Missile Command

Missile Command was designed to suggest the hopelessness of defending against nuclear war. The arcade game about defending cities from nuclear missiles was made to subtly suggest that such a defense cannot succeed. The message sits in the play itself rather than in any stated commentary.

Game Maker's Toolkit cites it, with Cannon Fodder and Metal Gear Solid, as proof that critical war games existed before Spec Ops: The Line, though not at triple A scale.