First aid

Game

Ambush

Some vipers hunt by waiting. Stay coiled and still in the leaves, and strike only when prey comes within reach.

Based on published research · pending expert review

1:30

5strikes left

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Choose your viper

A dusk hunt: 90 seconds and 5 strikes.

  1. Hold Space, or press and hold, to stay coiled and still. The longer you wait, the closer prey dare to come.

  2. Let go to strike when prey is inside the ring. Outside it you miss, and nearby prey run.

  3. Settle after a strike. Holding again within a second, or a quick twitch, makes nearby prey notice you.

The science

How an ambush works

The game is a simplification. These are the findings it is built on.

  • Wait, then strike

    Rattlesnakes and other vipers feed by ambushing prey with an extremely rapid strike that delivers venom.1

  • A short reach

    Wild Mohave rattlesnakes, about 69 cm long from snout to vent on average, struck at kangaroo rats from 4.6 to 20.6 cm away. In laboratory tests of defensive strikes, western diamond-backed rattlesnakes averaging 95 cm from snout to vent struck over 12.7 cm on average.1,2

  • Faster than a blink

    Defensive strikes filmed in the laboratory lasted 48 to 84 milliseconds. A human blink takes about 202 milliseconds. Harmless ratsnakes struck as fast as the vipers in the same tests.2

  • Not every strike lands

    Of eight wild strikes filmed at night, four caught a kangaroo rat and four missed. Some misses came from strikes started too late, others from rats leaping clear. A rat standing still began to react about 61.5 milliseconds after the snake started to move.1

What the game simplifies

  • The strike measurements come from North American rattlesnakes and cottonmouths, not from the two species in this game.
  • The ring is drawn at about a third of the snake's length. That is generous: on average, the measured strikes reached less far.
  • Prey that have noticed the snake always get away here. In the filmed strikes, some prey escaped and some did not.

References

  1. 1

    Higham, T.E., Clark, R.W., Collins, C.E., Whitford, M.D. & Freymiller, G.A. (2017). Rattlesnakes are extremely fast and variable when striking at kangaroo rats in nature: three-dimensional high-speed kinematics at night. Scientific Reports 7: 40412. doi.org

  2. 2

    Penning, D.A., Sawvel, B. & Moon, B.R. (2016). Debunking the viper's strike: harmless snakes kill a common assumption. Biology Letters 12(3): 20160011. doi.org

  3. 3

    Glaudas, X. (2021). Natural history of a highly medically important snake, Russell's viper (Daboia russelii), in a human-dominated Indian rural landscape. Journal of Herpetology 55(2): 151–159. doi.org

  4. 4

    Wall, F. (1921). Ophidia Taprobanica or the Snakes of Ceylon. Colombo Museum, Colombo. Vipera russelli, food (p. 509); Echis carinatus, disposition and food (pp. 533–535). archive.org

  5. 5

    Kuttalam, S., Owens, J.B., Chaudhary, P., Jhamku, Kumar, A., Gopalakrishnan, M. & Malhotra, A. (2025). An Indian desert gerbil (Meriones hurrianae) and a camel spider (Galeodes sp.) as prey of Sindh saw-scaled vipers, Echis carinatus sochureki, from Rajasthan, India. Reptiles & Amphibians 32: e23070. doi.org

  6. 6

    Tsairi, H. & Bouskila, A. (2004). Ambush site selection of a desert snake (Echis coloratus) at an oasis. Herpetologica 60(1): 13–23. doi.org

Try “krait”, “cobra” or Naja. Typos are fine.