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Advance Wars - Dual Strike: Reviews

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Game Score: 9/10

If you like strategy games, then look no further than Advance Wars DS. Disappointingly, not too much has been added this around, forcing the game to rely primarily on its original gameplay formula. Luckily, this formula definitely works, and what little new elements were added (however trivial they may be) only serve to improve that formula.

For those new to the game, the formula consists of moving military units (land, air, and sea) across a map/board and killing your enemy/capturing properties. Unlike other popular SRPGs, you produce generic units rather than control specific characters that can level up.

Graphics and sound in this edition of Advance Wars are much nicer than those of AW's predecessor, but remain largely unchanged. Everything still looks and sounds great both on and off the battlefield.

A few gameplay elements have been added, such as the new so-called Dual Strike system. Here, you fight on two fronts instead of just one, with some catches: one, some maps require that the computer control the second front for you. Two, the second front is not an independant battle. In other words, you must send units from the primary front to use on the secondary front; most of the time you will not be able to produce units on the secondary front and will simply engage the enemy. Three, once you win the secondary front, you lose all your units on that front and gain stars to use on the primary front. Still, it's an entertaining system to play with, even with the limited amount of maps available both in the campaign and war room modes.

There are also a few new units: the megatank, carrier, stealth bomber, and blackboat. Of all these, the only unit really worth using is the blackboat, which can repair any unit adjacent to it. The three others are too specialized/expensive to be of any frequent use, but are still cool to play around with if you're rolling in the dough. Or maybe I suck at AW, for those who have super cool strategies that I don't know about involving these units.

At its core, AWDS is simply an update to the previous games with not very many significant additions/changes, but is a fun and challenging game nonetheless. Definitely pick this up if you're a fan of the genre. You will not be disappointed.