Boong-Ga Boong-Ga

Lore & Background

Boong-Ga Boong-Ga was reportedly designed for the Japanese market and, according to advertising material, was well received at the 2000 Tokyo Game Show. An initial contract was made for distribution of 200 units in Japan, but only 5 units were ever actually distributed in the country. The game received infamy on the internet in 2001, where it was often misattributed as Japanese, due to a badly translated advertising flyer.

Reader's Guide

The object of Boong-Ga Boong-Ga is to score points by spanking or performing kancho on a model of a human posterior embedded in the game's cabinet. A plastic finger is attached to the machine for players to perform the latter. The game features eight characters players can punish: 'Ex girlfriend', 'Ex-boyfriend', 'gangster', 'Mother in law', 'Gold-digger', 'Prostitute', 'Child molester', and 'Con-artist'. During gameplay, the facial expression of the chosen character is displayed on a monitor. The game also dispenses cards that rate players on their 'sexual behavior', and for players who perform exceptionally well the machine will dispense a small plastic trophy in the shape of a pile of feces. Its significance lies in being a rare, culturally specific arcade novelty that became an internet curiosity, though its actual commercial reach was extremely limited.

Did You Know?

• Boong-Ga Boong-Ga is the first arcade game to simulate kanchō, a prank involving poking the anus with two fingers.
• The game was developed by South Korean company Taff System.
• Only 5 units of the game were ever distributed in Japan, despite a contract for 200.
• The game dispenses a small plastic trophy in the shape of a pile of feces for exceptional performance.

Origins & Cultural Context

Boong-Ga Boong-Ga is an arcade cabinet created by Taff System, a South Korean game developer, and it holds the distinction of being the very first arcade title to mechanically simulate kanchō, a prank tradition well known across Japan and Korea in which a person is secretly poked in the anus with two fingers. The game's Korean title translates roughly to "Bunga Bunga," while its Japanese marketing name reads "Kai Un! Kedamono Urai," and it was occasionally promoted in English under the catchier label "Spank 'em." Although the developer was Korean, the product was explicitly designed with the Japanese market in mind, reflecting the cultural familiarity Japanese audiences already had with the prank the machine recreates. The concept sat at an unusual intersection of arcade gaming and physical comedy, turning a private, somewhat crude joke into a scored, competitive experience. By embedding a physical model of a human posterior directly into the cabinet and providing a dedicated plastic finger for the more invasive action, Taff System transformed a social prank into a repeatable, point-based activity that no other arcade game had attempted before it.

Gameplay & Cabinet Design

The core loop of Boong-Ga Boong-Ga is deceptively simple: players earn points by either spanking or performing the finger-based prank on a molded representation of a human buttocks built directly into the machine's housing. A small plastic finger is mounted on the cabinet specifically for the latter action. Before each round, the player selects one of eight target characters, each representing a different social archetype: an ex-girlfriend, an ex-boyfriend, a gangster, a mother-in-law, a gold-digger, a prostitute, a child molester, and a con-artist. As the player interacts with the model, a monitor displays the chosen character's facial expression reacting to the punishment. Beyond the physical action, the cabinet also dispenses printed cards that assign the player a rating on their "sexual behavior," adding a layer of mock-moral judgment to the session. For those who achieve an exceptionally high score, the machine rewards them with a small plastic trophy sculpted in the shape of a pile of feces, cementing the game's commitment to crude humor from start to finish.

Internet Infamy & the Translation Fiasco

Boong-Ga Boong-Ga's most widely known chapter began not in an arcade but online. In 2001, a badly translated advertising flyer for the game circulated across the internet, and its garbled English copy describing the spanking and kancho mechanics in terms that were both confusing and unintentionally hilarious sent the title into viral infamy. The flyer's poor phrasing made the game's premise sound even more absurd than it already was, and screenshots of the document were shared widely, cementing the cabinet as a piece of internet folklore. Compounding the confusion, the game was frequently misidentified as a Japanese production. Although it was developed by the South Korean company Taff System and bore a Korean title, its intended market was Japan, its Japanese marketing name was prominently displayed, and the cultural reference to kanchō is deeply rooted in Japanese prank culture. This combination of a Korean developer, a Japanese target audience, and a viral English-language flyer created a persistent identity confusion that followed the game through every subsequent mention, with most online references still getting the country of origin wrong.

A Curiosity in Limited Release

Despite generating buzz at the 2000 Tokyo Game Show, where advertising material claimed the game was well received by attendees, Boong-Ga Boong-Ga never achieved a meaningful commercial footprint. An initial distribution contract called for 200 units to be placed in Japanese arcades, yet only five machines were ever actually shipped and installed in the country. That minuscule number means the cabinet is an extreme rarity, a piece of arcade hardware that most players will never encounter in a working state. The gap between the game's viral notoriety and its physical scarcity is striking: millions of people saw the infamous flyer online, yet the total number of functioning cabinets that ever existed in its target market was fewer than a dozen. This paradox—a game that became a global internet joke while remaining almost entirely absent from the arcades it was built for—has only deepened its legend. It exists now more as a cultural artifact and a talking point than as a playable experience, its handful of surviving units making it one of the most elusive arcade titles ever produced.