Cannon Fodder 3 was released in Russia in December 2011 and – via download service GamersGate – Europe and North America on 9 February 2012, receiving mixed reviews.

Cannon Fodder 3 has a basic premise involving American soldiers[2] battling disparate terrorists who have united with the aim of world domination.

They are fragile (though, possessing health bars, are somewhat tougher than the protagonists of the originals),[5] but increase in status and power should they survive; the player is provided with a replacement squad should all his platoon die.

[5] As well as facing large numbers of equally frail enemy infantry, the player must combat vehicles, buildings and turrets which cannot be destroyed with the standard machine guns.

For this reason, the player must rely on explosive secondary weapons such as grenades and rockets, which are essential to destroy enemy structures and more powerful units.

[15] GFI's Oleg Lychaniy stated the developers attempted to retain the most appealing elements of the original Cannon Fodder while attracting new players.

[6] Richard Cobbet, writing in PC Gamer UK said "just maybe, this is going too far", in reference to images of soldiers' gory corpses cleared from the interface by windscreen wipers.

The player is thus forced "to play with aching, paranoid care, picking away at base defences from as far away as possible, and rubbing up against the save points like a lovely cat finally reunited with its owner.

He felt use of strategy to be "limited" but the action "enormous amounts of explosive fun" and enjoyed the gratification of destroying enemies and buildings with rifles and tanks.

The writer found the game a "little repetitive" with a "tendency to grate", which he blamed on somewhat tedious level design, a lack of variety in objectives, a poor camera and long loading times.

He wrote: "In fact, tedium is a frequent bedfellow in Cannon Fodder 3", due to the lack of variety in the gameplay and mission objectives.

The reviewer acknowledged the "wonderfully cartoony" graphics, found the gory windscreen wipers "amusing" and wrote "it’s all over-the-top explosive goodness and contributes a great deal to what little appeal is present".

[4] Strategy Informer felt the game had updated and improved upon the original, noting better controls, more forgiving health bars and save points, and more engaging mission goals.