Hungry Hole

Hungry Hole is a two minute arena round played over a bright little town seen from above. You steer a hole, and anything that fits through your rim leans, wobbles and slides out of sight with a satisfying gulp. Traffic cones and fire hydrants first, then wheelie bins, park benches, bicycles and lampposts, then parked cars, oak trees, kiosks, buses, whole houses and — if the round goes your way — the tower blocks downtown. Every swallow widens the rim a little, so the ladder keeps opening up in front of you and the thing you could not touch a moment ago is suddenly lunch.

The town is not yours alone. Eight rivals roam the same streets, and the board is live: names, points, your row picked out in gold, a feed of who just ate what, and a rival joining or dropping out every half minute or so. Rookies drift towards whatever is nearest, regulars price up a whole block before they commit, and sharks come looking for a smaller rim — yours, if you let them get close. A hole wider than yours can swallow you whole, and you come back small at the edge of the map with a grudge and ninety seconds to fix it. The multiplayer-style board means everyone on it is out for themselves, you included.

With thirty seconds left the edge of town starts falling away into the dark, the map squeezes everyone into what is left, and the last swallows are worth the most. Then the card: your points, the biggest thing you managed to swallow, how many rivals you ate and where you finished. It is a quick round with a long tail — your best high score and best rank are kept in the browser, so there is always a number to beat. Play with the mouse on a desktop or drag a thumb across a phone in portrait; both run the same arena at the same tick.