I’m assuming everyone here is old enough to remember that addictive, mind-numbing and time-consuming game called Snakes that we used to play on our computers, cellphones, hand-held game consoles, and the like. How many hours did you waste invest in Snakes back in the good old days?

I do. I used to spend half a day in one corner of my house, cellphone in hand, playing Snakes till my fingers go numb and my eyes go red. Wasn’t it frustrating to try to be the top scorer? You’d have the longest snake ever, then in a moment your snake would die.

Okay, I think I need to stop waxing nostalgic for my old Snake-playing days, because you can actually play Snakes on Gmail. Yes, you heard it right, Snakes on Gmail. I know, awesome. It’s like being able to play old-school when you’re bored with checking your mail and minesweeper or solitaire just doesn’t cut it for you anymore.

Google is calling it Old Snakey, and with a little poking around on Gmail, you’d be able to play Snakes and rack up the high scores in no time.

First off, we need to enable keyboard shortcuts in Gmail, by selecting Settings from your main Gmail page. (It’s at the top-right of the screen). Choose Keyboard Shortcuts On and click Save Changes. The shortcuts start working immediately.

Then we have to go to Gmail Labs by clicking on settings:

Then go to the Labs tab within settings:

Then within the Labs tab, just enable Old Snakey:

Then hit Save Changes.

Now, you can just hit “&” anytime you want to and you’ll be able to play a nice game of Snake on the fly!

Okay, so now I’m actually trying to rack up a high score. I’ve spent a couple of hours on this already, with like three deaths every other minute, I seem to bump into walls very easily, my snake’s tail is always in the way, and my score is, well, dismal. But I think I’m getting the hang of it though. Give me a couple of hours more.

What are your Old Snakey scores?