General Chaos (Mega Drive)

I decided to write a review of this seeing as I've never met anyone else who has ever heard of this bar my own brother. we used to while away the time on this simplistic army game.

The game is named after one of the storyline's main General's. The conflict in question is between the blue forces of 'General Chaos' and the red troops of 'General Havoc.'

The game is a very cartoony offering from EA, released in 1994 on SEGA ...
...players can play either co-op or against each other, and if I'm not mistaken, it was also possible to play 4 player with use of the special multiplayer pads.

I no longer own this game and as a result am reviewing this from hazy childhood memory. The two main game modes are firstly a kind of 'campaign mode' where players compete against the computer for specific areas of a map, one region at a time. The other mode is a versus mode, which ... more

I decided to write a review of this seeing as I've never met anyone else who has ever heard of this bar my own brother. we used to while away the time on this simplistic army game.

The game is named after one of the storyline's main General's. The conflict in question is between the blue forces of 'General Chaos' and the red troops of 'General Havoc.'

The game is a very cartoony offering from EA, released in 1994 on SEGA Mega Drive. It is a mulitplayer compatible game and two players can play either co-op or against each other, and if I'm not mistaken, it was also possible to play 4 player with use of the special multiplayer pads.

I no longer own this game and as a result am reviewing this from hazy childhood memory. The two main game modes are firstly a kind of 'campaign mode' where players compete against the computer for specific areas of a map, one region at a time. The other mode is a versus mode, which is similar in essence but allows competition between two human controlled teams. Each battle is set on a small battlefield viewed from an isometric camera angle. Both sides can choose from a varying combination of troops to deploy for each battle and the stronger combinations must be saved for the more difficult battles. In some cases, there are 4 troops available and at other times, there are 5 available. There is also a 'Boot Camp' training mode which allows players to practise their skills on dummies before actually going into any real combat.

The troops are as follows.

Grenadiers - Troops who have a long range of attack and throw grenades.
Launchers - Rocket Launcher wielding troops which can kill enemies instantaneously
Blasters (I think thats what theyre called) - troops which throw dynamite, although they only have a small radius for attack.
Gunners - They have a decent range of attack but lack in accuracy.
Scorchers - Flame-thrower wielding GIs with a very short attack range but deadly power up close.
Medics - Non-playable characters who can be called upon a set number of times to heal wounded men.

The objective of battle is to eradicate the opposition. Each unit has it's own strengths and weaknesses and when initially wounded they can call upon a medic to resurrect them. That is unless they are hit by a rocket launcher, which can sometimes turn the recipient into a skeletal pile of ash if its a good shot.

The battles a very comic book but the troopers are easy to control and the battles are played in real time. If a set number of battles are won in a row by one side then the campaign will end with them becoming the victor.

The game's graphics are a staple of the time although they look very poor compared to todays 3D Call of Duty escapades but thats to be expected. The game's main strength was its simplicity and the capacity for multiplayer which was relatively rare at the time. The soundtrack is quite bare but the effects are nice and quirky, especially the explosions.

Overall, this game is not one to keep you entertained for long nowadays, but in its heyday, did more than its fair share of miles on my Mega Drive. You could probably finish the campaign in a few hours but the game does a certain value in the sense that it is definitely replayable and fun to boot, I believe it is an ideal candidate for a port to a mobile phone game. If you have an emulator, it may be worth giving this a go, just because of its lack of notoriety and what I believe is it distinctly original approach and retro charm but anyone who doesnt whistfully long to be back in the days of Euro '96 probably won't be too impressed. 

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