War is a misguided topic in today’s gaming world. It’s understood to be misguided by a majority of gamers too. Call of Duty, Medal of Honour and Battlefield all make for great gaming, visually, if you are inept to that kind of entertainment. But key factors are lost in translation while playing these games. Those factors can be attributed to any way the gamer wishes to interoperate the images on the screen emotionally. Sure, falling from a helicopter at a thousand feet while playing Battlefield 3 online is fecking hilarious, but does any one take into account the realism that’s been sucked out of this? You Re-Spawn.
No body count, no weapons loss, no one is hurt. No one really dies.
But what if a game was produced, where be it that if you lose men, they were gone forever. Also, while on the mission selection screen, you could actually see all the graves of your fallen online friends in the background? Cool? Meaningful? Disturbed? Well, no game exists in this generation to my knowledge. But an older generation of games, yeah, there is a game like that. Cannon Fodder.
I remember getting hold of this game when I was around the age of eleven, 1994. At this age, I presumed the game to be pure fun with a hint of sarcasm. But it was only later on, around the age of 18 when I started to read between the lines of the games message. I don’t think any other game has had an impact as meaningful as this one did.
The opening credits, Jon Hare, Julian ‘Jools’ Jameson & Stoo Cambridge dressed up as soldiers in black and white still pictures will always remind all Amiga gamers of fun times past. But it was the word ‘Fun’ that had been misguided by the press and others at the time. ‘War has never been so much fun’, the title song and the games motto.
The message of the game was realised by gamers of a more mature age. The press and MP’s at the time however, concluded its frantic, unnecessary gore and violence was a stain on society, the army and the war dead and condemned the game. My view? Well, I’ll try to explain it as best as I can.
At the beginning of the game, red poppies can be seen on the title screen. This is in no way an offensive gesture towards the war dead, or the poppy appeal. In fact, it was intended to be a gesture of ‘Anti-War’. Another following title screen appears with the words ‘This game is not in any way endorsed by the royal British Legion’. Well, of course its not. But, again, read between the lines and you will see a conveying message that haunted most gamers and me while playing this spectacular game. Why would Sensible Software & Virgin endorse such a violent, yet fun game under a banner of poppies? Simply because war is pointless, it hurts and most of all, people that die in wars, don’t come back. This message is abundantly clear throughout this game.
After a few missions, I remember thinking to myself how easy this game is. I had been given a huge amount of soldiers at my disposal. All with names and different ranks. I felt like a general. Each time I completed a mission, depending which soldier killed the most enemies; he would rank up to become squad leader accompanied by the according stars and stripes to his name.
By the fourth level, Jools, my main guy was blown straight in the air, guts galore and drowns in icy water screaming like a trapped cat in a door. Soon followed by Jim (grenade attack), Ronald (Enemy Fire) and Bazza (Friendly fire from Ronald who threw a grenade at Jim by mistake and whom himself was shot at the same time by the enemy). Gone. Wiped out. No Re-Spawn. Dead.
I paused for a moment, the poignant but epically cool music kicked in, accompanied by the words ‘Mission Failed’. I was gutted. I’d had these guys from the beginning, over 47 kills to the enemy and heaps of praise given to them. But now, they were gone and I had other recruits to look forward to. But that was not the point, neither important here. I’d just lost four blokes for whom I’d tried to guide through the game as best as I could and look after them. Not now though, I had to start the mission again with some other random peeps with no combat experience.
So, I press the button on my mouse and get on with it while the Amiga loads up and takes me through too the mission screen. This screen is the games most important feature, it tells you how many recruits you have left. Well, it actually shows the new recruits in civilian uniform, appearing from over a hill, sun rising in the background and queuing up in a straight line, all ready for action. Nice feature.. different.. but, behind the line of new soldiers to be, is a more haunting feature. A hill. The bottom of the hill has a few red poppies dotted around. Just above that, four graves. White crosses that sit all alone, scattered on the hill top. I suddenly realised, that’s Jools, Bazza, Ronald & Jim. The graves sit on the hill, over looking the new guys lining up for war in civilian attire. Over the next few missions, I lose more men. Graves are added to the hill. More and More, until I have only 3 guys left.
They die too. Game over the screen says to me. War over. No more men and no more chances.
I think the message in this game can be sometimes seen as a bit drastic or even more so, ‘over hyped’. Ironically, war has never been so much fun while playing this game, but that’s all it is, a game. A very good game. No other game has ever affected me like this and it’s a pungent and very dark feeling. But the message could not be clearer.
War isn’t fun.
Cannon Fodder box images courtesy of retrojakker
I loved this game as a child. I never looked at it this way, the best article I think I’ve ever read on a game.
Its the song that has always got to me: “Go to your brother, kill him with your gun, leave him lying in his uniform, dying in the sun”. That the media, the politicians, and the army overlooked this ever so powerful song, I’ll never understand, especially the chorus, they focussed on the wrong words: “war, has never been so much fun”, the so in the sentence is there for emphasis, but switching to “that” instead, downplays the message, but adds the true clarity of “war, has never been that much fun”.
So unless they played it on mute (probably never played it at all, just acted on hearsay), they didn’t even need to read between the lines. But, this game was released in 1994, the wall had come down just 4 years earlier, the Gulf war ended two years before, and the Bosnian conflict still raged on, the last thing politicians and the army wanted was a game with strong anti-war messages, where a single bullet will kill your trooper, never to return. This kind of message could seriously harm Britain’s combat effectiveness. Far better is worms which came out the year before, with their huge lives, that can withstand an airstrike, minigun, bazooka, and in some edge-cases, a holy hand grenade, and still come back fighting in the next scene. Cannon Fodder vs Worms is much like the Lego Movie, we just need people to do as they’re told, rather than stand back and ask questions.
We need people who shall pick-up a weapon and advance on the enemy, leave the pansies who’ll weep over Jops, Jools and Stu back home.
I’ve just started playing CF again, only this time with DOSBox, it has a neat session save feature that I activate at any time, so I might actually be able to complete the game, but the message is still there: I last played in 1995, but gave in after loosing Jops and Jools one too many times. Why? Because just like you, I felt it too much, in a way that causes me to really question the pain felt by those pixels.
I still carry this message with me today, AC Odyssey, I knock every foe out, recruit to the Adrestia and then send them on their way, TW3, I avoid the kill whenever I can. Why? Because war has never been so much fun.