The Snake I remember from old button Nokia phones kept its high score on the phone itself. You did not need an account or a connection. You lost, saw that you were three apples short of your best score, and started another run.
That is where Pixel Snake began. Before version 1.0, the game had its own local leaderboard: the ten best scores, saved directly on your device.
Version 1.0: Game Center arrived
For version 1.0, I added Game Center: a shared leaderboard and achievements. You can compare your score with other players and see your achievements alongside your other games.
The easiest thing would have been to stop there and replace the local board with the system one. I kept it instead.
Why the local leaderboard stayed
Game Center means signing in to your Apple Account, a prompt you can easily close, and a leaderboard that may be unavailable without a connection. Imagine being on the metro, setting your best score of the week, and having nowhere to see it.
Your record is a small personal history with the game. The game should not lock it behind an account sign-in.
Local achievements came later
Achievements took the same path in reverse. At first they existed only in Game Center; later I added local ones. There are 31 now, all visible inside the game.
Some are earned in one run: 30, 60, 90, and 120 apples. Others build over time: 2,000 apples in total, 50 games played, or 20 minutes in a single game.
They are satisfying to collect. Today you eat 28 apples and nearly reach your first achievement. A week later, you unlock the 60-apples-in-one-game reward and see that your play has improved.
Not a fallback
The rule I set for myself was simple: local achievements are not a reduced copy of Game Center for people who did not sign in. They are a full system with its own screen, progress bars, and achievements that Game Center does not have.
Before an achievement-structure update, the game saves a backup of your progress so a new version does not erase what you have collected over months.
Which one is for you?
If you want to compete, sign in to Game Center and your score will appear on the shared leaderboard. If you play for five minutes before bed and compete only with yourself, Pixel Snake will still remember every record.
The player should choose, not the app. Like the classic Snake I remember, where the record was simply there.
