Polandball games

Polandball, also known as countryballs, is an internet meme, a comic style and a whole genre of geopolitical satire. Countries are drawn as balls painted with their flags. They speak broken English, carry their national reputations around like luggage, and get into arguments with their neighbours.

It began on Krautchan, a German imageboard, around September 2009. A British user known as Falco drew Poland as a ball to tease a Polish user called Wojak. The early comics painted Poland’s flag upside down, red on top, and that accident became one of the style’s defining features.

• 2009The first Polandball comics appear on Krautchan’s international board.
• November 2009A Facebook page called POLANDBALL starts collecting comics.
• May 2011The r/polandball community opens on Reddit and grows into the main home of the comics, known for its strict quality rules: newcomers must get their first comic approved.
• TodayCountryballs are everywhere: comics, animations with huge YouTube audiences, and games.

Want the full explainer, with the drawing rules and the famous jokes? Read what are countryballs?

The meme is named after its first star. Poland was the ball in the very first comics, so the whole style took its name: Polandball. Other countries joined so quickly that “countryballs” became the wider name, but the original stuck.

The most famous joke of all is “Poland cannot into space.” Poland dreams of going to space and never quite makes it. The grammar is the point: “can into” and “cannot into” became the signature of countryball English, along with extra “-ings” on verbs and very confident spelling.

Poland can into space!

Polandball was made for small panels drawn in a hurry, and that is exactly why it works so well in games. A round ball with a flag is readable at any size, even on a phone held in one hand. Balls roll, bounce and squash, so they are a joy to animate. And every country walks in with a ready-made personality, which saves a game a lot of explaining.

Fans have taken the style into many genres: strategy games on world maps, platformers, puzzle and physics games, idle clickers and flag quizzes. Our pick is tower defense, where every country’s weapon becomes a tower and every country’s locals become a new kind of wave. You can read how that works on our countryball tower defense page.

In Countryball Defenders, Poland is one of the three balls you start with, and it finally gets its rocket. Its attack is literally called Can Into Space: a homemade rocket that blasts the ball nearest your wall. In battle it can learn Cluster Rocket and the ultimate MEGA ROCKET. Its bio: “Built a rocket from a fridge. It works. Mostly.”

Poland can into ur lawn! HUSSAR CHARGE!

Poland’s own stage is stage 75, at the end of the Amber Coast leg, where the locals are stubborn and very tough, and its champion wears hussar wings and charges at your wall. Beat a champion and it flies into space, so in our game everyone gets to space eventually. The top rank title is even called “Can Into Space”, and so is the first Bonk Pass season.

One small change from the classic comics: our Poland wears its flag the right way up, white on top. Monaco, which is red on top and also in the game, asked us to. Monaco has a yacht to protect, and the mix-ups were getting awkward.

• The classic look. Round balls, flags drawn with care, white eyes without pupils, and no mouths.
• Broken English, used kindly. “Is of small change,” says our Monaco about its pile of gold. The voice is half the charm.
• Countries that act like their reputation. Quirks are the jokes, and the best games turn them into gameplay.
• A light touch. Polandball comics poke at stereotypes and history; a game played by millions of different people should keep it friendly. We joke about food, sports, landmarks and famous habits, never about religion, war or real people.

• What are countryballs?Rules of the style, famous jokes, how to draw one.
• Countryball gamesThe kinds of countryball games, and where to play.
• All 205 ballsEvery ball’s weapon, skills and champion.
• Beginner’s guideLearn Countryball Defenders in five minutes.