Advance Wars is finally back after a 15-year series hiatus, and I’ve had the opportunity to jump into the remake of the first two games: Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp. I will admit that I’m a beginner when it comes to strategy games, and I never played the original releases. Despite that, Advance Wars has been easy for me to pick up and learn, and I’m enjoying my experience with it so far.
In the game, you take control of an army called Orange Star and must use strategy and tactical maneuvers to defeat your opponents. You must manage resources, build units, and plan your attacks carefully to gain the upper hand. The game is played on a grid-based map, and each side takes turns moving their units and attacking their opponents.
In each turn, you can move your units and attack your opponent’s units or structures. Units include infantry, tanks, planes, and ships, and each unit has its own strengths and weaknesses. For example, infantry units are cheap and can capture buildings, but they are weak against most other unit types. Tanks are strong against infantry and other ground units but are vulnerable to air attacks.
The game does a pretty good job of teaching you how to properly use each type of unit. There are many of them to remember, but luckily, you can access an in-game guidebook to remind yourself what each unit does; I used this often throughout the first few missions as I was learning.
To win a battle, there are two win conditions: you can either defeat all of your opponent’s units or capture their headquarters. I’m grateful that there is more than one way to win; when one of my strategies fails, I tend to have better success going for the other objective on the next attempt.
In addition to strategizing with the different types of units, Advance Wars throws in a few other challenges to spice up the gameplay. One of them is the use of terrain, which changes how units move or behave. One of the trickiest terrain conditions is called Fog of War, which is a fog on some maps that conceals opponents at a distance but can also be used to your advantage to hide within.
Another challenge you’ll need to navigate is each army’s Commanding Officer (CO) who has a unique power that can be used throughout a battle. During the campaign, you can choose from a few different COs you’ve unlocked, and each has his or her own strength.
I like using Andy, the default CO, because his power allows him to repair and heal units every few turns, which is super helpful. But I’ve also unlocked Max, another CO, whose power grants additional movement range and unit power. Some opponent COs can use very deadly powers, such as the ability to move units twice in a single turn.
Advance Wars is simple to pick up and play, especially for newcomers to tactics games. The game’s tutorial does an excellent job of introducing new players to the mechanics and gameplay elements, while the campaign mode gradually ramps up the difficulty as players progress through the story. At the end of each mission, you are awarded a score based on how fast and efficiently you won the battle.
I absolutely adore the art style of this remake. It reminds me of little toys on a game board, and nothing is ever too violently depicted despite being a game about warfare. The graphics are bright and colorful with lively cartoon-like animations that make each character and unit feel unique and distinct.
There is voice acting, but not every line is read aloud. I’m not too bothered by this, but there is so little dialogue that it makes me wonder why they didn’t just have the actors record it all.
The main characters in Advance Wars are very fun and full of quirky personalities. The opponents seem pretty basic though, so I’m very curious about where the story will go in terms of the big villains and what their motivations are. At least in the beginning missions, the emphasis is more on gameplay than on the story.
One quality of life feature that I’m grateful for is a “speed up” button you can hold to fast forward through enemy attacks. It doesn’t skip them entirely, so you can still watch what your opponent is doing, but it goes so much faster than the default speed to save some time.
Something that I really wish was included in this remake was touchscreen support. I play in handheld mode a lot, and I often find myself wanting to tap on my units to move them. Unfortunately, there is no touchscreen support at all.
Overall, I’m enjoying my time with Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp so far. I’m 10 missions into the main campaign of the first game, so I’ve still got a bit ahead of me to experience, but I’m pleasantly surprised with what I’ve played. A few missions have been a little tough already, but I’m not super experienced with this genre of gameplay, so veterans likely wouldn’t find it as difficult.
There are a few parts of the game that I haven’t had a chance to dive into yet, such as the custom map designer, the collectibles shop, or the local/online multiplayer battles. I’ve honestly just been too engrossed with the campaign missions; the game has that “I’ll do just one more battle before I stop” type of feel to it.
I’m looking forward to playing more of Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp over the next few weeks. The game releases later this month on April 21, so keep an eye out for our full review before it launches.
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