Snake

In this tutorial, we’ll recreate the classic Snake game, using everything you’ve learned so far: drawing, input, and screen updates.

You’ve already mastered how to draw rectangles, check key input, and update frames. Now we’ll combine all that into your first full game!

How it works

Here’s the basic logic behind the Snake game:

The snake is made of a list of positions (x, y), starting with 1 segment
It moves in a direction on a grid
If it eats the apple, the snake grows
If it runs into itself or the wall — game over
We update and redraw everything every frame

Grid and Layout

We divide the screen into a grid:

GRID_W = 20
GRID_H = 20
CELL = 10

This gives us a 20×20 grid, with each square being 10×10 pixels.

We center the game on the screen using:

OX = (DWIDTH - GRID_W * CELL) // 2
OY = (DHEIGHT - GRID_H * CELL) // 2

Then we define and draw the grid limits:

C_GRAY = C_RGB(200, 200, 200)  # Light gray

while True:
    dclear(C_WHITE)
    
    # Draw grid border (kill zone) 
    drect(OX-1, OY-1, OX + GRID_W*CELL, OY-1, C_GRAY)        # Top border
    drect(OX-1, OY + GRID_H*CELL, OX + GRID_W*CELL, OY + GRID_H*CELL, C_GRAY)  # Bottom
    drect(OX-1, OY-1, OX-1, OY + GRID_H*CELL, C_GRAY)        # Left border
    drect(OX + GRID_W*CELL, OY-1, OX + GRID_W*CELL, OY + GRID_H*CELL, C_GRAY)  # Right

So everything is aligned properly regardless of screen size.

Snake and Apple

The snake is stored as a list of coordinates:

snake = [(GRID_W//2, GRID_H//2)]

It starts in the center of the grid.

The apple is just a random position on the grid:

apple = (randint(0, GRID_W-1), randint(0, GRID_H-1))

We make sure the apple never spawns on top of the snake with place_apple().

Main Loop

This is the usual draw → input → update flow.

1. Drawing

We draw the background, the apple, and the snake:

dclear(C_WHITE)
draw_cell(apple[0], apple[1], C_RED)
for x, y in snake:
    draw_cell(x, y, C_BLACK)
dupdate()

Each cell is drawn using draw_cell(), which uses drect() to draw one square.

2. Input

We read input with pollevent() and use a dictionary to turn arrow keys into directions:

DIRS = {
    KEY_UP: (0, -1),
    KEY_DOWN: (0, 1),
    KEY_LEFT: (-1, 0),
    KEY_RIGHT: (1, 0),
}

Then we update the direction, unless the player is trying to reverse into themselves:

if ev.type == KEYEV_DOWN and ev.key in DIRS:
    new_dir = DIRS[ev.key]
    if (new_dir[0] != -direction[0]) or (new_dir[1] != -direction[1]):
        direction = new_dir

3. Snake Movement

We calculate the new head position by adding the direction to the current head:

head = (snake[0][0] + direction[0], snake[0][1] + direction[1])

Then we check for collisions:

If the snake hits itself or the wall → break
Otherwise, we add the new head to the front of the list

if head in snake or not (0 <= head[0] < GRID_W and 0 <= head[1] < GRID_H):
    break  # Game over

If the snake eats the apple, we place a new one. Otherwise, we pop() the tail.

Final Code

from gint import *
from random import randint

# Grid size
GRID_W = 20
GRID_H = 20
CELL = 10

# Position offset to center the game
OX = (DWIDTH - GRID_W * CELL) // 2
OY = (DHEIGHT - GRID_H * CELL) // 2

# Directions: (dx, dy)
DIRS = {
    KEY_UP: (0, -1),
    KEY_DOWN: (0, 1),
    KEY_LEFT: (-1, 0),
    KEY_RIGHT: (1, 0),
}

C_GRAY = C_RGB(200, 200, 200)  # Light gray

snake = [(GRID_W//2, GRID_H//2)]
direction = (1, 0)  # Start moving right
apple = (randint(0, GRID_W-1), randint(0, GRID_H-1))

def draw_cell(x, y, color):
    x1 = OX + x * CELL
    y1 = OY + y * CELL
    drect(x1, y1, x1 + CELL - 1, y1 + CELL - 1, color)

def place_apple():
    while True:
        a = (randint(0, GRID_W-1), randint(0, GRID_H-1))
        if a not in snake:
            return a

while True:
    dclear(C_WHITE)

    # Draw grid border (kill zone) 
    drect(OX-1, OY-1, OX + GRID_W*CELL, OY-1, C_GRAY)        # Top border
    drect(OX-1, OY + GRID_H*CELL, OX + GRID_W*CELL, OY + GRID_H*CELL, C_GRAY)  # Bottom
    drect(OX-1, OY-1, OX-1, OY + GRID_H*CELL, C_GRAY)        # Left border
    drect(OX + GRID_W*CELL, OY-1, OX + GRID_W*CELL, OY + GRID_H*CELL, C_GRAY)  # Right

    # Draw apple
    draw_cell(apple[0], apple[1], C_RED)

    # Draw snake
    for x, y in snake:
        draw_cell(x, y, C_BLACK)

    dupdate()

    # Read input
    ev = pollevent()
    if ev.type == KEYEV_DOWN and ev.key in DIRS:
        new_dir = DIRS[ev.key]
        # Prevent reversing
        if (new_dir[0] != -direction[0]) or (new_dir[1] != -direction[1]):
            direction = new_dir
    elif ev.type == KEYEV_DOWN and ev.key == KEY_EXIT:
        break

    # Move snake
    head = (snake[0][0] + direction[0], snake[0][1] + direction[1])
    if head in snake or not (0 <= head[0] < GRID_W and 0 <= head[1] < GRID_H):
        break  # Game over

    snake.insert(0, head)
    if head == apple:
        apple = place_apple()
    else:
        snake.pop()

Want to challenge yourself? Try adding:

A score counter
Difficulty that increases over time
A title or game over screen

Need help building those? Ask the 👨‍💻 PythonExtra ChatGPT for ideas or code!