One of the express joys of watching Squid Game, the hit South Korean survival drama blowing up on Netflix, is how the show twists childhood games into life-or-death contests.
While some games from the show, like Tug-of-War, are popular across the globe, some of these games might not be all too familiar outside of South Korea. As someone who grew up on the playgrounds of Seoul, there is a deeper history behind the twisted, colorful competitions of Squid Game
Spoilers for the games played in Squid Game below.
Pog/Ddakji
The first game in Squid Game isn’t Red Light, Green Light, but rather Ddakji, a Korean game similar to Pog. At the start of the series the protagonist, Seong Gi-Hun is a deadbeat dad down on his luck and drowning in debt. While waiting for the subway a mysterious man known as the Salesman approaches him with the opportunity to earn some quick cash.
This is where the two men begin a game of Ddakji, a game where players must use paper pieces and hit them against each other on the ground to flip the other player’s piece.
When I was a kid growing up in Seoul, Ddakji was the game to play on the schoolyard. Pokemon had just taken over the world and in Korea, you could buy rubber Ddakji pieces molded into the shape of different Pokemon. If a player had their Ddakji piece flipped over, the winner could keep the rubber token. This trend was so popular it even had its own small "Satanic Panic" when local news media once reported the rubber used for Ddakji was poisonous, causing fear among parents.
Red Light, Green Light
At a glance, Red Light, Green Light seems easy to grasp but the version played in Squid Game has unique Korean characteristics. Typically, Red Light, Green Light is a game where one player has their back to the wall while the rest try and cross the finish line. Only if they get caught moving during a “red light,” they’re eliminated (hopefully not via a sniper rifle).
As explained by game designer Jeeyon Shim in a very helpful Twitter thread, the version of Red Light, Green Light in Squid Game is a bit different. In Korean, the game is called “무궁화 꽃 이 피었 습니다” or “The Mugunghwa (Hibiscus in Korean) Flower Is Blooming.” Whereas in Red Light, Green Light the decision for when players can run and when players have to stop is solely at the discretion of the player calling the colors, Mugunghwa relies on a very orderly cadence.
If you noticed in Squid Game the robot girl says a very specific phrase, and it’s when she recites this phrase players are allowed to run towards the finish line. But when she ends the sentence, that’s when she turns her head indicating that anyone caught moving at this time will meet an untimely end.
The phrase never changes, which means players will know when to run and when to stop vs. the more random Red Light Green Light variation. However, as Shim explains, the tempo of how you say the phrase will speed up, making it more and more difficult as time goes on. “If you were too conservative in the first rounds, you’ll have to cover more distance as the spotter goes faster, which means increasing your own speed, and increasing the risk you won’t be able to cut your own body’s momentum short when the spotter turns around,” Shim breaks down in their thread.
Honeycomb Candy/Ppopgi
In the Netflix translation, this candy is confusingly called “Honeycomb candy” when it’s just melted sugar with a little baking soda mixed in. Known as Ppogi (literally meaning “to pluck” in Korean) it is a snack usually sold by street vendors around the country for less than a dollar.
The painfully sweet snack is usually cooked on a hot plate into a disc and as a bit of fun, Korean vendors will etch a shape like a star or a triangle onto the candy. Most vendors will provide a needle for you to try and “pluck” the shape from the candy, though given the concoction is 99 percent sugar, the slightest mistake will crack the whole disc.
Some Ppogi vendors would even exchange successfully “plucked” shapes for small toy prizes. But this is a trap. The candies are deceptively fragile and some children will end up ordering multiple Ppogi to try and win a prize, emptying their wallets and ruining their teeth in the process. Even in real life, Ppogi are crane games in candy form.
Tug-of-War
This one is fairly self-explanatory for anyone familiar with the popular American gym exercise. Across Asia, ancient variations of Tug-of-War have existed for thousands of years, including Korea where it is known as Juldarigi (rope pulling).
In ancient Korea, Tug-of-War serves as a popular festival game, especially during the lunar festival. Today, Tug-of-War is still played during Korean festivals using ropes as large as tree trunks. It is said the team that wins will ensure a bountiful harvest for their village.
Glass Bridge
The glass bridge challenge in Squid Game is most certainly not based on any specific game children play in Korea, and if it were I certainly would not have survived to my current age. Instead, the set design for the glass bridge marks a turning point in the series when it’s revealed that wealthy patrons gather to watch contestants play the Squid Game for their enjoyment.
The level design for the glass bridge reflects this reveal. Instead of taking place in some twisted recreation of a children’s playground or neighborhood, the set for the glass bridge evokes the glowing lights of a game show stage. The players are now officially contestants on the world’s most exclusive and un-televised game show, competing for the amusement of anonymous wealthy patrons.
This is also the game where several previously unknown contestants reveal that they spent years as glass-makers, reflecting the blue-collar, manufacturing background who have since been hit hardest by the economy as their wages stagnate.
Squid Game
If there’s an international equivalent to Squid Game I’d love to hear it. According to The Korea Times, the Squid game likely originated sometime during the 1970s and 80s in South Korea’s post-war era. There are no records of the game either before the Korean war, nor was this a game that continued to be played by children of subsequent generations.
As explained in the show, Squid Game is played on a board drawn in sand with players separating into two teams: attack and defense. Attacking players, who are initially handicapped by only being allowed to move on one leg, must first promote themselves to use both feet before reaching a “home” square drawn into the sand.
Defending players are tasked with stopping the attacking players by pushing them out of bounds. If the attacking player reaches the home square, they win, but if their team is eliminated the defending team wins.
I won’t presume to know how this game originated and there are very few records, even in Korean, about the origins of the Squid Game. However, I have to imagine that this being a game that can be played on any sand yard might have something to do with its rise in popularity during the 70s and 80s.
As the economy was still recovering from the Korean war, children had to find ways to entertain themselves and a lot of playgrounds and schoolyards were un-lawned fields coated in coarse sand. Grass fields were not common even into the 90s when I grew up in Seoul. While it allowed for kids to draw homemade boards quite easily, lending itself well to activities like Squid Game, they also hurt like hell if you fell.
With this added context consider revisiting the series or, check out IGN’s review of Squid Game season 1. The show’s popularity has been such that one poor South Korean man whose real phone number was mistakenly used by the show has been bombarded with thousands of callers hoping for a chance to participate in the real-life death game.
Matt T.M. Kim is IGN's News Editor and someone who would have likely been killed during the honeycomb game. You can reach him @lawoftd.