After numerous delays to an initial proposed launch date of December 2021 due to real-world events that Nintendo evidently felt made launching a light-hearted warfare game problematic, Wayforward's Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp is finally almost here. Featuring the classic Game Boy Advance campaigns from both Advance Wars and Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising, there's enough turn-based tactical good times here to satiate even the hungriest of wannabe Sun Tzus, and the whole thing has had a right old spruce up in the graphics department.
We've been busy getting to grips with the first 13 missions from the Advance Wars campaign and it's been an absolute blast so far. There's been no great shakeup of the core gameplay here — these are genuinely timeless strategy classics we're talking about after all, a pair of almost flawless experiences and the sorts of games that don't really need to be messed with. However, some excellent new modes and a few modern bells and whistles have been introduced, making for an even slicker and more streamlined experience than the one you'll remember from back in ye olden days.
For those who are new to the series, Advance Wars' brand of turn-based warfare is all about facing off against enemy armies with a view to either wiping out all of their units or capturing their HQ. In order to do so, you'll need to capture cities dotted around the map, with each city you control giving you more funds which you use to spawn all manner of vehicles and troops onto the battlefield from your bases.
Captured cities also allow you to heal and repair by simply stationing the affected unit there for a few turns. Maps are dinky little grids with plenty of chokepoints such as bridges to consider, and from this very simple setup these games manage to produce gloriously strategic confrontations.
New unit types are introduced at a nice pace to up the ante as you progress through the campaign. You'll start out with some basic infantry and a small tank, but before long you'll be using bombers and helicopters, blasting enemy planes out of the sky with anti-air missiles, slinking around the sea in submarines, engaging battleships and having great big tank battles to control and/or push through all-important chokepoints.
Further to this, the CO (commanding officer) you are currently using will have a special CO skill that can be utilised as you fight and fill up a gauge. Once unleashed, these skills have the power to turn the tide of battle. For example, Andy can miraculously repair units across the entire battlefield, Olaf covers the map in snow, making movement harder for his foes, Max can boost his army's firepower and defensive capabilities and Grit can employ his sniping abilities to extend the distance at which his units may attack. CO skills also come in a super variant too, so there's no shortage of tools to employ here overall.
Kicking off the campaign from the first game in this reboot, fans of the series will immediately feel at home, as it's an almost scene-for-scene reproduction of the early stages of the original, with a now super-sassy Nell running you through tutorials to get you up to speed on how to pound your enemies into dust. The tutorial here has certainly been condensed from how we remember it back in 2001, with just a few missions to teach you the basics of movement, healing units, mending busted vehicles, and capturing those all-important cities before you launch into the story-driven campaign proper.
It's a nice shakeup, doing away with the extended (and mandatory) tutorial section of the GBA version in favour of incorporating advanced lessons into the campaign battles themselves. You'll learn the ins and outs of APCs, helicopters, submarines, battleships, various tank types, surface-to-air defences, and so on as you need them. If you feel like you already know best, you can skip a lot of this stuff and plough on.
Of course, anyone needing extra help or wanting to take it a little easier/slower is also catered to, with extensive tips from Nell herself, plenty of information on every aspect of battle to read through at your leisure, and a casual mode that allows newcomers to find their feet in fights that can be delightfully drawn out and challenging affairs. Indeed, it may look cute, but Advance Wars provides a stern test of your strategic skills once it really gets going on harder modes, and a finely tuned turn-based beast awaits those who want to up the difficulty and really push themselves.
Speaking of those cute looks, the graphical overhaul here is a noticeable one, replacing the chunky pixel look of the original games with a wonderfully clean, clear, and super sharp style that's full of nice little details and animations. We'll admit, it took us a little while to warm it — we're big fans of those thick and chunky early-noughties features — but, a few missions in, and we can see the benefits.
There are some very nicely animated cutscenes, CO powers are accompanied by plenty of flashy fanfare, all of the original characters look and sound great (that's right, there's full voice acting this time out) and the battlefields just feel easier to read now with everything that's taking place presented with pin-sharp clarity. The voice acting and new animations really do add a ton of personality too, with the likes of Andy, Max, Sami, Olaf, and all the rest of the COs brought to life like never before.
Away from the jazzed-up graphics, pumping new rendition of the soundtrack, and all the rest of the aesthetic improvements, the real meat in terms of changes here comes in the form of some brand-new ways to play. Not only can you settle in for four-player fun on one Switch console or via four separate consoles in local play, but online is also now an option, allowing you to jump into matches against your pals over the intertubes. You've even got an ID Tag this time around that's emblazoned with your military achievements so you can show off to your pals before giving them what for on the battlefield. Hooray! Of course, we haven't had a chance to try out online play just yet, and the whole thing will depend on how well the performance holds up, but we're hopeful the slow style of matches will mean that it works out just fine.
The Design Room gives you access to a pimped-up map editor allowing you to create your own maps to battle on or to share online for other users to enjoy. There's also a new War Room mode that allows you to select from a whole bunch of maps, with more available to purchase from Hachi's shop with your hard-earned winnings. The War Room's battles are score-based affairs that see you settle in to earn your S+ rankings, whilst Versus allows you to take on other players or the CPU in order to hone your skills and commit map tactics to memory.
There are lots of ways to play, in short, and it's amazing just how little the core of these games has aged over the past 22 years, the strategic fun here really is just as massively engrossing as ever. Seriously, if you've never played Advance Wars, you're in for such a huge treat. There are a handful of nice little touches added to make things feel that little bit zippier, such as the ability to fast-forward through enemy turns and battle animations, or even rewind and reset to your previous turn, and you can now hover over an enemy unit to choose attack right from the get-go rather than moving first and then attacking. It's still the same Advance Wars fans we all know and love, just slicker, shinier, and with all the bells and whistles you'd expect from a more modern release.
We've already had lots of tense tank battles, naval skirmishes, and aerial face-offs against Olaf and a bunch of other baddies in our short time playing this one so far, with the game wasting absolutely no time in putting up a challenge that results in tense confrontations that are always a sweaty joy to engage with. We're looking forward to getting stuck into the rest of the first game's campaign before moving on to Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising — although you can choose to jump straight into the second game if you wish — and we'll be sure to report directly back to Nintendo Life HQ with our full thoughts on the entire package a little closer to launch.
Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp releases on 21st April. Will you be enlisting? Be sure to let us know in the comments.
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Comments (82)
So what is the objective on this game ?
I never knew about this game before.
This is the game I’m most looking forward to this year! I love the originals. The only concern I have is the graphics, as I’m a huge fan of the original pixel graphics, but I hope the style grows on you as you play as the article states above. I have this preordered and can’t wait!
Reading this made me even more hyped for the game (I have had it pre-ordered since it was first announced), but more paranoid that another world event will delay it. World, can you hold off on getting worse at least until this game comes out? Is it really that big of an ask?
Pretty sure the War Room isn't new, but that aside, I'm super excited for this game!
Cool, now do Fire Emblem: The Binding Blade + The Blazing Blade, please.
I had this preordered before the 1st delay and then they cancelled it after the 2nd delay. I loved these games back in the day. I picked up some vouchers and got this for $60 and zelda for $40.
@Anti-Matter It's in the article, third paragraph.
I'll likely pick it up at release, as I have a lot of fond memories of playing the first Advance Wars, and haven't played through the original version for quite some time. So the remake is much appreciated. But, don't know when I'll be playing it.
The final timing of its release is unfortunate for me personally. Mega Man Battle Network Legacy Collection comes out literally one week before this drops, and my focus will 100% be on playing that when this releases. Wish Advance Wars would've shadow-dropped during the last Direct, like some had speculated.
Reads like it's a promising release!
Been a looooong time since I've played through the first game.
WayForward looked to have done an excellent job on this! I’m surprised Nintendo haven’t purchased them yet. I’d love to see Shantae be a Nintendo all star!
I'm so glad I bought the originals on the Wii U, this artstyle doesn't sit with me at all and DS era games are stunningly gorgeous
I'll admit, I'd be much more excited for this game if the entire game featured the 2D artstyle that the characters have. The 3D playboard style just doesn't quite do it for me.
I'll still be getting it and I'm sure I'll still enjoy it, but you know.
I really hope online play takes off for this release.
Also:
"or even rewind and reset to your previous turn"
lol they added divine pulses to the game. Hopefully they've not allowed for significant abuse of that feature. This isn't Fire Emblem. There's no permadeath to worry about.
@Olliemar28 About the map creator: do you know if you can manipulate the size of custom maps? Like, create bigger or smaller maps?
I’ve only played the DS game called something like Dark Conflict, but I am jumping onboard with this one.
It looks well designed, and a very lovely remake.
But it's hard to justify spending $60 to anyone that still has access to the original games, either via GBA cartridge or GBA emulation.
I am super excited for this one! I played a bit of the original GBA game a while back and really enjoyed it, but I was busy playing other stuff at the time. The ability to make your own maps in particular is great, I can’t wait to see what people come up with.
@Anti-Matter You win battles. That's it. That's the game.
I hope for a decent online infrastructure but I'm not expecting much
Do I want this? YES! Do I need this? No……. I will probably pick this up for grins. I have the first one unplayed on the WiiU.
I love the set piece/ war table art style. Can’t wait to add this to my library.
@Ralizah Not sure I'm afraid, that's one for @PJOReilly
At long last. Cannot wait.
I wonder if Nintendo will release this game in Russia. Despite saying they stop selling games there, their Russian site still gets updated advertising the latest games including Pokémon Scarlet and Violet.
Even though I have solved them both on the GBA, still going to pick this up. Two of the games that have held my attention the most for a long time.
the 2 delays with the $60 price I can't see this game doing well sales wise
I was sold on getting this, but then I played Tiny Metal recently and had to drop it because it was so difficult for me.
I know there is a casual mode, I'm just wondering just how casual it is, or if Tiny Metal was just hard (or I just suck I'm not sure) either way it's made me a lot more hesitant to pick this up.
Tiny Metal felt soooo slow as well to move every single unit, but this looks snappier than that at least.
@PJOReilly
Do you know if online is friends-only? Can it be played with randoms? Or is there no matchmaking? I know you can't really PLAY online yet, but surely the menus would show that sort of thing, yeah?
@Olliemar28 Somehow I tagged the wrong person.
@PJOReilly About the map creator: do you know if you can manipulate the size of custom maps? Like, create bigger or smaller maps?
@Nanami_Ataraxia
As a huge AW fan, Tiny Metal is... not great IMO. The sequel is better, but I haven't bothered to finish either.
That said, tbh, I did also like AW2 far more than 1, but I'd say I enjoyed even 2 far more than Tiny Metal.
@Anti-Matter Which is strange because you've commented on multiple articles about this game in the past lol
I definitely prefer the original artstyle, but the other changes sound interesting.
You can rewind your move, that's cheating.
It would also be nice to hear how the online play works, some system to deal with people quitting games as soon as they start to get overpowered, which is very likely with this game.
Oh yes, we've waited 22 years for this! Cannot wait. Sounds like an excellent remake by Wayforward. Hopefully it'll lead to a brand new entry in the series! Also, can't wait to hear the remade music!
@Olliemar28 You mention in the preview tense gameplay, but I just wanted to ask how you felt about the difficulty in general compared to other strategy titles on the switch?
best srpg hands down, can't wait!
This probably guarantees the original games are not coming to Switch online gba. Then again, who cares if you can get better upgraded versions now.
@hippoeater
I have never knew this game before, even only reading the game objection I still cannot imagine how the game will be interesting for me.
I'm more PlayStation guy than Nintendo guy here.
I grew up by PS2 games during early 2000's era, not by GBA and Gamecube so I have no idea with a lot of Nintendo IP on those machines.
I can see the grass graphics is better than the initial previews, nice, I'll be getting this for sure
Not bad, I'm getting it but not at launch. But before the year ends.
Still wish it was 1+2+DS, so it were kind of like "Advance Wars: The Complete Story".
The tutorial was mandatory in Advance Wars GBA, but the ending of the tutorial sets up the start of the main campaign — I was never too bothered by it because you're allowed to simply skip to Lesson 13, do that one and then go into the main campaign. Didn't really need to be truncated tbh :x
But then again, I don't think Advance Wars has been played recently since the War Room is also not new at all :')
My main questions are whether or not they use AW2 balance for AW1 and if supers are integrated into it now.
I’m slowly becoming enticed to pick this up. I think I’ll enjoy it, and perhaps I can hand it over to my little brother due to the voice acting
@Anti-Matter Look at this game as Nintendo’s take on the military sim genre. It simplifies and streamlines many of the complex mechanics while making it turn based like a board game. You progress through various missions until you’re chosen leader “wins” the war.
Good to hear the tutorial section of the first game has been condensed, was way too long in the original (and while you could skip it by doing what @ShinEon said it wasn't obvious at all so I feel it's for the best)!
Also nice that not only there will be online multiplayer as we already knew, but also local on a single console!
Other than that it seems to be everything others and I loved about the original Advance Wars 1+2 with new visuals and musical renditions, plus additional animated cutscenes and voice acting.
@Nanami_Ataraxia Haven't played Tiny Metal, but I'd say to give this game a shot, even the originals aren't excessively difficult unless you're playing on hard or even more so aiming to get the highest rank (which you might have to for certain unlockables if those still work like they used to in the originals, but currently we don't know).
@Cia Most likely not soon, but then again we got Link's Awakening on NSO despite the Switch remake so maybe in the future!
@HammerGalladeBro Yeah, it would've been really nice if they included Dual Strike to have the complete story and even more so for me since I've never even played that one. Hope they'll consider remaking that too at some point!
@Anti-Matter It's like Fire Emblem but completely amazing. It's probably one of the best game series in existence. Sadly this is only a remake of 1 & 2, when 3 & 4 are way better. For the gameplay, you capture cities/factories/ports/airports, and get money from them on a per turn basis. You spend the money on units and repairs/fuel/ammo for units, and use those units to capture more places to give you more money. With the goal of capturing the enemy HQ.
@Wilforce @ArcticEcho
Wow, never heard kind of genre game like that.
I will check the gameplay from YouTube once the game has been released.
I'd still like to try this series, likely with this double pack. This'll have to be an "eventually" however. There are several SRPGs both in my backlog and on my wishlist that I'd like to get to as well.
Edit: Apparently this is my 7,000th article comment. What have I been doing with my life? XD
Can’t believe 2 of my childhood games are coming out at almost the same time, Advance Wars along with the Megaman collection.
Day one for me. Very excited for this as I never got to play the GBA versions. I enjoyed the clones (tiny metal 1 & 2) a lot.
Never played these games back in the day, because I never owned a GBA.
I did start the first one a couple of years ago. I didn’t stick with it (I probably got distracted by another game), but from what I did play, it seemed like the single-player campaign was just going to be a tutorial for multiplayer, because it went on for so long.
It’s good to hear that isn’t the case, and I look forward to picking up this remake eventually. I still think it’s a bit expensive, being the same price as a new AAA release, but it’s Nintendo — whaddaya gonna do? 🤷♂️
@JohnnyMind The main thing is that Nell is supposed to teach you how to skip field training if you answer that you've already played before and answer that you want to skip field training but then just kinda... doesn't. That's the main thing that needed fixing tbh. Being able to skip field training is honestly for the best but to hear that it's been inducted moreso into the main campaign will probably just make it a bit annoying as now those bits aren't skippable at all anymore. I just wanna get going, and maybe be able to select the hard mode campaign for AW1 from the start too. That'd be neat.
Then again, I'm not sure how confident I am in saying that as the tutorial continuing into the main campaign already was the way it was to begin with (what's an airport, again?) As long as it doesn't do the same as the actual tutorials where it forces me to make moves in incredibly specific fashion, I'll be good though
I tried playing the GBA version again a few months back and got turned off after couple hours because of all the foggy maps. Really don't like those. So this one's pretty much a no-buy for me.
I haven’t purchased a new game for my Switch in a while. Advanced wars will break that streak- this was one of my favorite GBA games.
Have they added new levels of difficulty?
Loved the first games but gave up on later levels as I found them too tough!
I've got the first two games on Wii U, so initially I wasn't inclined to double-dip. But man! The clean, bright, crisp art direction in these screenshots has me salivating. Time to scrounge up some disposable income!
Finally it's here, saga that i always loved comes back after years and years. I'll buy a digital copy at launch, hoping it'll be a good success to convince Nintendo we want a new chapter
What are the new modes?...Also, were pipes in the GBA games? I never played them much back then so I dunno, thought pipes were new in DS alongside Piperunners.
Personally can't wait for this. Finished Prime just in time to get into these again. Other than Zelda this is my most anticipated game of the year on Switch.
Im so torn on this one and I keep going back and forth. I had the original back in the day when it first came out and I loved it. I always thought of it like a mini-Starcraft of sorts. I got pretty far in it but never beat it and at one point like an idiot, traded everything in for the latest greatest system at the time, probably a PS2 lol...
I have since acquired the game again over the past few years, on GBA, and I'm having a hard time with it because I keep forgetting the mechanics and what each unit does. I restarted the campaign so many times and I keep saying to myself, "If I can't get into the original, I'm not so sure i'll get into the new one" and then it ends up going on the shelf with the others.
I mean this in the best way possible but it seems it is largely unchanged from the original so I may just stick with the original for now and buy when this goes on sale. Yeah this one includes the second game and stuff which is GREAT but...
I 100% think the game looks worthy and great and if it's not broken, don't try to fix it and all that but I just cant justify spending the money right now I guess. For those who have ir preordered and are going through with it, have fun! It looks great!
Still probably getting this, but down the line. Gonna see about getting Swiss for my GB player for my original carts. The art on the remake is really crispy though, not gonna lie.
@Joeynator3000 I thought pipes were part of the 2nd game as I somehow associated them with certain Black Hole missions. I could be wrong, though.
@BLD @JohnnyMind
Thanks for the comments I will keep them in mind.
I loved the originals and have had this pre-ordered twice now (counting the delay).
For anyone with the hardware (or, more likely by now, emulators) who loves AW, there's a far deeper yet still very accessible franchise called Daisenryaku (Grand Strategy) that's mostly Japan-only but has had a few entries make it to the West. It comes in both WWII and modern-era flavors (Iron Storm for Sega Saturn, Daisenryaku VII: Modern Military Tactics Exceed for Playstation 2 and XBox, and Daisenryaku Perfect 4.0 for Steam PC). Think of it as a literal encyclopedia of real-life military units, roughly 500 in Iron Storm, a WWII entry where you can play full campaigns including "what if" scenarios with the USA, Japan, and Germany, and over 400 in DSVII Exceed across 8 nations (USA, Russia, China, Japan, Germany, UK, France, and Israel) and 1500 across 48 nations in DSP 4.0, both of which are modern-era. The latter two also have fully featured map editors and the ability to play up to 4 players (DS VII on 64 X 64 hex maps) or 8 players (DSP 4.0 on up to 256 X 256 hexes) in any combination of human and AI-controlled players. Unlike AW's Rock/Paper/Scissors approach where Tank = Tank, Daisenryaku employs actual algorithms depicting the real life strengths of individual unit types, so a squadron of M1 Abrams is going to wipe the floor with older T-72s but have a harder time against German Leopard 2A6s or Israeli Merkavas.
I had a group of friends who played DSVII for thousands of hours, sometimes over 10 hours at a stretch. The multi-player is incredibly addictive and tense whether you're playing with FoW (Fog of War) rules where each player takes their turn privately or like a tabletop game where everyone is watching (and doing their best to offer manipulative "advice"). Great times.
Anyway. I can't recommend these enough if you love AW and want a taste of something similar. The campaigns in DS VII, by the way, are easy and bland, but they do unlock some amazing units for multiplayer like the Zumwalt-class, the Lun (the fastest water transport in the game), and the "Spooky". Just ignore the game-breaking Cyber-Ninjas that were included as a joke by the dev team.
Man, I would absolutely love for a localization company to port DS VII or its Japan-only sequel DS 2 Exceed (I know, weird numbering) for current consoles; they would be huge additions for the Switch.
@masterLEON Ah well, hopefully the game does get some DS content at some point, even if it an expansion or DLC. Doesn't have to be an entire remake of that game, just bring back the characters, units, and Dual Strike mechanic. xp
@Anti-Matter you complete campaigns by taking over the map. the screen shots will give you an idea. (red team icons, blue team icons) you can take over the "city" icons to gain capital and you can build better units etc.
@AtlanteanMan yeah I love the daisenryaku games. super large maps. I think there is one for the switch but its in Japanese.
This looks cool and all, but it's clear Nintendo gave this c-team attention rather than a-team effort, be it shopped-out to a third party or whatever. If this had been given the same level of full first party AAA love that Nintendo has been given Fire Emblem for a while now, this really could have been something very special rather than just good. And that's sad to me, because, at its core, I actually think the Advance Wars series is a much better game than the Fire Emblem one personally. Now, I'm not saying this is a bad game; I just alluding to far more potential here and a missed opportunity to reach it.
@Beefcakeyamato There is but unfortunately it's not one of SystemSoft Beta's better efforts. The unit list is far smaller, there is no multiplayer, and they're monetizing it with overpriced scenarios required to access additional units that should have been in the base game to begin with. In other words, similar to the approach of stringing consumers along with "more $$$ for less effort and quality" that's become rampant across the entire industry.
@B238ben I have the same concern. When I first saw the new art style it reminded me of the art style difference between mega man 10 (and earlier) and mega man 11. But yes, I'll see if I can get used to it..
Nice. Looking forward to getting this collection, probably won't get it until June, but interested nonetheless.
@Joeynator3000 Yep, like @masterLEON said pipes are in some missions in the second game.
Personally would love an entire remake of Dual Strike since I've never played it, but I'd absolutely take even just an expansion/DLC including the characters, units, Dual Strike mechanic etc. over nothing!
Looking forward to playing the multiplayer with my friends online!
Because of the delay, this went from day 1 to reduced for me
It's cool they let Gameloft design an AW game. At least Metal Slug Tactics is on the way?
Seeing as I never played the advance war games because of reasons that even I don’t know (probably either me being stupid or me being too young to play games at that point) I’ll definitely give these a try.
If this game came out buggy then Nintendo just lose me as a consumer. They had a whole year of delay for this game, not even a stealth release was given. It better not be buggy or had framerate issues.
"real-world events that Nintendo evidently felt made launching a light-hearted warfare game problematic"
I've always called BS on that. I'd wager the game desperately needed more development time.
Advance Wars was my first GBA game. It was the only time I'd used up the battery on that system. Really looking forward to this!
@AtlanteanMan ah that's unfortunate. thanks for the explanation on it. sounds like you are a big fan of the series. I haven't played any of them past 4.
I need a retro graphics mode or something to buy this again. I'm not keen on the sharper, slick graphics style at all :/
@Beefcakeyamato I have a friend who I used to play DSP 3.0 online with (we even found a way to play DS VII for PS2 online via emulator, sending our save file to each other by e-mail after our turns!) and was part of a fan effort to get it localized on the US PlayStation Forums over a decade ago. He owns the game and has been relaying the info to me, and he too is disappointed with it overall. Daisenryaku is one of those unfortunate cases of a company not knowing the potential what they have in an IP and/or simply not being able to give it proper QC or marketing.
I'm wondering if I have 2 switches, would it be better to buy the digital or physical version?
@AtlanteanMan Yeah exactly. I feel that way about a lot of companies and their IPs. such as konami.
That's awesome you were trading save files though haha.
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