Topic: REVIEWS: Advance Wars: Dual Strike

[Bloodworth]

Use this thread to discuss TY's fantabulous Advance Wars: DS review.

http://www.planetgamecube.com/reviews.cfm?action=profile&id=647  

[Hostile Creation]

I'm into this thing where I want to play some installment of every Nintendo franchise I haven't played yet.  I have not played Advance Wars yet.  So that, paired with the fact that this game sounds freakin' incredible, leads me to believe that I will purchase this game.  Very thorough review, TY, I liked it a lot.  Granted, having not played any of the other games I understood next to nothing, but a good review nonetheless.

[Dasmos]

Nice review..but now i really want to get it

[Bill Aurion]

Sounds good, I hope I have enough money to get it!

[KnowsNothing]

Awww shucks, now I have to get THIS instead of Nintendogs >=O  Funds are low, you see...

I've been reading that the campaign mode is considerably harder than that of the other AW games, is this true?  Would they be talking about the HARD campaign mode, or is the regular campaign tougher too?  You see, I am absolutley the WORST Adwance Wars player you will come across that still loves the game, so if the regular campaign is much harder than in AW2, I'll just die ;___;

[KDR_11k]

This is probably great news for people who can stand turn-based tactics games... But please, yet ANOTHER super-hyper-mega-tank?!? Wasn't the MBT enough? What do we need even heavier tanks for?

[JHarris]

This... is... beautiful!!!

Despite all the GBA games we had, Advance Wars 2 was the one we played the most of BY FAR.  I wouldn't have thought it possible to top, but this does.

This could just be a system seller, if only Nintendo will release it in the US soon!

[S-U-P-E-R]

The campaign doesn't seem harder to me. It's easier, if anything, but probably about the same difficulty. That goes for hard campaign, too. Actually, hard campaign wasn't too hard at all because I then had a really big choice of COs (including Hachi).

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Granted, having not played any of the other games I understood next to nothing, but a good review nonetheless.

Oh snap, I was worried this might happen. I thought the only people that would be reading the import review were the guys that had already played AW. Er, maybe reading the old reviews will put things in perspective?

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But please, yet ANOTHER super-hyper-mega-tank?!? Wasn't the MBT enough? What do we need even heavier tanks for?

I guess the small/md/neo tanks all had pretty much the same usage and strategy about them, but the mega tank is for way different situations and has a bunch of trickery to deal with. It only carries like 4 or 5 shots and only gets a few movement points, and clever guys can run low-cost infantry at it to eat up its ammo and kill it for free with other tanks. I was using Neo tanks instead on a lot of maps where I needed to cover distance and/or forrest.

Putting two on a lander and dropping them right on the enemy hq is the boomnizzle, though.

[Bloodworth]

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if only Nintendo will release it in the US soon!

 
It's out in like 2 weeks dude.

[KDR_11k]

and clever guys can run low-cost infantry at it to eat up its ammo

Sounds like a job for the APC. Apropos APC, does the computer still priorize APCs over all other targets?

[S-U-P-E-R]

I think it still overprioritizes, but not as bad. I'd also say APCs are a little more valuable in this game for the money because you NEED to support megatanks and stealths. I'll watch for APC tomfoolery to find out.

The thing with the troops, though, if you attack it, you're forcing it to use its ammo for the counterattack immediately so I don't really see why you'd want to wait and hope it attacks the APC.

The AI is still no genius, but I think it sucks a little less now. I'm noticing, in DS battles, your CPU buddy is pretty smart but he never, ever goes for obvious fast wins (which would benefit greatly).

[KDR_11k]

No, I meant the APC staying close behind the Megatank to make sure it doesn't run out of ammo, not distracting enemy megatanks with APCs. How many hits can a megatank take from antitank weapons (bombers, heavy artillery)?

[oohhboy]

APC baiting is almost unusable in AW2 as it is far too unpredictble. Most of the time the APC is attacked first because the AI already has enough firepower to target the unit you are trying to protect and the APC. So your only cutting down on over kill and slowing down the overall advance a little bit. Your better off using infantry if you want to stall.

As for APCs rearming in AW2, the AI will usually not target the APC and go after softer targets like the Artillery your rearming.

Another quirk that AW2 has is that you can place a medium or neo tank on a choke point facing a tank or weaker unit. Instead of replacing it with a stringer unit, they just leave it there blocking thier entire advance. Unless they have artillery there to kill the blocking units, the AI is quite happy to sit there and let you snipe at them with your own artillery until you break out with your own built up forces.

[Mario]

Nice review, straight to the point and no bullcrap.

Basic AW gameplay + bajillions of extras is enough to sell me on it, don't fix what isn't broken, just add to it. :thumbsup:

[KDR_11k]

ohboy: I wasn't talking about APC baiting, just keeping the Megatank filled up by replacing any used ammo immediately.

Meh, one gripe I have with AW cannot be fixed without screwing up the entire game, it's that e.g. bombers are so damn hard to take down, either you send in your fighters and probably lose them to enemy anti-air troops next turn or you have to wait until the bomber wipes out one of your troops and send in an AA unit afterwards. Either way you lose at least one unit to the bomber.

Reminds me, do stealth planes have the same firepower as bombers or are they weaker to compensate for their stealth ability?

[oohhboy]

I follow the American AirLand battle idea. Take the Air and the land is yours. I just make sure that the AI can't keep things up in the air and that they don't have anything to target the air I do put up.

If opfor AAA unit/s are close, I try to bring in artillery/ground to have a go at them before sending in bombers then the fighters.

Better lose the ground unit than the fighter most of the time since the fighter is worth more than most ground unit in both utility and cash.

Relying on ground AAA defense doesn't work as you always get hit first. But camping a AI airport before you take it with AAMs is an effective way to drain the AI and keeping air down.

[miedo]

Your review was enjoyable, but I lost a sense of balance between the final score and your comments.  Most of the review was spent explaining the different mechanics of the game (which I praise you for filling me in on extra details) and pretty much giving it whole-hearted praise.  You made a few comments about how the presentation was low, but I half-expected a 10/10 after reading your review (I don't check the scores at the top usually, I generally scroll down right away and then read the scors on the second page).  Most of the critizism for giving the presentation a low score was shoved into the second page of reasoning.  Which is okay, but I've always thought that those extra summaries were there for doubling the points made in the review, not introducing facts that you missed in the actual review.

I hear you are a bit busy lately, so if my comments felt like they overassumed the time you had, then I'm sorry.  I'm also a bit of a fanatic for the series, and got a little hyped up after seeing a 10/10 on Gamerankings right away, heh.

[Arbok]

Always good to hear a positive review. I got my DS just for this game, everything else I have picked up has been gravy, so I can't wait for this to hit store shelves. Advance Wars 2 would rank among one of my favorite games of all time, and I can't wait to see how I enjoy this one.

Bummer about Sturm not showing up, though.

[Mario]

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Meh, one gripe I have with AW cannot be fixed without screwing up the entire game, it's that e.g. bombers are so damn hard to take down, either you send in your fighters and probably lose them to enemy anti-air troops next turn or you have to wait until the bomber wipes out one of your troops and send in an AA unit afterwards. Either way you lose at least one unit to the bomber.

Doesn't the fact that they're expensive balance that out? For 22,000, you'd expect to at least kill one unit.

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Which is okay, but I've always thought that those extra summaries were there for doubling the points made in the review, not introducing facts that you missed in the actual review.

More like the "extra summaries" are PART of the review.

[Bloodworth]

Yeah, the score summaries don't have to be covered in the body at all.  There are some games where I choose not to mention the graphics or sound in the body, and just let the score summary for that category cover those points.

[S-U-P-E-R]

Yeah, it was kind of just a mere afterthought since really, graphics and sound have very, very little to do with AW in general. I think I looked at my graphics and score summaries after I wrote the whole thing, and then went back and added like half a sentence somewhere in the main body.

I appreciate the hell out of comments on my writing style. I try to make every review better than the last one. (Hey, maybe I should post a thread about it)

And, of course, the final score isn't averaged out of everything, and I think if you'll look through my old reviews, I don't give 10s out easily (ever?) and a 9 is pretty high praise. (I think if somebody like Zosha or Jonny reviewed it, they might be more inclined to give AW DS a 10 assuming they liked it as much as I did).

[Edit: Yeah, I just looked, it looks like 9 is the highest rating I've ever given a game on PGC]

Regarding the power of stealths, I think they actually lowered the power of them from the E3 version, if I'm remembering it that well. They used to have absolutely sick attack power, but now they're a bit more fair. I think, uhhhh, they're maybe about 2/3 the attack power of bombers? More or less? Remember, though, they can attack other air units, too, and I think they take most of a fighter's hp if they attack first, if I remember correctly. Someone dealing with stealths would probably have to move a unit to where they think the cloaked one is before they move out their fighters.

Just to make sure you know, cloaked stealths, even if they can be seen by an adjascent unit, can NOT be even targetted by anti-air or missles or anything BUT fighters. They are invincible to all non-fighter units. Their weaknesses (they run out of fuel really damn fast) can be managed around without too much trouble, usually...   so I still fear this unit might be a bit overpowered. They can also target any type of unit, including bombers, all the boats, tanks, etc.

Non-cloaked, though, and anti-air units swat those biznatches down, so cover those airports so they can't make them and then cloak them on the next turn.  

[miedo]

Okay, I understand now.  Thanks for clearing that up.

Anyway, more on the Stealth Bomber.  Do they use one weapons (assuming...bombs), or do they have a weaker weapon against air units?  I've noticed in the past that sometimes the weapon will change to a machine gun or a just a different type when changing from air to ground/sea or infantry.

[S-U-P-E-R]

Stealths only have the one missile weapon.

Oh yeah, on this note, Mega Tanks have a secondary weapon, but it's weak sauce (and they always use their main cannon first, except against air units).

[Hostile Creation]

This comes out Monday, right?

I'm getting it.  When does Geist come out?

[Karl Castaneda #2]

Monday.