Advance Wars:
Dual Strike
By Alan Rappaport
Let me just start
this review off by saying that if you own a Nintendo DS, and do
not pick up a copy of Advance Wars: Dual Strike there is something
wrong with you, something very, very wrong with you… The proven
Advance Wars ‘turn-based strategy’ formula is injected
with a bevy of new ingredients for Dual Strike, and the result is
quite possibly the best DS title available to date.
For those of you not familiar with Advance War’s two Game
Boy Advance predecessors, the series is an immensely deep, and addictive,
turn-based strategy game that puts an entire army’s arsenal
under your control. ‘Rock-paper-scissors’ battles rage
by land, air and sea, and now across two fronts thanks to the DS’s
dual displays. This whole package is tightly presented in an extremely
bright and colorful, anime inspired delivery.
The dual screen battles are far from the only addition Dual Strike
adds to the mix. 25 battle ready units are available for deployment,
and 9 new Commanding Officers join the already loaded roster. New
‘Tag-Team’ battles call for you to enlist two COs, and
alternate between them as the missions play out. This adds yet another
unique layer of strategy to mix, as you can use each CO’s
super power separately, or charge up both CO’s power meters
to unleash a devastating ‘Dual Strike’ attack. COs can
also gain experience points, opening up the ability to use ‘skills’.
These skills can be used to enhance a CO’s abilities, and
the higher ranked the CO is, the more skills they will have at their
disposal.
In addition to the new units, COs, and tactics, Dual Strike offers
up new ‘Survival’ and ‘Combat’ modes. Survival
comes in three separate flavors (Money, Turn, and Time), and challenges
you to complete a set amount of maps under limited circumstances.
Choose money for instance, and your allotted a lump sum of cash
that you’ll have to stretch across several different maps.
Turn and time offer you similar challenges, limiting the amount
of turns and length of battle respectively.
Combat mode is a complete departure from everything Advance Wars.
Combat puts you in control of a single unit at a time in a real
time battle environment. I like to think of Combat mode as a bit
of ‘fire and forget’. It’s a fun little variation
on the Advance Wars game play, but isn’t quite as flushed
out as it could be. Combat mode will entertain here and there as
a nice little distraction, but I can’t see anyone spending
all that much time with it – especially when the rest of Dual
Strike has so much more to offer.
The bulk of your time will be spent in the game’s Campaign
mode as you follow the story of the Allied Nations struggle against
the reinvigorated Black Hole Army. My only gripe with Campaign mode
is the endless CO chatter before and after most missions. Dual Strike’s
COs just love to talk and you’ll find yourself clicking through
seemingly endless dialogue boxes throughout the Campaign. Advance
Wars veterans might also find Campaign mode to be a bit too easy,
but will be rewarded for completing it with access to Hard Mode,
which ramps the difficulty level up quite a few notches.
My only other gripe with Dual Strike is that its wireless multiplayer
mode only supports Wi-Fi ad-hoc (system to system) type multiplayer.
I would love to be able to battle armies around the world over wireless,
but I guess that will have to wait for Advance Wars Dual Strike
2.
Advance Wars: Dual Strike is simply a battle of epic portable proportions.
Its longevity is immense, as there is a seemingly endless supply
of battlefields available for you to wage war upon. If that isn’t
enough, there’s even a fully featured map creator that will
allow you to build and play upon custom designed creations.
I cannot stress enough how amazing a title Advance Wars: Dual Strike
is. My only concern for those unfamiliar with the series is that
there is a quite a lot of information to soak in, and it may scare
some newcomers away. My advice would be to pick up a copy of the
original Advance Wars title for the Game Boy Advance (you do have
that GBA slot in your DS after all) to ease your way into battle.
The first Advance Wars will offer a batter tutorial on battle basics,
and once you master those you can take on the slew of new additions
Dual Strike has made. If you’re really eager to check out
an incredible game, jump right in to Dual Strike, but be sure to
keep that manual handy. As for me, I’ll be out on the battlefield
right up until the next game in the Advance Wars series is released.
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