From a pacing standpoint it would have been great if episode 6 was the penultimate episode, with one long episode following it as a finale.

But that episode and everything about the marble game was absolutely FLAWLESS. Every partner pair had an absolutely gut wrenching story, just beautifully well done. But to your point - if they are gonna have that much happen at that point, they needed to bring it on home afterwards. No need for so much time between 001 losing and the reveal. Showing him from behind as the host made the reveal completely obvious. Up to that point is was perfect with the subtle hints, but they shouldn’t have given anything else between 001’s death and the reveal.

To make this work they could have completely cut out the policeman subplot with trying to find his brother. The stuff that happened in that subplot was probably the most unrealistic of the show, and that’s saying a LOT. How did NO ONE find him out in that right operation, with him switching uniforms and personas and effing up on his “job” the whole time? How did his cell phone still have a charge after all that time, and taking video?and after all that it was pointless - there was never a connection between him and the main characters, and they could have done a reveal about the front man being a former winner without ever having his brother involved.

Cut that out, and you could fit episodes 7-9 into one long finale. Episode 8 was only 30 minutes anyways. Maybe also cut out the final dinner, and condense it down by having Sang Woo kill Sae-byeok right after the glass bridge, back to back after pushing the other dude off, for his full transition to evil mode before the last game.

All that being said, great watch as it was, and honestly the predictability and somewhat let down of the ending was just due to how great episode 6 was and where it fell in the season.