“Netflix Reports: Why the Demand for ‘Squid Game’ Games Overlooks Their True Essence”

After watching and feeling deeply disturbed by Squid Game, I experienced some astonishment upon witnessing the announcement of Squid Game: Unleashed earlier this month. The new video game interpretation from Boss Fight at Netflix Games transforms the show’s harsh challenges into chaotic multiplayer adventures. There is still violence, but it takes on a comical tone. Unlike the characters in Squid Game, for these players, demise does not signify the end. You can continue attempting repeatedly until you master these not-so-lethal virtual versions of the originally-quite-lethal games.

From Squid Game: Unleashed to the forthcoming Call of Duty crossover with Squid Game, and even the real-world portrayal of the concept shown in YouTuber Mr. Beast’s Squid Game, each endeavor to gamify Squid Game arguably misses the essence of the series. However, this is not the inaugural instance of such a situation. Recall the similar violence and social critique of the book Battle Royale (1999), which was adapted into the broad video game genre phenomenon of the same name (as evidenced in PUBG and Fortnite). The novel Battle Royale presents a raw illustration of a tyrannical regime that dehumanizes its nation’s youth through a lethal, performative version of military conscription. Within the narrative, being drafted into the titular battle royale is the absolute worst fate. All of that original meaning has been overshadowed in later adaptations like Fortnite, which is entertaining and features Snoop Dogg.

That’s precisely why it genuinely shouldn’t astound me to see Squid Game: Unleashed and others like it. The game’s director, Bill Jackson, informed me in a recent discussion that this kind of adaptation is exactly what players requested — rather than, for example, a Telltale Games-style narrative game situated in Squid Game’s universe that maintains the original TV show’s social commentary and gripping storytelling format. No, folks did not desire that. They yearned to engage in the games.

“We inquired with the players, the members, if we’re developing games at Netflix, what would you like to witness? And the foremost reply, and it was a significant gap, was Squid Game,” Jackson shared with me. “And we further asked, ‘Do you enjoy that? What do you wish to do?’ And their response was, once again overwhelmingly, ‘I want to be a contestant and I want to participate in those games and strive to survive, and I’m okay if that implies I fail and perish. And it could be harsh.’ That was extremely evident from our initial discussions with members. Hence, we aimed to make that a reality. Now, that remains a challenging task, but we accomplished it. I genuinely believe what we aimed to present here is that you will be — you assume the role of a contestant in a stylized version of that series.”

Squid Game: Unleashed is intrinsically distinct from the original material through its medium. As Jackson articulated: “The primary aspect is you are a contestant and the consequences are severe if you do not succeed. But guess what? It’s a video game. If you falter, let’s give it another shot. And that’s ultimately the cycle of it.”

At this stage in the interview, I indeed queried Jackson about Battle Royale and its impact on video games, and he acknowledged how much more common this type of narrative has become across various mediums. “You can trace back to the films — Death Race — there are all these sorts of configurations like this. Or Bruce Lee, Enter the Dragon. It’s the same. It’s similar kinds of influences. But in video games, yes, it is a profound framework, right? We’re going to place you in a contest and the penalty is relatively — that you’ll be eliminated, and others will advance. That pattern is — it’s inherent to video games. It’s intrinsic to us.”

As unusual as it may appear, people enjoy it. It’s not some executive at Netflix insisting that the in-house game developers strip all the social critique out of Squid Game and transform it into something more digestible. It’s the players themselves — everyday people — who can’t resist the urge to compete in the games, just to discover how they’d fare, if it came to that. However, essentially, these players prefer to do so in a secure virtual environment, where demise doesn’t count, but bragging rights still hold significance.

That doesn’t imply that individuals overlook what truly counts about the narrative of Squid Game, or that all of these individuals are merely uninformed or shallow, or anything of the sort. I believe, as Jackson indicated, this urge reflects something deeper, something inherent within all of us. It may seem somewhat eerie, but that’s the very reason why all of these adaptations are emerging in such a format. We have asked for it.