As humans, it is only natural for us to enjoy playing games. From childhood, and even into adulthood, play is an essential part of our lives. And I’m sure we’ve all at some point wondered about what it would be like to experience a death game of sorts, especially since the success of The Hunger Games and Squid Game. Luckily, anime doesn’t have many issues when it comes to exploring topics that most people would shy away from, and death games are one such topic.



So, here are 10 death game anime, arranged in alphabetical order, to get your heart pumping this spooky season:

Angels of Death
Studio: J.C.Staff



While not a traditional death game in the sense of having multiple people compete for their lives against one another, Angels of Death is its own kind of death game for one person. The series follows Rachel, a young girl with amnesia, as she makes her way through a series of different levels, each with its own psychotic “boss” that she needs to find her way past. Helping her is Jack, the first boss she encounters, and to whom she promises her death if he helps her make it through the various levels to escape.

Angels of Death is available to stream on Crunchyroll.

Watch time: 16 episodes of 24 minutes each – just under 6 and a half hours.

Danganronpa
Studio: Lerche (subsidiary of Studio Hibari)



Danganronpa is probably every high school student’s worst nightmare come to life – a death game where you have to murder your fellow classmates, but be found innocent in the subsequent trial. Based on the visual novel game of the same name, the series takes place in the elite Hope’s Peak High School and follows protagonist student Makoto Naegi. Makoto and his classmates are threatened by an anthropomorphic bear who tells them that the only way to leave the Academy is to literally get away with murder.

Danganronpa is available to stream on Crunchyroll.

Watch time: 13 episodes of 25 minutes each (season 1) and 24 episodes of 24 minutes each (seasons 2 & 3) – just over 15 hours.

Darwin’s Game
Studio: Nexus



High school student Kaname Sudo receives an (accidental) invitation from a friend to download an app called ‘Darwin’s Game’, and when he launches it, he’s drawn into a game where players fight each other, generally to the death, using ‘Sigils’, a kind of superpower bestowed on the players once they join the game. With no way to quit the game, except through death, Kaname must defend himself against more advanced players and try to survive through their attacks.

Darwin’s Game is available to stream on Crunchyroll.

Watch time: 1 episode of 48 minutes and 10 episodes of 24 minutes each – 4 hours and 48 minutes.

Deadman Wonderland
Studio: Manglobe



After being convicted of a crime he didn’t commit, Ganta Igarashi is locked up and sentenced to death in famous prison turned theme park, Deadman Wonderland. In order to survive, Ganta must participate in deadly games and entertain the tourists so that he can live to fight another day, while also battling a lethal poison that is injected into his bloodstream every three days, and can only be neutralised by obtaining a special candy, mainly through participating in these death games.

Deadman Wonderland is available to stream on Crunchyroll.

Watch time: 12 episodes of 25 minutes each plus 1 OVA (The Red Knife Wielder) of 30 minutes – 5 and a half hours.

The Future Diary
Studio: Asread



Shy Yukiteru Amano is a loner who enjoys observing people and jotting his observations down on his phone. When his friend, Deus Ex Machina (God of Space and Time), turns his phone into a Future Diary, capable of telling the future up to 90 days in advance, Yukiteru finds that he and eleven other individuals are now part of a battle royale executed by Deus. The objective is to eliminate the other players using their Future Diaries, and the reward is taking Deus’s place and becoming the God of Space and Time.

The Future Diary is available to stream on Crunchyroll.

Watch time: 15 episodes of 24 minutes each, 2 episodes of 25 minutes each, and 9 episodes of 26 minutes each – just under 11 hours.

High-Rise Invasion
Studio: Zero-G



After suddenly finding herself on top of a high-rise building in a surreal world consisting only of high-rise buildings, high school student Yuri Honjo must find a way out through these interconnected buildings, with no way to reach the ground, and to her brother, who is trapped in the same strange world. All the while, she is being hunted by humans in strange masks, and must escape from them while surviving the extreme heights of the buildings.

High-Rise Invasion is available to stream on Netflix South Africa.

The Ones Within
Studio: Silver Link



A popular live-streamer for the game The Ones Within -Genome, Akatsuki Iride finds himself, along with seven other players, transported into a game world similar to that of The Ones Within -Genome, where their every move is livestreamed, and death and injury are very possible. Their only way to escape is to reach 100 million viewers while clearing game stages to obtain a token of completion known as the “chromosome”.

The Ones Within is available to stream on Crunchyroll.

Watch time: 12 episodes of 24 minutes each – just under 5 hours.

Shiboyugi: Playing Death Games to Put Food on the Table
Studio: Studio DEEN



Veteran death game player Yuki participates in death games as a career in order to win lucrative cash prizes. These death games are created and televised for entertainment, and to keep the death games sustainable (and keep contestants coming back), only about a third of players tend to die. Yuki, with all her experience, knows that survival is based on calm calculations and not luck, and that failure in these games is final.

Shiboyugi: Playing Death Games to Put Food on the Table is available to stream on Crunchyroll and Netflix.

Watch time: 11 episodes of 24 minutes and 1 episode of 89 minutes – just under 6 hours.

Talentless Nana
Studio: Studio Bridge



In a futuristic world, extraterrestrial life has appeared and has been named “Enemies of Humanity”. Around the same time as the appearance of these monsters, children with supernatural powers also appeared, and they were called the “Talented”. Seeing a way to combat the monsters using these children, they are sent to train on a deserted island in order to prepare for battle against the monsters. One of these students is Nana Hiiragi, a Talentless individual who makes friends with the class. Soon, the students start dying off one by one, and distrust takes root in the students, for who could be killing off the saviours of humanity?

Talentless Nana is available to stream on Crunchyroll.

Watch time: 13 episodes of 24 minutes – just over 5 hours.

Tomodachi Game
Studio: Okuruto Noboru



After raising enough money to join his friends and classmates on a school trip, Yuichi and his classmates’ money is stolen! What’s worse, the group finds themselves abducted and forced to participate in the Tomodachi Game, a debt repayment game where if they lose, they’ll find themselves millions of yen in debt. The group will have to choose which means more to them in order to survive – money, or friendship.

Tomodachi Game is available to stream on Crunchyroll.

Watch time: 12 episodes of 23 minutes each – just over 4 and a half hours.

Below is a list of honourable mentions that didn't make the list and/or aren't available for streaming right now in South Africa.

Sword Art Online
Gantz
Death Parade
Kaiji: Ultimate Survivor
Btooom!
Juuni Taisen (Zodiac War)

Written by Samantha Crerar