Snoopy vs. the Red Baron is a 2006 video game developed by Smart Bomb Media and published by Bandai Namco Entertainment. It was released for the PlayStation 2, PC, and PSP. Rated Everyone 10 and up, it is a flight combat game starring the lovable beagle from Peanuts. The story is presented as Snoopy's dream (that he writes down into a manuscript) starring Snoopy as a WWI flying ace (with numerous other Peanuts characters serving as allies) on a mission to defeat the villainous Red Baron and his Flying Circus. Along the way, he flies in his trademark Sopwith Camel, unleashing bullets, fireworks, potatoes, and other ammunition on all sorts of enemies planes, boats, and mechs.
It got a successor in 2010; see Snoopy Flying Ace for information on that game.
This game contains examples of:
- 100% Completion: Achieving General rank on all levels (which requires collecting every item) unlocks two things: The Octogun, a free upgrade to the machine gun so it shoots eight bullets per volley (twice the damage of the max normal level), and the ability to find and use the Woodstock Missile in multiplayer maps.
- Ability Required to Proceed: Starting with Woods of Montsec, there's one level in each world where you need one of the unlockable weapons to destroy an obstacle to proceed. The game will warn you of this if you lack the weapon when starting the level, and will flat-out lock you out if you haven't bought it yet.
- Abnormal Ammo: The game's weapons range from expected (rockets and missiles) to "out-there" but still feasible (firecrackers, lightning orbs, freezing blasts) to ridiculous (a boomerang, pumpkin seeds, water balloons, potatoes, bees). Even the enemies are guilty of this.
- All Just a Dream: The game exists as a story Snoopy wrote that he is dreaming about. This is established in the manual and seen in the game start-up and ending cutscenes.
- And This Is for...: Peppermint Patty says "This one's for Chuck" during one of her bombing runs.
- Artistic License – History / Anachronism Stew: Not only were things like radar and guided missiles not invented in World War I, many of the robots/mechs used by the Flying Circus never existed and would be difficult to build in 2006. Baron Richthofen is also much more powerful, so powerful that one would think the Flying Circus includes the entire Central Powers based on how large and well-equipped they are. The timeline is also confused, the Battle of Verdun (which took place in 1916) features prominently but occurred before 1917, when the Americans entered the war and before the Sopwith Camel entered service. Of course, it is just Snoopy's fantasy and a fun game, not meant to be particularly accurate.
- Awesome, but Impractical:
- The 10 Gauge Pumpkin is very powerful, but it's hard to use outside of boss fights, since it consumes two ammo per shot with a capacity of 16, and its low range means that it's very easy to waste shots.
- The Woodstock Missile in multiplayer mode. You still control it like in the campaign, but your camera doesn't focus on it, so moving it towards a target is much more difficult. With every other weapon available on the map, there's little reason to use it outside of messing around.
- Battleship Raid: The first Boss Fight in the game is a Battleship that attacks the aerodrome, which Snoopy flies around so the Woodstock Gunner can sink it.
- the final area in the game, and the penultimate mission, is a large "Flying Fortress" that Snoopy flies around and attacks.
- Bee-Bee Gun: The Stinger allows Snoopy to shoot bees at enemies.
- Big Bad: The Red Baron, leader of the Flying Circus.
- Big Good: The role is split between Lucy (the primary military commander) and Marcie (the brains of the allied operations and the authority on the Sopwith Camel). Marcie takes precedent by the end of the game due to Lucy being captured.
- Bleak Level: Front Lines of Verdun is a dirty war zone, in contrast with the rest of the game.
- Bloodless Carnage: As violent as it is for a Peanuts game, this is played straight. The majority of the enemies Snoopy blows up are machines, and anything that's piloted has the person inside eject with a parachute when their vehicle goes down.
- Boss-Arena Idiocy: The Flying Circus boasts that Major Catastrophe, their massive war tank, is invincible. This is true... until they decide to ignore Snoopy and head for the front lines, parking the vehicle on a stone bridge with weak supports over a river.
- Bragging Rights Reward: The Octogun tears through enemies extremely quickly, but it's unlocked by achieving the max rank on every level. It's useful for grinding money to buy multiplayer characters, but that's it.
- Brits with Battleships: The Peanuts Characters are in the role of the Allies, and presumably the British in particular; the British roundels (used historically by the Royal Flying Corps and Royal Air Force) are used to represent the Allies in-game.
- Butt-Monkey: Charlie Brown as usual, but he gets it far worse. You can't get much more unlucky than being cast as a janitor in Snoopy's WWI story/fantasy, getting abducted by the bad guys because you were holding onto secret plans, and getting fired off with the rocket built by said plans.
- Color-Coded Speech: Dialogue from the enemies is shown with red text.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: Averted with Charlie Brown (as he survives), where for the very final mission is strapped to the doodlebug (V-1) as it's fired. Regardless, this is still pretty harsh- even for German standards.
- Chainsaw Good: Major Chaos, the Flying Circus's logging harvester, has two chainsaw arms that it uses to fight. The driller machine later in the game uses buzzsaws in one phase.
- Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Pigpen and Schroeder only appear in the Aerodrome Island levels early in the game.
- Damsel out of Distress: Lucy is captured in Verdon Gorge while Snoopy is in the Matterhorn mines, but manages to escape during the final battle, and manages to briefly engage the Red Baron himself before being forced to bail out.
- Death Mountain: The fourth area of the game is the Mines of the Matterhorn, where Snoopy is flying in snowy alpine valleys.
- Dieselpunk: Aside from WWI-type biplanes, PT boats, U-Boats, and tanks, the Flying Circus also has Dieselpunk helicopters, drones, and mechs, and the Flying Circus overall has a very Dieselpunk feel to it.
- Distressed Dude: Charlie Brown is kidnapped by the Red Baron's men in the Woods of Montsec intro, imprisoned somewhere in Verdon Gorge by the Front Lines of Verdun intro, and then strapped to a rocket during the final battle. Rerun and Franklin are also captured trying to rescue Charlie Brown, and manage to escape, but Franklin's guns are disabled and Rerun's plane is badly damaged, forcing them to disengage.
- Duel Boss: Due to Lucy being shot down early in the level, the Red Baron fight is a straight dogfight between him and Snoopy, with no allies on either side (aside from Marcie's airdrops).
- Dwindling Party: The Peanuts characters acting as the Allies. First, Charlie Brown is kidnapped in the intro to the Woods of Montsec. Schroeder and Pigpen appear as an Allied PT Boat captain and a Quartermaster (respectively) exactly once each in the Aerodrome Island levels. Peppermint Patty appears as a bomber pilot in the Aerodrome Island and Front Lines of Verdun levels before being Put on a Bus. Then Lucy, Franklin, and Rerun are captured while Snoopy is fighting in the Matterhorn. Then Linus faints after seeing the fully-functional Doodlebug bomb. Only Snoopy, Sally, and Marcie are still active by the end of the game.
- Edible Ammunition: Among the special weapons are potatoes and pumpkins.
- Elaborate Underground Base: The Flying Circus has these in Aerodrome Island (on the nearby Outpost Island), Mines of the Matterhorn (a large underground mining operation that takes up the last two levels) and Verdon Gorge (built into the canyon walls).
- Enemy Chatter: During the levels, you'll frequently overhear the troops and commanders of the Flying Circus talking about their plans. This turns into Boss Banter during boss fights.
- Fake Nationality: In-Universe. The Peanuts characters are all American, but in the game they are acting in the role of the British (the RFC/RAF roundel is used to represent the Allies in-game), and mostly use British and French roundels on their aircraft (or variants where the circle is replaced with a heart, or more personal heraldry like Schroeder's plane using his piano as a symbol). Only Rerun's plane is marked with American (Army Air Corps) roundels.
- Final Boss: At first it seems like the Red Baron himself is the Final Boss, only for your duel with him to be interrupted by the launching of the actual Final Boss, the Doodlebug Bomb.
- Final Boss Preview: The Red Baron appears at the end of the first Aerodrome Island mission, though you don't fight him and are expected to immediately flee to the home base.
- Flunky Boss: The Circus aircraft carrier is initially nearly immune to attacks, but doesn't fight on its own. By destroying all the fighter waves it sends out, it tries to attack with guns and exposes a weak point in the process.
- Frontline General: Supreme commander Lucy isn't afraid to go flying into battle herself. this backfires when she gets captured while Snoopy is in the Mines of the Matterhorn.
- "Get Back Here!" Boss: The Doodlebug gets a head start in the final level, so Marcie drops rings that Snoopy needs to fly through to catch up with it.
- The Goomba: The Blue Fighters, the standard plane variety and the weakest of them all.
- Gotta Catch Them All: The various colors of balloons (which unlock weapons needed to progress if you collect at least half of a certain color) and the letters (which let you buy a multiplayer character if you collect all of them in a world).
- Green Hill Zone: Aerodrome Island and Verdon Gorge. The former is the first area, but the latter is the second-to-last.
- Heroic Mime: Snoopy never talks, he only laughs or makes other sounds.
- Hub Level: The baseball field and schoolhouse in the neighborhood where Peanuts takess place. There, you can access training and the shop, and fly into billboards to start levels.
- Hyperactive Metabolism: Collecting root beer restores Snoopy's health.
- Kaiserreich: The Flying Circus seems to be a Dieselpunk amalgamation of not just the Luftstreitkrafte, but also the Imperial German Army and Imperial German Navy. Regular soldiers are depicted with Stahlhelm helmets, while Officers wear Pickelhauben.
- Level in the Clouds: the final area is in the middle of the air, around the Red Baron's "flying fortress".
- Lighter and Softer: Compared to many other WWI works.
- Locomotive Level: the second Mines of the Matterhorn mission is a boss fight against an armored freight train carrying Doodlebug parts.
- The Lost Woods: The Woods of Montsec, where the Flying Circus has made a hidden base, is the second area of the game. The area boss is a massive logging machine.
- Mission Control: The role jumps around a lot, depending on who is assisting in a area:
- Aerodrome Island/Front Lines of Verdun: Lucy, serving as the commander for the allied forces in those areas.
- Woods of Montsec: Linus, helping Snoopy on a mission to take out a secret Flying Circus base.
- Mines of the Matterhorn: Sally, joining you on a stealth mission to take out enemy resources.
- Verdon Gorge/ Flying Fortress: Linus and Marcie, due to Lucy being captured. In the game's final level, Linus faints from seeing Charlie Brown's predicament, leaving just Marcie to assist Snoopy.
- Mythology Gag: Numerous ones to the original comics:
- A few character traits get off-hand mentions, such as Linus craving his blanket in a rough moment, or Marcie addressing Peppermint Patty as "Sir" in a cutscene.
- In the opening cutscene, Charlie Brown says that Snoopy dreams about being a famous writer or a tennis pro, two things he did frequently in the comics.
- Snoopy starts out without the Sopwith Camel, instead flying in his bullet-ridden doghouse, as would frequently happen during his WWI fantasies.
- Sally's habit of mangled school reports is replicated in the Woods of Montsec cutscene, where she does a report on said woods.
- In the Front Lines of Verdun cutscene, Charlie Brown writes to the allies in the same way he writes to his "pencil pal" in the comics.
- Charlie Brown's continuous wishes for a normal dog are turned on their head when, while strapped to the Doodlebug, he exclaims that he'll never wish for a normal dog again. He says it directly in the final cutscene.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Marcie's plans for an ally superweapon get stolen by the Flying Circus early in the game and used to build the Doodlebug that gets launched at the British Isles. The story never establishes why she designed such a thing, as the allies don't seem to have the necessary manpower to build it.
- Player-Guided Missile: The Woodstock Missile does heavy damage, but Woodstock must pilot it into the target.
- Playing with Fire: The Flame Boomerang, one of the special weapons.
- Portal Picture: You enter levels by flying through billboards in the Hub Level.
- Put on a Bus: Peppermint Patty only appears as a bomber pilot in three levels (once in Aerodrome Island and twice in the Front Lines of Verdun), and is not seen afterwards. Pigpen appears once to receive a freight shipment in an Escort Mission in Aerodrome Island, and Schroeder appears once as a PT Boat captain in the Allied attack on Outpost Island; neither appear in later areas.
- After being captured by the Flying Circus and then escaping during the final battle, Franklin and Rerun have to depart due to their planes being too damaged to fight.
- Red Baron: The Trope Namer himself is the Big Bad.
- Re Militarized Zone: The Front Lines of Verdun is an active war zone that makes up the third area of the game, and is the closest area of the game to a typical WWI Western Front setting.
- Scary Scorpions: The harvester boss seems to be designed after one, with a water-spewing tail, an extendable jaw, several tiny legs, and two chainsaw "claws".
- Shotguns Are Just Better: The 10 Gauge Pumpkin is a pumpkin shotgun.
- Short-Range Shotgun: The 10 Gauge Pumpkin has a very short range, and it'll do more damage when fired closer to the target.
- Show Within a Show: The plot is presented as a story written by Snoopy, with him and the other Peanuts characters playing roles in it.
- Slippy-Slidey Ice World: The outside portions of Mines of the Matterhorn, taking place in the snowy mountains.
- Strapped to a Rocket: Charlie Brown is tied to the Doodlebug when it is launched. After destroying its boosters, he wriggles free and parachutes away, letting Snoopy attack the missile without hurting him.
- Tank Goodness: They appear throughout the game, primarily in Front Lines of Verdun. That world also features a massive boss tank, Major Catastrophe.
- Tempting Fate: Charlie Brown in the hangar, upon finding the top-secret plans: "These must be the secret plans to the Doodlebug Bomb! It would be terrible if something were to happen to them! It might change the whole outcome of the war!" He gets kidnapped, along with the plans, immediately afterwards.
- This Is a Drill: Driller robots are a frequent tool used by the Flying Circus to destroy structures. They have a boss variant in General Mayhem, a drilling tank in the mines.
- Time-Limit Boss: Many bosses have time limits for either the entire battle or just parts of it. Most are just listed timers, but the battleship has a different variety: it starts attacking Aerodrome Island in the last phase, and it must be destroyed before it blows up the main base.
- Underground Level: The last two levels of the Mines of the Matterhorn area both have Snoopy flying through underground mines.
- Unexpected Gameplay Change: Bosses are either fought with the Woodstock Gunner (turning the game into an on-rails shooter) or by pursuing them with Snoopy (where it becomes a 3D shoot-em-up in the vein of Star Fox). Only the Red Baron is fought in the standard dogfight mode.
- Unique Enemy: "Destroy Circus City" features a Big Bertha cannon, which can down the plane in a few hits but can be destroyed by going behind it via a tunnel, and two riveter machines that guard transport bridges.
- Unobtanium: The Mines of the Matterhorn arc is based around Snoopy and Sally stopping the Flying Circus from shipping a rare element needed for their superweapons. Its name? Unobtanium.
- War Has Never Been So Much Fun: How else do you describe a WWI game starring the Peanuts cast?
- Weapons of Mass Destruction: The Doodlebug bomb is extremely powerful. Charlie brown says that "It could change the whole outcome of the War." In the mission briefing for the final level, Linus states: "We've confirmed that the Doodlebug is heading toward (the) British Isle! If you don't stop it, we've lost the entire War!"
- Worthy Opponent: At the end of your fight with the Red Baron, before you disengage to shoot down the Doodlebug Bomb, the Red Baron admits that "it has been an honor" to fight the player.
- Averted for the Officers and soldiers of the Flying Circus, who regard Snoopy as an annoyance at best.
- You Can't Thwart Stage One: Despite all the effort you go through, the Flying Circus will still build the Doodlebug by the end of the game. It's possible that you stopped them from mass-producing it, at least.
