" Never before has war been such an exciting, happy go lucky event!"

Being a dedicated fan to everything RTS, at first the idea of a turn based Game Boy Advance game sounded a bit fruity, and distasteful. However, after seeing first pictures and video footage from Advance Wars, it was love at first sight. I had this game pre-ordered the day pre-ordering was opened, and I picked it up an hour within release. I knew that this game would redefine portable strategy games, let alone GBA strategy games. This is a story that anyone who has ever bought an Nintendo game has their own version of. With this game I was reminded of why I buy Nintendo products in the first place. Now if that doesn't show how excited I was/am about the whole Advance Wars idea, hopefully I can convey my feelings in this review.

You are the leader of your own force which is known as the Orange Star Army. Upon opening up the game and inserting the cart into my GBA I came upon a Tutorial/Training mode which is common place in Strategy games. What isn't common place is the depth the training goes into, and I'm not complaining. As you delve further into the training it teaches you everything you need to know, and makes you do everything so you know you are capable once you hit the war field. This game bases its gameplay off of logic, and hard-fought thinking games between you and the computer. In may ways Advance Wars is comparable to Chess. It is comparable in the way that you have to line your units to attack the enemy, and the strategy evolved is greater than what appears on the screen. It is actually a very deep game. As for multiplayer, sporting extreme class and style Nintendo enabled Single-Cart play. However, with a single cart you get about 7 units and navigate them around random maps seeking out the enemies 7 men. While this may seem like an excuse to utilize the single-cart feature, in practice, it is amazingly fun, but cannot compare to the full multi-cart experience. With all the same carts you and your friends can choose map, color, teams, and a variety of customizable features for the in game play.

Possibly the strongest part of this game is its difficulty, packaged with 30+ missions that you could do for Campaign mode, Advance Wars is going to last you awhile. In each of the scenarios given from the Campaign mode you will have to battle it out with various leaders of other armies. There are 8 commanding officers in total, and once you have beaten all their needed lightly story-driven missions, you can play with their armies as well. With progress comes rewards, you gain Coins as you complete the game little by little, these coins can be redeemed for maps in the “battle maps” room at a later time. If the 150 maps don't tide you over you can unleash your creative juices and create your own map. However, it is insanely easy to out-balance one side of your map, so you will definitely want to spend a lot of time on them so they are perfectly balanced and professional looking. I have created maps that are a ton better than what Intelligent Systems programmed in the game. However the game only allows you to save 3 maps at a time, which isn't really a big letdown, but I wanted to make new ones all the time so this was a bit conflicting.

At first I had been searching for a portable strategy game, and had come across Mech Platoon which is a great game in its own respect. However the resource management and the overall complexity were all too much for a gamer on the go. Luckily Advance Wars plays it simple, anyone can play it, but mastering it is an entirely different story. I'm sure if I wished to I could cheat the game and exploit little areas where I can trick the AI (I have done it many times.) but it really takes out the trial and error needed to be successful in the game. The gameplay is comprised of capturing cities, and building an elite force of units capable of over-coming all enemy units. In a turn you can begin to take over cities, merge weak units into strong ones, transverse about the land, gain money from previously owned cities, and line up appropriately distanced from your enemy and tap the fire button. To win you can either destroy all the enemy units or send infantry to stomp their HQ.

Looking at the varied units the first thing you may notice is how they are grouped. They are grouped by land/sea/air. Land units are men and tanks, Sea units are boats, and Air units are planes and helicopters, it doesn't get easier to explain than that. The basic and most commonly used unit is the Infantry whom is responsible along with Mechs for taking over cities. The lightest tank is the recon which I use as a scout, since it can travel extended distances that other vehicles just cannot reach. The heaviest tank is the Md. Tank which has been labeled as a cheap and pathetic key to success, but hey it works. I am guessing there are around 15+ controllable units in the game.

This game may seem a bit intense already but after the element of Co-Powers is added in you realize that this game becomes complicates itself with instant repairs, blizzards, and progression of units. The main character Andy uses hyper repair to heal his army back into the competition. Max uses his Co-Power to shoot life into his many tanks, this can be devastating, but will also seemingly increase moral if you are paying out the damage from Max's Co-Power.

The land in the game plays a big role on how things are done. If you can effectively hide lurking Mechs in the many mountains, and can utilize each peace of land to the best of your character's potential, then you have figured out a key element of success in Advance Wars. If you are up high or are in a shrouded area it will be harder for the enemy to launch its devastating weapons on you, but overall you will have an edge which can be manipulated to your liking, depending on the variable which would be the land type you are on.

Now that we have briefly scratched the surface in describing gameplay lets move onto a normally less important area for GBA game: Graphics! Now I know many people have become obsessed with fancy next generation visuals, but you mustn't forget your routes, luckily AW sticks with trying to stay simple and clean with a Manga-esque look that it holds carefully throughout the war. As for the music it is just modern war beats thrown together into an organized fashion, nothing out of the ordinary for Game Boy Advance. The audio didn't really strike any emotions from me at all.

Never before have been able to look at a war game and know that some point into my battle I am going to laugh and smile with delight as I blow stuff to smitherns. Luckily the replay doesn't seem to end for me, and I will countinue to play it in pride until there is a Next Generation reincarnation for the said series.

10/10

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 05/30/04