K-Pop Source — Keeping the K-Pop Forum Spirit Alive

I'm a little particular about what counts as a death game. For me, it has to be (a) something you can win or else it's just an extended way to kill someone, and (b) the game itself has to be deadly, so just because a game is present, if it's not connected to what killed a character, then it doesn't count.

So to be completely fair, there are media other people count that I don't, like the Saw series. Technically, some of the traps are survivable, but too many of them aren't. Or like the movie Clue, where just because it's based on a board game, the movie itself is a murder mystery to me, not a death game.

So what I do count that I have read/watched/whatever:

• Movies: Ready or Not
• Shows: Alice in Borderland, Squid Game
• Books: The Hunger Games, The Long Walk, Battle Royale*
• Video Games: Danganronpa trilogy, Zero Escape trilogy

*I haven't read Battle Royale yet, but it's up next on my audiobook list! So I'll report back if it actually counts at the end. I expect it to with people saying The Hunger Games ripped it off.

So not enough media options for my taste. I do think the movie The Platform gives similar vibes on Netflix, but it's not quite a death game.

I finde your definition is very plausible!

For Saw it depends on the movie! The later ones intentionally have games that are not winnable, as the people setting up the games are stupid and then later get punished for this by the original creator.. I thought thats kinda clever! But most saw games, even the ones you can win, will still be very painful and cause permanent damge..

I would also not count Clue!

I'm not sure about the movie ready or not, I just checked the trailer and it seems very familiar, so probably I have seen it too Wish I had better memory

I only watched the anime of Danganronpa Do you watch anime in general?

Uhh I skipped through the trailer of the platform.. it kinda seemed like people are eatching each other??

Right! I think that's kind of my issue with some of the Saw ones... they feel like they went into being gory for the sake of it, so I dipped out of the series after #3.

Ready or Not is literally the game hide and seek. It's a pretty dark comedy at times, and there's only one scene that I would consider body horror, which is pretty brief other than them leading up to it and so you have the extra horror of knowing it's coming. The ending always makes me laugh out loud though.

I have never seen the Danganronpa anime! You can buy the three games as a package on the Switch, which is what I did. I liked it because the third one ends up being pretty meta, which was really divisive in the fandom even though I found it clever, lol.

So The Platform is basically a giant tower (? they aren't clear whether it's in the ground or above the ground) where you can elect to imprison yourself basically, like the main character wants to quit smoking, or actual criminals can elect to spend a stint in the tower instead of regular jail. Every day, once a day, a platform laden with food is deposited from floor 1 to the bottom. It stops on each floor for a few minutes, and there is enough food that if you just eat your fair share, everyone in the entire tower can be fed. But you can imagine that people don't do that. Every 30 days, what floor you are on gets reassigned. So if you end up on floor 1, you're pretty lucky, you have first dibs on the food. If you're on floor, idk, 255, the 254 floors above you may not have bothered to leave you any food. And you can survive for 30 days without food, but what if next month, you get floor 230? Technically better, but not by much. So I think it's pretty similar to what I like about death games in the sense of: when you think you're going to die, and you have a LOT of time to think about the fact that you're probably going to die, you have to have a reason to pull yourself through the days/weeks/months-long struggle, and in that struggle, you find out what really matters to people and who they really are. I don't think horror quite manages that same thinky aspect, because a single instance of being terrified isn't the same as, say, Arisu finding a reason to be a better person and wanting to protect his friends. The Platform's trailer I think makes it look more like straight horror, but the real message is very in line with "eat the rich" lol.

mmh I would not have expected that danganronpa is avaiable on the switch! Is nintendo not kinda strict about violent stuff? I wonder if they changed the game for the switch release?

Platform sounds pretty interesting, I will watch it

I'm only half an hour in, but I did not expect tha canibalism...

I finished it, thank god it did not focus too much on canibalism after the first time...

the film was pretty nice! but again very opend ended, I guess that means you liked the ending

so the 333 floor was the last one and that was were the little girl was all the time..? I wonder how she surives.. but I guess the logic is if someone manages to get down to her and save her, thats how everyone is freed? I wonder why no one else ever thought of going down from one of the deep floors... they have no food anyways

When I finished it, my immediate reaction was "that was weird." But oh my goodness, it just lingered in my head for like the next couple weeks after I watched it, because I kept thinking of all the imagery and unexpected puzzles. I loved the cut ins of the fancy restaurant making it look perfect, contrasting against what happens. Or like you said, the mystery with the child. The woman was going down all the floors so does that mean that she never reached the floor 333? Was someone was feeding the child through a side door, because you know the platform was empty by then. Or was a child some sort of metaphor? It was weird but like in a good way; it gave something for my brain to chew on besides my anxiety lol.

Since it's been a week for you, what are you thinking?