General Chaos Retrospective

I was a Sega kid growing up. I had a Genesis, a Game gear and didn’t have an SNES until just last year. So, today, I wanted to talk about another game that I played a lot when I was a kid that most people I talk to know nothing about about: General Chaos on the Sega Genesis.

The game came out August 15th, 1993 and was developed by Game Refuge Inc. and published by the devil—I mean, EA. It boiled down tactics and strategy to a more arcade-y, cartoon style where battles would last a few minutes at most. The game also supports multiplayer, so you can play side-by-side or head-to-head with your friends. My dad and I would play this game all the time.

I’ve had a fondness for Isometric games for as long as I can remember, and General Chaos might be part of the reason. You play from a top-down perspective and control a squad of up to five soldiers to combat the forces of General Havoc. The objective of the game is to win a series of battles and take over the enemy capital. Not a whole lot of story here.

There are five different types of soldiers in the game, and they all have distinct playstyles and designs.

Gunners have machine guns that they use to do a quick mid-range spray over multiple enemies—good for locking down a group to line up one of your hard-hitters. They look like the traditional macho soldier stereotype: crew cut, sleeveless shirt, clean-shaven.

Chuckers are long-range grenadiers with a smaller area of effect, but the blast does go over cover. You can run around and bomb people to support your close fighters. They sport an orange head of hair, a bushy beard and a white headband, looking an awful lot like a cartoon Chuck Norris.

Launchers are the longest-ranged units in the game able to fire their bazookas from edge-to-edge. Their weapons are also capable of inflicting instant death on struck enemies, turning them into a pile of bones and preventing them from being saved by a medic. They wear an American WWII-style helmet.

Scorches are, as the name might suggest, flamethrower troops and known for their fast attacks and short range. They’re also capable of the rare insta-kill mechanic, able to char up a whole group of clumped-up enemies. Sunglasses that look like goggles and fuel tanks are their distinctive style.

Blasters carry short-range explosives meant to bypass cover and deal massive damage in a wide radius. Their slow attack speed and close range balance out their destructive power, but they often end up getting downed before laying into the enemy. A goatee and eyepatch mark them.

At the start of a battle, you’ll be prompted to pick from squad “A” or “B.” They have predetermined mixtures of the aforementioned soldier types each fight, sometimes narrowing it down to five of a class. A match with five Gunners is a hilarious bout of dakka-dakka Orks would be proud of. There’s also a “commando" squad choice where you only get two soldiers, but you have active control over their movement instead of the usual point-and-click.

The battles start without any fanfare, and you get stuck right in. You cycle through your different squadmates with one button, tell them to move with another and shoot with the last. It’s all about quick decisions and positioning your units for maximum damage while reducing the opportunities for your opponent to strike. If one of your guys gets downed, you can have another soldier run over to him and call a medic to bring him back to the fight. You can only call two medics per battle, though.

Rivers, ponds, lakes, trees, rocks, sandbags, the occasional wreaked vehicle and building all make up the different terrain and obstacles.

Any unit can cross a water hazard, but their movement speed is crippled, and they can still be shot at. The scorcher also has a bigger penalty for entering water as his flamethrower will shoot harmless bubbles for a few seconds after exiting. If you get knocked into water, your character will drown with no chance of recovery.

Objects that block line-of-sight will also block incoming fire from the Gunners and Launchers. Some things break, like vehicle wrecks and guard houses, while most things in nature are permanent. The best cover is behind sandbags…until a Blaster pins you down with TNT.

While you’re running your troops around, they can come into contact with the enemy and engage in a melee brawl denoted by a cartoon dust cloud with punches and kicks. There’s two types: automatic ones and ones where it throws everyone nearby away and the two fighters duke it out in fisticuffs.

You have the option to punch, kick or block in these mini-games. Punching is quicker than kicking but does less damage, while blocking nullifies all incoming attacks. Once one of the fighters loses all their pips of health, they lose and fall over. Sometimes, the soldier just fakes it and pulls a gun while on the ground, flip-flopping the whole segment. It does feel cheap at times, but the reaction of a new player who doesn’t know is priceless.

The last thing of note for the game is the music or lack thereof. There’s only one music track that plays throughout the game—and only in the menus; there’s no music during combat—and it’s this patriotic little tune that gets stuck in your head. It’s the driving force for this whole post since I couldn’t get it out of my head from the last time I played it.

That’s pretty much it for General Chaos. The game doesn’t have a lot of meat on its bones, but the variable squads and, albeit light, tactics makes the game highly enjoyable and re-playable. It’s one of my favorite games on the Genesis and holds a special place in my childhood. I recommend picking it up if you have a Genesis, it’s pretty cheap, and having some wacky fun.