I’ve played this game for over ten hours now and not a single campaign mission has been completed. But then, what have I been doing? Surely the campaign is the main attraction of the game? It’s Advance Wars, after all! It’s a turn-based tactics game! How can you not be testing yourself against the strategy the game provides.

Ah, but the main attraction for me with Advance Wars has never been the strategy. It’s always been with the design room, and the fact the turn-based mechanics of it allow for roleplaying – much the same as with Worms. Two, three, or four players means that amount of armies, where truces can be made to overcome a stronger foe, or one team sits back preparing a massive defence. It all depends on what story I want to tell.

And part of telling that story is in the design of the maps made. Whether one side has an advantage, closer to capturable bases or many cities already under their control. How the world looks, such as mountains blocking a direct route somewhere. Of course, what I’m saying might make it seem like there’s a lot of thought that goes into such creation. Fact of the matter is, there isn’t.

I’ll have an idea of what I want for the map, then just get creating. Most maps I create feature just land-based combat, though sometimes I will put in a bit of water-based warfare to spice things up. This does mean that a number of units go unused, since there’s no need for anti-air units if there’s no air vehicles in play, but there’s enough variety to all units that RPing is possible and fun.

The first map I created was a fully landlocked one, with no sea to speak of. Instead, a river flowed from north to south, splitting near the middle to create an island in the south. This one had just two armies involved. South Quadril and L’Via Thoren added in sea to create restrictions, with L’Via Thoren having one army massively restricted by being based on the islands to the south.

The first to involve more than two armies is Mirrored War, a map created to offer no real advantage to one side as everything is equally spaced. However, it is also designed in a tournament-like fashion. Where the first encounters will be to the sides with the winner of those battles progressing to the middle. Ruby Archipelago is so far my first to feature sea combat. Since it’s an archipelago, it just makes sense to.

As for the handling of the game, it is pure Advance Wars. Each unit has a maximum number of spaces they can move per turn, with a fuel limit determining a total maximum unless they refuel at an owned building. Yes, even the on-foot units. I guess they’re grabbing a full English breakfast from a café or something. With each unit having a set cost depending on how powerful it is, there’s some strategy in waiting to bring out the big guns if you feel you can take the risk.

With how simple the act of making a map is, you can easily have the fifty maximum custom maps filled in no time. Just a simple idea of what you want that map to be, including recreating or being inspired by real-world locations. Or those from games that use tile-based map design. It is unfortunate that you can only share maps between friends, but hopefully WayForward can be given the go-ahead to make a new Advance Wars that allows more to be done with creating and sharing maps. There are some great map makers around, and it would be lovely to play on something that’s not been designed by me.

While I can’t speak for the campaigns of the two remakes, the overall presentation of the game is just lovely, with that original sprite work faithfully rendered as models. The small details such as the bobbing of the units as they wait on the field of battle have also been recreated. If you love strategy or creating, I can certainly recommend this to you. As basic as it might be, being a remake of the two GBA games, there’s still enough here to just absolutely fall in love.

Images Taken From:
Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp