Smoke Grenade

Lore & Background

In the world of GoldenEye: 007, the Smoke Grenade is a standard-issue field device carried by operatives working alongside or against James Bond. It is not a weapon of destruction but of disruption: a compressed canister of smokescreen compound that, once its fuse burns down, vents a thick grey-white cloud capable of swallowing an entire corridor or open courtyard in seconds. In the hands of a well-trained agent, it is the difference between a clean extraction and a firefight. The item reflects the game's broader design philosophy, in which Rare gave the player a small but meaningful set of non-gun tools to break the rhythm of pure shooting. The Smoke Grenade sits alongside the Molotov Cocktail as one of the throwable ordnance options, each solving a different tactical problem. Where the Molotov denies space through fire, the Smoke Grenade denies information through obscurity, forcing enemies to fire blindly or abandon their position. Within the narrative of the game, these items are found scattered across the various facilities the player infiltrates, suggesting they are part of the standard kit of the security forces guarding those sites. Their presence in enemy hands as well as the player's underscores that they are a universal tool of modern close-quarters operations, valued not for what they kill but for what they hide.

In Their Own Story

The corridor beyond the blast door was a kill-box. Three guards, two angles, a long sightline that left Bond no cover between the doorframe and the far wall. He checked his magazine. Enough rounds, but not enough time to close the gap without a round finding his shoulder first. His fingers found the canister in his side pocket — the smoke grenade, its pin already pulled in the last room. He counted to two, then three, and flicked it in a low arc toward the centre of the corridor. The hiss of the fuse was a thin, reedy whistle. He was already moving, flat against the wall, sliding the door shut behind him. The cloud bloomed. Not a puff — a wall of grey that swallowed the corridor whole, thick enough to turn the overhead fluorescents into pale, useless smears. He heard the guards' voices rise, a sharp bark of an order, the rattle of a magazine being checked. Then the ragged, uncertain sound of someone firing into nothing, rounds sparking off the tile floor. Bond stepped through the grey. The world was a watercolour of white and grey, shapes dissolving at the edges. He moved by sound and memory, two more steps, and the corridor was empty behind him. The smoke would thin in a minute, maybe two. He had less than that. He had enough.

Reader's Guide

The Smoke Grenade is a throwable, non-lethal item found in select areas of GoldenEye: 007. Picking one up adds it to your throwable inventory; you then aim and throw it like any other projectile. Once it lands and its short fuse expires, it vents a dense cloud of smoke that persists for a limited time, blocking the line of sight of both enemies and the player within its radius. Tactically, the grenade is best used in three situations. First, to break a sustained firefight: throwing it into a corridor or open room forces enemies to fire blindly, giving you a window to reposition or reload. Second, to cover a retreat: if you are pinned down with low health, a well-placed smoke cloud between you and the nearest threat can buy the seconds needed to back away to cover. Third, to mask a flanking move: deploy it in the main room while you loop around to an alternate angle, letting the confusion buy you a clean shot from the side. Because the cloud obscures your own vision as well, do not throw it directly in front of you unless you are already behind cover. Also note that the grenade is finite per level; wasting one on a single guard in an open area is a poor trade when a single aimed shot would suffice. Save it for moments where numbers, angles, or sustained fire make a direct engagement too costly.

Did You Know?

• In GoldenEye: 007, the Smoke Grenade is one of only a handful of non-gun throwable items, making it a deliberate tactical counterpoint to the game's otherwise firearms-heavy combat loop.
• The smoke cloud affects the player as well as enemies, meaning a poorly placed grenade can blind you just as effectively as it blinds your target.
• The item is non-lethal by design: it deals no direct damage to enemies, making it the only throwable in the game whose sole purpose is to manipulate the battlefield rather than eliminate a threat.
• Rare's design for the N64 version of GoldenEye: 007 gave players a small, fixed set of throwable ordnance per level, so the Smoke Grenade's availability varied depending on which areas of a stage you explored.