Which Version of Tag Did You Play as a Kid?
What playground games did you play when you were a kid? Now stop and think about how violent some of those games were.
Red Rover. Holy crap... one side stands in a line yelling to the other side to send someone over. Then that person runs, full speed to the other team, who have locked arms trying to prevent that person from breaking through their arms.
How about dodgeball? Hurling giant red balls at another team as hard as you get, with the intent to hit them without them catching it. Awesome.
What about tag? A game that could be fairly innocent. But a game that could also be crazy violent. Like tackle tag. Yes, you had to tackle the person instead of just tag them. What were some other versions of tag? Here are the ones I can remember.
- Standard tag - This one was simple, if you're 'it', you tag someone else. Now they are 'it'.
- Freeze tag - One person is 'it' for the whole game. When they tag you, you have to freeze where you are. If another player who isn't 'it' comes up and tags you, you can move again. The game ends when all players have been frozen by the player who is 'it'. There's a modified version of the game where to unfreeze someone you needed to crawl between their legs.
- Zombie tag - You start with one player who is 'it'. When they tag someone, that person also becomes 'it'. As the 'it' virus spreads, the game ends when everyone has been tagged.
- Cartoon tag - Same rules as standard tag, except if you are about to be tagged, you can drop to your knees and yell out the name of a cartoon. But cartoons can't be repeated.
There are a lot of other versions of tag, but there were the core 4 that we played when I was a kid. Did you play a different version not listed here?