with his most valued possession - and died. The hunt for the mystery treasure has turned into the hottest game show on earth as contender after contender dies trying to crack the maze’s secrets. Will you succeed? Snare: fiendish, frustrating and deadly - only for the quick witted!”
This perhaps the weakest game in the whole of the Thalamus collection. Not because it is a bad game or lack of presentation because it’s all there. It’s just a very frustrating game which defies all logic and not a game I played often nor would recommend anyone to play today. I’m guessing QueDex must have done really well for this game to have been signed up. If the game ended after its first five levels, that would have been great that would have been enough for me. But no, it goes on for 20 levels!
On each level you constantly move forward (unless set to stop - but not possible on every level) and spin the ship round 90 degrees each time you hit left-right button. It can be very jarring when moving at speed and you need to have good twitch reaction times!. On the floor you will various tiles with different functions such as speeding you up, slowing you down, activating a switch, removing your ability to jump amongst many others. For the first few levels it all seems to make some kind of sense, but after level5 the rules start to change and we end up not having to just get from a to b, but to also find hidden tiles and switches and from level 10 onwards it gets really bonkers with hidden objectives which require to manipulate the guardians into doing things. One level you have to discover a shootable wall (it doesn't give any hits that it is) release the guardian, shoot it to turn it into a constructorcon (normally it would just be destroyed after shooting it) and then manipulate it into building a path to get you across into another section. Oh and an early level requires you to destroy all guardians to reveal the end goal. This rule is not used again. The biggest issue is that these little objectives are not listed anywhere. With quedex, after a few moments on the level its obvious what it wants you to do even if you have to figure out how to achieve it. But with snare its hard to have fun with it when its not clear what the actual puzzle is.
I have to confess I didn't spend any time with the game trying to figure it out nor would I ever want to. I used Eino’s existing longplay as a guide as no other solution appears to have been posted online that I can find. Eino, if you had to figure the game out yourself without a guide, I tip my hat to you. The easiest way through the game would be to roam the levels picking up bonus icons and collecting the Level Jump bonus. That way you only have to play the odd numbered levels cutting the game in half! The longplay does show all 20 levels. Watching the longplay back, the game makes even less sense as with all the constant rotating, you lose any sense of direction and difficult to keep focus on what's going on.
As mentioned at the start, the game is loaded with music and presented as well as any Thamus game as you would expect, including a nice animated ending. I think the game would have been better with more clues on what the level required to complete. A few direction tiles on ground isnt enough for me. There are even switches that do bad things that will stop your progression and its not instantly obvious what you have done wrong.
00:00:00 Loader Music
00:03:00 Title Screen music
00:05:08 Gameplay Starts Here! -
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