No Game Has Ever Scared Me More Than DEFCON
DEFCON is an extraordinarily bleak real-time strategy game set moments before the end of the world. Tucked away in an underground bunker, you use a retro-futuristic tactical map (inspired by '80s movie WarGames) to command troops, make strategic decisions, and ultimately wage thermonuclear war on your enemies. It isn't a particularly deep strategy game, but its cold, detached depiction of humanity obliterating itself is utterly harrowing.
DEFCON is short for Defence Readiness Condition—a series of numbered alert states, from 1 to 5, which determine how close the United States is to being on the receiving end of a nuclear attack. The lower the number, the more likely it is to happen. Grim stuff, but part of the reality of living in a world dominated by nuclear-equipped superpowers. This is the system that DEFCON, a 2006 game from Prison Architect creator Introversion, is designed around.
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You start at DEFCON 5, placing radar dishes, missile silos, naval fleets, and air bases around your territory to prepare for war. Time is constantly ticking down, and things get more tense at DEFCON 4. Now you can see the movements of enemy units as they're pinged by your radar network. Then, when DEFCON 3 is triggered, the war begins. Skirmishes break out and the map explodes with activity. At DEFCON 2, the ferocity of this world war peaks.
DEFCON 1 is the miserable, inevitable end to every game of DEFCON. There's no way around it. You're given the green light to use nukes, and the map suddenly erupts with white flashes indicating successful impacts. If a major city is hit, the number of casualties appears matter-of-factly over it: ROME HIT. 1.5 MILLION DEAD.
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