Nintendo DS - Advance Wars: Dual Strike

Format
Nintendo DS
Publisher
Nintendo
Developer
Intelligent Systems
Country of origin
Japan
Genre
Turn-based strategy

Advance Wars: Dual Strike

By David Rasmussen
5th Mar 06

When it comes to strategy turn based combat it seems that only the PC and handhelds are doing anything with this genre to any great depth. And, as far as portables go, the greatest of the turn based strategy games is the Advance Wars series. Enjoying success on the GBA with two versions to date, as well as recently sporting it’s first third person strategy shooter in Batalion Wars for the GameCube, the series further branches out by invading the Nintendo DS with Advance Wars : Dual Strike.

The story is simple. After fighting the Black Hole Armies from CosmoLand, then through MacroLand… which kind of sound like countries named after theme parks… the Black Hole Army has set up shop in their next invasion spot, OmegaLand! OmegaLand is a turning point for the war as the four armies (each identified by a color code that seems to have had their national identities picked from a box of Galactic Lucky Charms found in Hachimaki‘s locker at Half Section - Orange Star, Blue Moon, Yellow Comet and Green Earth) join forces to form a united front against the reborn Black Hole Army to drive them out of this new battlezone. The rest is simple, pick a color coded nationality and stick to it (or let the computer pick for you in Campaign mode) as you fight through the game modes and combat which is deep and very involving! I always pick Orange Star, they‘re magically deli-- I mean “Go Orange“…. right!

First off there’s the game’s combat selections.
Campaign - Fight through storymode of the game.
War Room - Fight battles to earn medals and experience to level up your CO (Commanding Officer).
Versus - One on one action… or two on two… or three on three…. Up to four on four action!
Up to eight CO can battle it out at once, which is nice (either through download play or with each person owning a copy of the game… and, really, with a game this good why wouldn’t you want to own this game).
Survival - Fight through a campaign with one of three limitations. Money means you fight with a set amount of money for your military, Turn means you must clear the game in a preset amount of turns, finally Time where you are under a deadline to clear the campaign under the deadline of a relentless clock that counts down the seconds in realtime.
Combat - Realtime combat where you pick out a set of forces on a budget and roll them around instead of doing turn based combat. You have to clear six levels this way so management of your forces is important (once you lose them all the game’s over).

Combat is simple to learn, simple to pick up, and simple to run with -- and yet it’s deep as well.
Once you get into the addictive strategy of Advance Wars : Dual Strike you’ll find it hard to put down.
And with 300 medals to earn, and tons of experience to earn for each CO (which unlocks better abilities) you’ll find that this game offers up a ton of gameplay with hours and hours passing by as you find this to be your next portable crack that’ll keep you going to war over and over again (and unlike certain other wargames it’s not polarizing or politically grey… like fighting a Vietnam war game or a War on Terror game for instance)… but I digress, we’re talking color coded turn based combat here.

It would take a long while to explain the game, and I won’t since you won’t have a hard time getting your feet wet in the strategy fun of Advance Wars : Dual Strike (so I won’t), but I will say that you’ll have a ton of resources to play with (from troops to land, sea and air forces) as well as new forces unique to Dual Strike (the stealth fighter and the Megatank) as well as new CO to lead your forces to victory (like Jake for Orange Star for example). Also you’ll have fun with the CO Powers (which gives an advantage over combat once you build up your power meter for either a Power or Super Power strike) and Dual Strike where two CO double team their opponent for devastating results. Then there’s the Skills (of which you can level up to the ability to use up to 4 skills in one turn) and something good that’ll happen when you level up a CO to Level 10 and beyond... What that is, however, is a secret… hey, I just got my copy of Dual Strike and I only got my commanders up to Level 1 right now! Talk about a long road to understanding the joys of Level 10!
Otherwise that’s that. The rest will be meted out in the breakdown.

Advance Wars : Dual Breakdown
What’s Hot?
Advance Wars isn’t one of the best award winning turn based strategy franchises out there for nothing!
It earns it’s rep on the “battlefield” with solid (addictive) gameplay, enjoyable characters, lots of gaming modes and many many reasons to play this for hours and hours and hours on end.
If you are looking for a strategy fix that’ll keep you banging away at enemy forces until the mech infantry cow unit comes home from battle this is it! Utilizing the Nintendo DS’s special abilities to the fullest, Advance Wars : Dual Strike puts your DS to the test, and shows you why the Advance Wars series is the best of turn based strategy (both on portable and PC).

What’s Not?
Nothing… well, maybe finding another Nintendo DS owner in this so called Big Island to fight against.
My one complaint is that there’s no WiFi Connection compatibility with this game, which means that once again you can’t go online to pick a fight with someone else. The game itself is great, and one player modes will keep you going for many many hours… but if you are like me and looking for a chance to give the WiFi a spin so you can communicate and challenge someone from another State or Country? Then you’d still be looking for someone to play with online… someone that you don’t need to swap a Friend Code with before you can meet online.

Moments to Remember?
Lots. The game is just oh so memorable!

What to Ignore?
Hmmm… ahh… nothing. I can’t think of one bad move in this flawless turn based strategy game. And if there is a bad move it’s something I did in haste without thinking about it before I did it. That’ll teach me to move before I think!

Overall?
Award. Winning. Turn based strategy game. Those three thoughts strung together alone should be your rallying cry to gather your vital resources and head towards your nearest “recruitment” center (aka your local video game retailer) and enlist Advance Wars : Dual Strike into your army of games.
This, and the two GBA Advance Wars games, should be something you should own.
Now all I have to do is wait for Nintendo’s next great Advance Wars game, hopefully for the Nintendo DS, because I for one am ready for more warfare to be unleashed as Nintendo lets loose the color coded dogs of intellectual turn based strategy war.
Now if they would only offer WiFi online play next time… that’d be sweet.

-- David Rasmussen 5th Mar 06

Nintendo DS Advance Wars: Dual Strike Images