{"id":65465,"date":"2026-04-21T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-20T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/?p=65465"},"modified":"2026-04-20T17:43:04","modified_gmt":"2026-04-20T08:43:04","slug":"japanese-fire-sergeant-suspended-after-creating-10-different-diy-board-games-and-forcing-colleagues-to-play-with-him-while-on-duty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/japanese-fire-sergeant-suspended-after-creating-10-different-diy-board-games-and-forcing-colleagues-to-play-with-him-while-on-duty\/","title":{"rendered":"Japanese\u00a0fire sergeant\u00a0suspended after\u00a0creating\u00a010 different DIY board games and\u00a0forcing colleagues to play\u00a0with him\u00a0while\u00a0on duty\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

News recently broke out that disciplinary action was taken against a fire sergeant and nine other staff members of a fire department in Japan after they played board games while on duty, and the public has been equal parts appalled and intrigued by the case. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As reported by Mainichi Shimbun<\/a> and Asahi Shimbun<\/a>, the Inazawa City Fire Department in Aichi Prefecture announced on April 10 that it had suspended a fire sergeant in his 40s for one month for coercing his colleagues to participate in board games while on duty, and issued written reprimands to the nine crew members who participated. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This went on between July 2024 and January 2025, with the fire sergeant reportedly forcing his colleagues to participate in board games he had created himself using rules modelled after various card- and word-based games. The crew members had to spend even their nap breaks on board games, while employees who refused received the cold shoulder from the fire sergeant. The whole thing came to light after an employee reported it to the workplace in January. In response, the fire sergeant said his actions were intended as a form of communication building, expressing \u201cdeep\u201d remorse. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to the report, there were about 10 types of board games at the fire department, all of which the sergeant had made himself by\u00a0writing on\u00a0blank\u00a0pieces of paper. One of the\u00a0employees who received disciplinary\u00a0action\u00a0participated\u00a0in the games 14 times while on duty, totaling a whopping 35 hours, and even more shockingly, another participant was the fire chief, who was also reprimanded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A noteworthy detail about the incident is that\u00a0no money was exchanged between players, meaning\u00a0there was\u00a0no gambling involved.\u00a0This has made the Japanese public even more curious about the case, with\u00a0users on X proposing various conspiracy theories<\/a>\u00a0as to what went on\u00a0\u2013 from speculation that the sergeant needed\u00a0playtesters\u00a0for his game prototypes\u00a0so badly he\u00a0resorted\u00a0to power harassment;\u00a0to theories that\u00a0the\u00a0homebrew \u00a0games were extraordinarily fun and everyone was\u00a0actually\u00a0\u201cin on it\u201d\u00a0(this\u00a0likely comes from the fact that a number of\u00a0them reportedly\u00a0colluded to cover up the incident after it was discovered).\u00a0Of course,\u00a0the reported facts suggest employees were faced with repercussions if they\u00a0refused, which\u00a0most\u00a0definitely\u00a0constitutes\u00a0workplace harassment and\u00a0is\u00a0no laughing matter, even\u00a0when juxtaposed with the\u00a0light subject matter of makeshift\u00a0board games.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Japanese users are intrigued by the unusual details of a case in which a fire sergeant reportedly coerced coworkers into playing his homebrew board games.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":65470,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[17],"class_list":["post-65465","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-japan-related-news"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"\nJapanese\u00a0fire sergeant\u00a0suspended after\u00a0creating\u00a010 different DIY board games and\u00a0forcing colleagues to play\u00a0with him\u00a0while\u00a0on duty\u00a0 - AUTOMATON WEST<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Japanese users are intrigued by the unusual details of a case in which a fire sergeant reportedly coerced coworkers into playing his DIY games.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/japanese-fire-sergeant-suspended-after-creating-10-different-diy-board-games-and-forcing-colleagues-to-play-with-him-while-on-duty\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Japanese\u00a0fire sergeant\u00a0suspended after\u00a0creating\u00a010 different DIY board games and\u00a0forcing colleagues to play\u00a0with him\u00a0while\u00a0on duty\u00a0 - 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