ICE

CASE STUDY

RBKAVIN Studio × Snap Spectacles

Ice
Fishing

Snap Spectacles Phone-as-controller Hyper-casual AR Game

60sGame loop

6DOFPhone controller

2025Built on Spectacles

The brief

A frozen lake you can
fish with your phone.

Self-initiated. The goal was to explore what a hyper-casual game feels like on Snap Spectacles, using the phone-as-controller interaction that the platform supports. No client, no campaign brief. Just a question: can spatial AR be genuinely fun and low-stakes at the same time?

Ice fishing is the right metaphor for that: patient, tactile, a little absurd. You place a frozen lake on your floor, pick up your phone like a fishing rod, and try to catch as many fish as you can in sixty seconds.

An AR hyper-casual game on Snap Spectacles. The user places the frozen lake using world understanding, then swipes down to cast and swipes up to reel in. A custom rope physics system makes the line respond to motion in real time, and the score is how many you pull up.

Platform

Snap Spectacles

Role

Solo project, concept and full development

Controller

Phone-as-controller via 6DOF tracking

Game loop

Cast and reel in sixty seconds

Outcome

Shipped and featured by Snap, showcased at LensFest

In the space

A frozen lake in real space,
sixty seconds to fish.

Video

Snap Spectacles

Click to play

Ice Fishing on Snap Spectacles with a frozen lake and phone-as-controller

Ice Fishing frozen lake placed on the floor

Ice Fishing fish moving beneath the ice

Process

The platform gave the controller.
The game had to earn it.

01

The platform gave the controller

Spectacles supports the phone as a 6DOF controller natively. Most people treat it as a pointer. Fishing needed a believable physical connection between that motion and the in-world rope.

02

Rope made the metaphor

Bone simulation was not working on Spectacles, so the rope had to be rebuilt from scratch. Instead of a static line, custom shaders and an alternative weight-based simulation produced a rope that felt tactile. The constraint kept the fishing rod metaphor consistent from controller to object.

03

Sixty seconds as a game rule

Sixty seconds is a design decision, not an arbitrary timer. On glasses, there is no pause, no save state, and no comfortable seating. The limit keeps the game satisfying, short, and score-driven. It is exactly why people return for a second cast.

The result

A hyper-casual game that shipped.
And got noticed.

Shipped Active on Snap Spectacles

Featured Snap promotion across social media content

LensFest Showcased at Snapchat's annual AR showcase event

Something fun is a harder brief

Fun is specific. Ice fishing works because the metaphor is immediately readable, the controller feels physical, and the stakes stay low enough that failure is funny.

Platform-native needs a physical metaphor

The 6DOF phone controller is the platform feature. Fishing made it meaningful. Without the metaphor, users are tracking their phone in space. With it, they are fishing.

Workarounds sometimes produce better outcomes

Bone simulation failing on Spectacles was a blocker. The rope had to be rebuilt with custom shaders and an alternative weight-based simulation that kept the same tactile feel.

Hyper-casual is a natural fit for spatial AR

Most Spectacles content at launch leaned toward productivity, art tools, or tech demos. Ice Fishing was one of the first purely casual game experiences on the platform. Snap's organic promotion confirmed there was appetite.

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