If there's a great way to tell everyone in the world what not to do around trains, then it's with a video game and a jingle that has no business being as catchy and good as it is.
It has been almost a decade since the song "Dumb Ways to Die" was released in 2012 and its game app companion in 2013, but the game, its catchy jingle, and the message they both bring are still relevant to this day.
But did you know that the game was originally a public service announcement (PSA) from Australia?
Dumb Ways To Die - A Brief History
Yes, the song and its fun video game companion is a PSA straight from Melbourne, Australia.
"Dumb Ways to Die" is the world's most shared PSA, according to the game's official website. The jingle, which was published on YouTube in 2012, has accumulated over 239 million views as of the writing of this article.
Campaign mentioned that it has over 3.2 million shares on Facebook and has been retweeted over 100,00 times on Twitter in 2013 alone. At that time, it is the third most viral ad of all time, charting on iTunes in 28 countries.
The song was so viral it had sold 100,000 copies and entered iTunes' top 10 charts within days of its launch.
Meanwhile, its first game app, Dumb Ways to Die, climbed to number one in 22 countries, including the US, UK, Canada, and its homeland of Australia.
The game's premise is very simple: follow the instructions as best you can while under extreme time pressure. Failure to do so, accidentally or otherwise, will result in seeing your character's dumb death.
The message of the song and the first game is made clear in the last part of the song, wherein the song's cartoon characters die due to them doing acts that should never be done in railways, train station platforms, and around trains in general.
The message: don't do anything dumb and stay safe around trains.
The song and its game companion also featured other dumb ways to die (pun intended), such as setting fire to your hair, poking a stick at a grizzly bear, eating outdated medicine, and using your private parts as piranha bait to name a few.
Of course, there are other less common dumb ways to die described in the song, such as taking off your helmet in outer space, using a clothes dryer as a hiding place, and taking yourself how to fly.
Not following instructions, such as pressing the red button when instructed not to, is also featured explosively (sorry not sorry).
Dumb Ways to Die - The After Story
Thanks to the song and game's popularity, PlaySide Studios, the developer of the first Dumb Ways to Die game, eventually made two other games that stayed faithful to the song's message.
The second game, Dumb Ways to Die 2: The Games, featured characters doing Olympics-style games and just relaxing on the beach, but as the player, you have to keep them safe from harming themselves. This entry became the number one app in 83 countries, which resulted in 65 million people pledging to be safe around trains.
Thanks to the second game's popularity a third game was eventually released in 2017 called Dumb Ways to Die 3: World Tour. In this game, players are tasked to rebuild and keep the once great town of Dumbville safe and journey around the world to do the same thing.
The characters themselves, called Beans, are also turned into NFTS themselves in April 2022, which are called BEANS NFT, per the BEANS NFT official Twitter page. You can purchase them on Open Sea if you so wish.
