Another remake, the first GBA remake I can think of (well, beside the Ace Attorney-games). I've played all of the Advance Wars game released in the west (not finishing them all, but one day maybe). As traditions with this game it was off course delayed. First to fine tune some parts of it from its originally release in December 2021 so it was moved to March or April 2022... and then the Ukraine-Russian War started. Kinda ironic since the original was supposed to come out the week after 9/11 back in 2001 in Europe and they delayed it to the spring of 2002 instead. Well it's finally out and it was a breeze playing through the first game again.
Story is that Orange Star, a country pretty much appearing like USA/Europe is suddenly attacked by Blue Moon by CO Olaf, a country modelled after... Russia.... Oh Boy! Orange Star only have you, the player, as an Adviser freshly sent from HQ to learn the works with Commanding Officer Nell. After some tutorial levels she hands you over to Andy, a relative new CO as you start to push back Olafs assault and push him out of Orange Star territory. During the journey Andy stumbles upon a pluton of Green Earth Soldiers (modelled after Germany I would argue, with the WW2 hats and blitzkrieg tactics) led by CO Eagle that after taking a beating accusing Andy for some war crimes.
After that Andy gets reinforcements with CO Max, the strongest CO of them all, but lousy in indirect battle. Both of them push Blue Moon back to their own land so they continue hounding Olaf and his second in command Grit. After beating the Blue Moon army they meet up with Sami, the infantry specialist CO of Orange Star. They are again attacked by Green Earth and... for some reason heads over Yellow Comet (Japan pretty much) and constantly gets attacked, all the while the cutscenes tells us that they also have been attacked by Andy in the past. After beating Kanbei and Sonja it's over to Green Earth and meeting with Drake and Eagle. And during the battles it is revealed that there exists a clone of Andy that have attacked the other nations while Blue Moon was lead to attack Orange Star to keep them busy. All this is orchestrated by the Black Hole Army lead by Sturm, who likes to throw meteors on my most valued troops. You defeat him and all is well.
The new coat of paint is rather nice, although the pixel art has its charm, and the small changes too characterisation they made for some of the CO doesn't add up to me. Also, the quality of life improvements are wonderful. Restarting just a turn makes it so easier if you just did a wrong move (although it can be used to save scum through Fog of War maps). The casual mode (which was the mode I played through it in) is rather nice with a bit more soldiers and getting rid of fog of war in some maps (although I feel it makes it easier for the AI as well since I can't hide as well). And finally, the ability to pick and choose missions after finishing the campaign instead of having to replay the whole thing as well as getting rid of some of the criteria to unlock certain CO:s, as well as being able to chose the CO for the final battle however you want. No more playing X turns on the Kanbei missions to unlock him at the final mission, or playing Max stages to get Grit or Andy against Drake or Sami against Eagle.
The biggest problem I have is that everyone said this was pretty much a 1 by 1 recreation of the original. Lo and behold my surprise that they cut out most of the tutorial levels. Now, some might say that it went on too long and that the tutorials still pops up when appropriate, but the story and the ability to delve into the POV of the Adviser gets lost. What do I mean? Well, the tutorial levels is where you work together with Nell for 14 missions. She is your CO, she lambast Olaf for his betrayal and gives hint on the relationship between the two and all that. Olofs overconfidence and blunders that he shows throughout the story. And Nell talks to you, congratulate you for your tactics and how fast you can beat certain stages like the mission Dogfights and Air Defence. Now, you pretty much disappears after the first missions. It could be that they wanted 1 and 2 feel like the same game and the advisor roll disappeared in the sequel and I didn't like it then, and don't approve of it now. It felt more immersive in the old game and it's sad it disappears. If they continue like this I hope they don't remake Fire Emblem for the GBA that released in the west since it will feel worse there. But overall it's a fun game and just nitpicking with my preferences.
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