Harpoon

Harpoon is a naval simulator that uses data regarding real military equipment and weaponry, based on a miniatures wargame. The game does not use preset battle algorithms to control the outcome of combat, and does not control play balance between sides. The game comes with a user's guide with an appendix of information on the politics between superpowers and modern maritime warfare strategies, a Harpoon Tactical Guide by Larry Bond, and a booklet by author Tom Clancy about Russian destroyers. Clancy used the simulation to test the naval battles for Red Storm Rising, which he co-authored with Bond.

Harpoon is a game in which the player is the commander of either NATO or Soviet forces, making judgment calls and sending orders to ships and aircraft, armed with weapon systems selected from more than 100 available options. The game mainly focuses on combat in the GIUK Gap.

In the late 1970s, a manual wargame called SEATAG was introduced by the United States Navy for exploring tactical options. It was available in both classified and unclassified versions. SEATAG was developed into a true tactical training game called NAVTAG that ran on three networked microcomputers for the Red Side, Blue Side, and Game Control.

Former naval officer and future author Larry Bond's exposure to this system in 1980 while on active duty led to the eventual development of Harpoon.

Sales of Harpoon surpassed 80,000 copies by 1993.

In the February 1990 edition of Computer Gaming World, M. Evan Brooks, a United States military officer, gave the game five stars out of five. He stated that "there is no question that Harpoon is the most detailed simulation to appear in the civilian marketplace ... a must-have for the serious naval gamer", and that he had learned more from six hours with the game than one year at the Naval War College.