Candy Land
A sweet little game for sweet little folks.
Candy Land (also known now as, Candy Land: The World of Sweets) is a children's board game originally published in 1949. It consists of a long and twisty road of six colors and a 64-card deck. Players move by drawing the top card from the deck to reveal a color, moving their piece to the nearest space with that color. There are also cards that take the player to sections of the land, sending them forward or backward several spaces. The first player who reaches "Home Sweet Home" (later replaced with King Kandy's castle) wins.
Many consider the product to be the best example of a children's game. It requires no skill except basic motor control, children are enthralled by the colorful world, and anyone over the age of 10 will play only in order to spend time with someone under the age of 10. As such, it's a classic.
A movie version is in development.
There was an Animated Adaptation that is considerably less criticized for being too sweet.
- All There in the Manual: When the 1980s brought a new version of the board, depicting some of the characters who live in Candy Land, the game became packaged with a story detailing King Kandy's disappearance, all the citizens' reactions, and the players' mission to find out where the king and his castle went.
- The Big Bad: Lord Licorice.
- The Chosen One: The enclosed backstory says King Kandy's daughter, Princess Lolly, picked which kids would go find him.
- Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Earlier versions had a Satyr, Plumpy, rather than Mama Gingertree.
- Mama Gingertree, Mr. Mint, Jolly, and Grandma Nutt do not appear in the World of Sweets version.
- Sometimes Hasbro removes entire places from the board.
- Crap Saccharine World: Candy Land apparently lost some of its beauty and happiness following the King's disappearance. You probably can't tell by looking at all the bright colors and smiling denizens on the board.
- Everything's Better with Princesses: Princess Lolly. A revamped version only increased this by changing Queen Frostine to a princess as well.
- Excuse Plot: Even as a child, did the backstory about King Kandy's disappearance matter when you were actually playing the game? No.
- Five-Token Band: Updates made during the 2000s gave the Caucasian Candy Land Kids some African-American and Asian-American friends.
- Gingerbread House: The last space in the versions released before the 1980s. World of Sweets has it as one of the locales located along the path.
- The High Queen: Queen Frostine...before the Remake.
- House Rules: To keep your sanity as an adult playing with kids, these are often used: Draw a hand of three to five cards (instead of just a single card), choose which color to play (instead of accept fate), play multiple cards at a time if they're all the same color and use special cards to send your opponents backward .
- Hot Consort: Queen Frostine, originally.
- Level Ate
- Luck-Based Mission: Probably to assure the young ones aren't disadvantaged: The game's outcome is determined by the luck of the draw and nothing else. This game is not for the strategic crowd, folks!
- Mucking in the Mud: Land in the Molasses Swamp and you lose at least one turn.
- Sugar Bowl: Bonus Points for being made entirely out of candy.
- Winter Royal Lady: Queen Frostine again. Even as a princess, she retains this aspect.
- A Worldwide Punomenon: Some of the names of the lands.
This board game appears in the following shows
- Cory from Boy Meets World laments in one episode that he spent his Saturday night playing Candy Land with his sister, "and lost", as if losing a game of pure chance is more pathetic than winning it.
- Nurse Jackie has the main character playing the game with little girls and a boy in "Heading North".
- Played by Larry and Alfred in the Veggie Tales episode "Larry-Boy and the Fib From Outer Space".
- That '70s Show has Eric Forman stashing away money in a Candy Land box. It is later revealed that the gang hides a different kind of stash in the same box.
- The Wreck-It Ralph film franchise features a video game called Sugar Rush that is best described as "Mario Karting through Candy Land".