Broken
Wars today are such a downer. What with all their collateral damage, destroyed infrastructure, severed limbs, and massive loss of civilian life. But thankfully, not everyone shares this dreary view of war. Nintendo is here to show you that war can be fun! One of the Gameboy Advance's most celebrated games, Advance Wars takes place on a continent made up of several different factions constantly at war with each other. Why? Just for the hell of it apparently. There's no backstory as to why everyone hates each other. There may have been in the instruction manual but I think I lost mine. It doesn't matter though because this game really doesn't need a story and manages to be worthy of my time without one.
Actually, it does have a story, but it's pretty lighthearted, especially for a game set in a world with an almost sexual obsession with war. You play the role of a custom-named, godlike figure who's job it is to direct your units across the battlefield. Before a mission begins, you get to choose a CO to work with. Initially you only have one, but as you progress through the game you'll get 2 more. Each of them give you certain advantages when chosen. Between each of the missions you're treated to a little cut-scene where the characters talk to each other and give you a better understanding of what's going on in the world. It starts with your country being attacked by some other country and then goes into some stuff about clones and whatnot. Nothing particularly engaging, but the dialogue between the characters is pretty fun.
When you first start the game you'll be forced to go through a series of training missions that teach you how everything works. I normally hate tutorials but these weren't so bad. It might have been because I had no idea how to play the game and that if I ever hoped to do so, I would have to learn how. And if I was going to learn, it was better to be taught by Nell (your charming instructor) than by the instruction manual with all its words. Advance Wars is a turn based strategy game, meaning every unit gets a turn per round. You can move your units around the map to better position them or if your close enough, go attack someone. When you attack, it changes to an up-close shot of your units and the enemy units and they shoot at each other, after which, several of them die. The number of people that die depends on a number of things such as the number of personel remaining in that unit, attack power, defense power, the type of unit, and the type of terrain you currently occupy. You can also capture cities or bases which supply you with the funding necessary to build more units or repair damaged ones. You keep doing this until either all of the enemy units have been eliminated, or until you've captured their headquarters. Once in a while a mission will require something more from you, but a vast majority will be won simply by fulfilling either of the two conditions I just mentioned.
Graphics and sound are about what you'd expect from an SNES game. If you appreciate handheld or oldschool games, this should be no problem. If you're a graphics whore, look elsewhere.
The game's pretty addicting. I was playing another strategy game at the same time as this one called Tactics Ogre, which I indefinately put on the back burner (Mini-review: Way too similar to Final Fantasy Tactics but not as fun or addicting. The battles were too slowly paced. For someone as impatient as I, it got tedious to the point of apathy very quickly.) but I kept playing Advance Wars until I had it beat. Once you finish the main campaign you can buy more maps or make your own if you wish to do so. For me, the central campaign was enough. I don't think I'd be able to bring myself to play through it again, but the first time through was nice enough.
