"Advanced on all fronts."

Did you know you can apply Philosophy to video games?

A guy called Occam created a sort of meta-argument called "Occam's Razor". The idea was that a simpler argument was much more likely to be right. Most of the time, we can relate to this idea. In the world of games, this philosophy also applies. Some games are brilliant because they are so simple. Others are bad because they take a good idea and needlessly complicate it to the point where the original idea is unrecognizable behind a cloud of complications.

Advance Wars is one game that is so brilliant because it is so simple.

Ever played chess? Probably. Advance Wars is somewhat akin to chess. Ironically, it is essentially chess with some complications added, but these "complications" serve to make the game more interesting rather than simply hide the point of the game. Like chess, you aim to eliminate your opponent's army or eliminate key pieces. Like chess, you can play with many pieces, each with it's own way of getting around and attacking. The concept of chess is clearly recognizable in Advance Wars, despite the additions.

So what do you actually do in Advance Wars? Well, as you've probably figured out by now, it's a war game, played between opposing armies. You have units such as tanks and infantry, which you must move across the battlefield to attack the forces of your opponent. At the beginning, that is really all there is to it. But of course, you quickly learn that this game is a lot more complex than it seems. Of course, it takes time to acquaint yourself with the units of the game, which vary by the way they move, the way they attack, their abilities, and such. You must learn the various terrain you can move across and how you can use it to your advantage. You must learn to navigate through snow and rain and fog. You must learn the art of capturing properties for money, and taking care of your units.

Interestingly enough, you are not actually a commanding officer, although you DO do a lot of commanding. You play as an advisor to the commanding officer (and there are several different commanding officers that have various skills in unit command) who makes all the decisions so the COs themselves can stick to actually taking care of the units. You begin by completing Field Training, and then you begin the main Campaign (Story mode, essentially) in which you take command of an army proper and guide them through the events of the game. The actual story is the typical invading country that must be fought off, which soon develops into a full blown world war, as neighboring countries attack you for seemingly no reason while you pass through. For a non story oriented game, it's actually quite a decent story.

Gameplay - 10

War it may be, but real time, it is not. Just like chess, the game is turn based, but there is one fundamental difference to chess - you move your entire army in one go. You do all the commanding by moving a cursor over the battlefield, selecting units, and moving it, again using the cursor, and choosing available actions such as firing on enemies or capturing property from a menu.

The actual units are incredibly diverse. You've got your basic infantry and mechanized infantry, you've got your tanks, your artillery and your armoured personnel carriers. You eventually get planes and copters in the skies, and ships and subs at sea. Some units are easy to command, such as copters, while others have particular and specific uses, such as Cruisers, which target air units and subs, and can also carry copters. Each unit has an index for how far they can move (as well as a movement type that governs how they handle terrain), for how much ammo and fuel they can carry, the range at which they can fire, and how far they can see in fog. Some missions allow you to take control of bases, airports and seaports so you can build units for yourself - at a cost.

You probably won't just be able to use any unit at any time, however. Firstly because some units are just not available, or because the CO you are using isn't particularly skilled with that unit. There are about 11 COs in the game, and each is different, and has different tastes in units. Some are polar opposites, such as Max (who excels in direct combat with tanks and such, but lacks in indirect fire and has less range) and Grit (who excels in indirect fire and has longer range but is lacking in the tank department). Some are completely average, and some are more difficult to use (such as Sami, who excels in the use of infantry and can capture properties quickly but isn't skilled in direct combat).

And each CO has a special "CO Power" that they can utilize after taking enough damage. Some are obvious (Max's tanks get stronger still) and some are a little unexpected (Drake, who excels at sea, instead of powering up his armada, settles for a tidal wave that damages enemy units). They add a nice touch to the game when it is in danger of getting boring.

Terrain is another feature that allows for variety. Each terrain has different effects on different units. Roads allow for easy traveling but do not provide any defensive cover. Plains prove no problem for foot soldiers or tanks but can impede other vehicles. Forests are mostly navigable only on foot, and are a hassle to drive through. Mountains are completely inaccessible to vehicles but provide excellent cover for infantry, and also as a vantage point to see over the fog. Then of course, you have properties, which provide daily funds, and also repair some units.

The weather can completely swerve the course of battle. In snow, all units suffer reduced movement, especially vehicles on tires. Mountains become completely uninhabitable, and forests likewise. Roads are unaffected. Rain can damage plains and reduce vision in fog.

The most interesting condition is Fog of War. Normally, you see the entirety of the battlefield, but in Fog of War, you can see only what your units can see, which adds a new level of strategy. Some units are weak but have outstanding visual range, and others can extend their vision (such as infantry on mountains). Units can hide in forests and reefs at sea, and can only be seen from close up. You can spring traps on unsuspecting enemies. If you rush into Fog, you'll be wiped out.

Graphics and Sound - 8

The graphics are all colorful and detailed, and have a somewhat cartoony look and feel to them. The units on the map you look at for most of the battle are detailed enough, and when you fire on enemies, you see the units up close and they look very nice and are animated beautifully. The up close animations are among some of the best graphics seen on the GBA, ever.

Sounds... of course, you've got all the standard warfare noises. Guns firing, cannons blazing, bombs whistling, bullets ricocheting. It's all there. The music isn't really all that good and it's what's spoiling the score for this section. The menu and campaign screens always give you the same, repetitive theme, and during battles, each CO has their own theme that plays continuously during their turn. There is a short jingle that plays when a CO Power is used, but otherwise, that's all the music there is. The CO themes on the whole aren't that BAD per se, but some of them are a bit awful. I once had the misfortune of playing Max's theme through a pair of headphones. The base on that theme is simply awful.

Replay Value - 10

For starters, there's the Campaign itself. You'll have to play it a couple times to get maximum benefit, though. Why? Well, to unlock characters to use in other game modes, you must first complete Campaign. The catch is that you can only unlock two or three characters at a time depending on what you do in Campaign mode, so you'll have to clear it multiple times. Four COs are available from the start, so you'll still be able to have some choice.

Once you're done with Campaign, you can move on to Advanced Campaign - which is rediculously, rediculously hard. It's a real challenge, and it does what this game generally does best - it makes you think. Hard. AC is the same as normal Campaign, only with new units added or removed from either side, and also, in some cases, Fog of War is added. Most of the missions in AC are speed oriented, and the best way to gain max points is to rush for the enemies headquarters and capture it before they have a chance to strike.

Second, there's the War Room. This is basically a collection of sidequest-esque missions for you to do. They're all about strategy, and some of them have you at a ridiculous disadvantage which you must work your way out of. There are several War Room missions, which cover all the COs in the game. You can use any unlocked CO in the War Room.

Third, there's VS mode. Here, you can select any map (War Room Maps or prebuilt multiplayer maps, which are bought using money acquired in Campaign) and battle it out with the enemies of your choice, on the map of your choice, with the conditions of your choice. You can vary the number of players, allegiances, the weather, the number of days to battle, the amount of money you earn per property, and so on.

Fourth, there's Design Maps. Here, you can build the map of your dreams and save it for use in VS mode. There are some limitations (you can only have up to 60 properties and 50 units per army), but you have an immense amount of freedom when designing maps.

Fifth, there's multiplayer mode. There are two ways to play multiplayer. The first is to use VS mode, which, due to the turn based nature of the game, can be handled in a "hot seat" fashion in which the GBA is passed between the players. Or, you can use Link Mode, where you can link up GBAs to play against eachother. You can play either Multi-Pak mode, which is essentially the same as VS mode, or Single-Pak mode, which gives each player the same number of units, on a generic map, using generic COs and isn't very fun at all. Just use VS mode instead if you only have one copy of the game. One other thing you can do in Link Mode is trade Design Maps between players, which is a nice touch.

There's one other point - at the end of each War Room and Campaign Mission, you are ranked on your performance in Speed (how fast you cleared the map), Power (how many enemy units you took out) and Technique (how many units you lost). In the War Room, you are also given a score of 1 to 999. Even though once you've got above 950 and secured an S rank there isn't much more to do, the bragging rights of straight 999s are too much to pass up. You also have an Army Rank which is increased solely by collecting coins and doesn't really serve any purpose besides further bragging rights. Still, it's rewarding to finally achieve the Gold Dragon rank.

In Summary: 10
Note - that's not an average score!

Advance Wars is a brilliantly simple, simply brilliant game that makes you think. It's got the most important features of any game done perfectly - Gameplay and Replay. It backs this up with decent graphics and sound. It's incredibly fun and intellectually stimulating to play, especially when you play with friends. Due to the diversity of the game and it's COs, you will quickly find yourself developing your own unique play style which (hopefully) you can apply to any situation. Eventually, you will be skilled with everyone enough to fight your way through the toughest of disadvantages. The game has a mildly entertaining story that takes you through Campaign mode, and the War Room missions are fun on their own. A right round great game.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 06/16/04