Cannon Fodder 2

Playing Cannon Fodder 2 means sending Jools, Jope, and a revolving line of fresh recruits through time-traveling meat grinders, trading machine-gun fire with everything from medieval guards to alien invaders.

The original game earned its reputation by mixing tight mouse controls with a stark, cynical view of war. You pointed, clicked, and watched pixelated soldiers get mowed down by heavy fire, their deaths marked by little white crosses filling up the green hillside menu screen. When Sensible Software teamed up with publisher Virgin Interactive Entertainment, Inc. to produce a sequel in 1994, they did not change the mechanics. Instead, designer Stuart Campbell sent the troops into space.

Aliens, time travel, and a brutal difficulty curve

The premise of Cannon Fodder 2 is absurd right out of the box. Aliens abduct your squad to help them solve their own planetary conflict, shuttling your men across time to fight through medieval battlefields, deserts, tropical jungles, and alien landscapes across 72 stages. To help make sense of the madness, the manual details an invisible alien helper who quietly leaves ammunition dropped around each era so your squad never runs dry.

Your tiny troopers still move via right-clicks and fire their primary rifles with the left button. Mouse movement controls your targeting reticle, meaning you have to lead moving targets while keeping your men out of incoming hitboxes. Beyond basic rifles, collectible grenades and rockets are mandatory for clear runs. Standard bullets bounce right off structures and heavy armor, so if you run out of explosives before destroying every spawn hut or enemy vehicle on a map, the mission is effectively over.

Vehicles offer brief moments of total dominance. Rolling through a map in a tank or clearing infantry with a helicopter cannon feels great, but a single stray rocket will instantly vaporize your whole squad inside. Later stages introduce snowmobiles, mechanical dragons, flying saucers, and rams, each altering your movement speed and turning radius on slippery terrain.

The design trades innovation for punishment

Contemporary reviewers in magazines like PC Games and PC Player pointed out that Cannon Fodder 2 felt more like an expansion pack than a true sequel. There were no new core weapons or dramatic mechanical overhauls, which led to lower review scores around the 70% to 80% mark. What the team did add was sheer hostility in level design. The difficulty spikes early, turning later stages on the Alien Planet into twitch-reflex endurance tests that feel almost unbeatable without pure trial and error.

When the pressure gets too high, old-school players resort to a few famous shortcuts. Typing wellhard mid-mission grants complete invincibility to your active squad, while setting your player name to JOOLS raises the starting rank of your initial recruits. If you wanted to skip straight to late-game maps without grinding through the time periods, you could edit the save file directly: altering the hex values at offset 00 in any `.CF` save file lets you pick any level from 00 to 47.

Sensible Software kept the core structure intact for a reason. The instant responsiveness of the top-down controls set the standard for top-down action games, and the sequel keeps that exact feel. However, the harsh level layouts mean that casual players will hit a wall quickly compared to the more measured pacing of the first game.

How to play Cannon Fodder 2 free in your browser

While playing this 1994 release on modern desktop platforms used to mean fiddling with DOSBox configurations, you can launch the complete 1994 MS-DOS game right now without installing anything. Everything runs directly in your web browser, complete with original mouse aiming and audio support.

If you want to experience this piece of action history, you can play Cannon Fodder 2 online free right here on this page. Grab your mouse, keep your eyes on the reticle, and remember to save your grenades for the huts.