Candy Crush’s sweetest secrets

Games like Candy Crush Friends Saga don’t just appear fully-formed courtesy of a magic conveyor belt, you know.

A new Candy Crush is the result of years of hard work from a multitude of people – designers, programmers, testers, localisers and plenty more besides.

So just as we got stuck into the latest Candy Crush game, we asked game maker King to tell us what goes on behind the scenes when they’re making these oh-so sweet puzzle games.

And for starters, here’s a trick new players can take advantage of straight away.

From level five onwards, you’ll regularly encounter levels where you’re asked to ‘Free the Octopuses’. You can spot most of these little turquoise dudes poking out of the blocks they’re trapped in, but from level seven and beyond some will be completely hidden from view.

But! You can actually see which ones contain Octopuses if you wait a while. Watch for blocker tiles that wiggle a little – they’re the ones hiding these bashful molluscs.

King sneaked this easter egg into Candy Crush Friends Saga right at the last minute. Tap on the Friend at the bottom of the screen when they’re idle and you’ll trigger a fun little animation. We particularly like Red Rabbit’s vaguely Fonz-like wink and finger gun.

What do English singer Seal and Swedish crooner Tommy Körberg have to do with Candy Crush? Well, they’ve both become anthems for the development teams of both Candy Crush Saga and Friends Saga.

With every new Candy Crush Saga update pushed to the App Store, the development team blasts out Seal’s Kiss from a Rose to celebrate. And with the arrival of Friends Saga, a new tradition was born.

There’s a small town in the game whose lights change depending on the season and time of day (a neat little easter egg in itself). So, naturally, Tommy Körberg’s Stad i ljus (‘City in Lights’) was chosen as the team anthem.

You can find both tunes on Apple Music. Please do check out Stad i ljus. It’s an absolute banger.

Three characters in the first Candy Crush game are actually based on members of the development team. Mario the Mole, a cheerful sombrero-wearing chap who appears in the first game’s ‘Choco Rio Grande’ episode, is based on the game’s artist, Mario Santos-Ramos.

It’s the same deal with The Organist, from Candy Crush Saga’s ‘Sour Salon’ episode. He is based on the game’s synthesiser and electronic music-loving art director, right down to his neat haircut, glasses and, um, bare feet. And star of the ‘Ice Cream Caves’ episode Shiba Inu is based on one of the art team’s own little doggo, Yuni.

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