What Happened To War?

I know it wasn't just me. Many comics have bits about it. One of my favorite bits about it is from John Heffron. He was talking about how times have changed. When he was a kid, his Dad would come home from working the night shift at 7am and kick the kids out of the house. No one would check on them, look for them, there was no Amber Alert and the kids just played all day. The first time his Dad would see him again was at 10pm when he went back in the house.
"You in for the night?" his Dad asked.
"Nope. Just grabbing flash lights."

I remember these summer days. Walk to the store in the morning to grab snacks for the day. And by snacks I mean Lemon Heads, Jolly Ranchers, Air Heads and my favorite Fun Dips! Then build a jump in the afternoon for our bikes, skateboards and scooters. As sunset rolled around it was some type of game. Football, whiffle ball, tag or the ever deadly, Red Rover.

After the sun went down was the real fun. WAR! We broke into teams, set up bases(or safety spots for the wusses like me), gathered ammo(pine cones and flash lights) and the war was on! If you got hit with one pine cone, you were wounded but a team member could get you back to base to be "fixed." Hit twice with a pine cone before being fixed and you were out. If someone from the other team was close enough to shine a flash light in your face without you wounding them or shining them, you were out.

We played for hours! We changed up teams to be fair, but I think my brothers and friends just wanted to trade me around so one team was not stuck with me the whole time. As long as the neighbors did not call to complain about us and Saturday Night Live was still on, Mom watched it each week, we played past mid-night.

What happened to that game? Who wants to burn some calories playing WAR?