The best handheld game I ever played!
The game focusses on a lenghty and varied campaign mode, were you have to drive back the evil forces of Black Hole. The goals are always somewhat the same, but the maps are varied enough to use diffirent tactics each time. The 2D terrain map involves mountain ranges, rivers, seas, roads, reefs, bridges, forests, cities, bases, HQ's, silos or in other words: it very complete. And there is little variation within the mission goals. Sometimes you'll have to hold the line for a couple of weeks ( in-game weeks, not real ones! ), rout the enemy in a few days, capture X properties or a certain building, reach your HQ, demolish a certain building and the more sneaky version: Fog of war-missions, were you have limited vision range and you really have to make use of the special terrain features.
The variety in units is also huge. Subs, planes, copters, tanks, bazooka units, rocket launchers, artillery and many more, even the unlockable Neotank, the deadliest weapon on the ground in Advance Wars 2. In addition, in the "battle sequences", where you actually see a side view of the battle, the diffirent units, cooresponding to their nation, look diffirent. For example, a Black Hole tank looks robotic, while a Yellow Comet tank looks a bit Japanese. These sprites and their background are very detailed. They change when weather does ( snow covers the ground ) and sometimes you'll notice a road next to the offending unit. You switch back to your terrain map and you'll see the offending unit stands next to a road. Fantastic!
I could go on for a while, but I see you're bored. You read this in the GS review. You want to read something new instead of copy-pasted work. I won't tell of the weather effects ( both strategic and graphic excellent ) and the fine tuned units ( Neotanks are powerful but slow ). Find it out yourself in the campaign mode. Once you finished it, there's another, harder campaign. But the true challenge lays in the War room and the Versus modes. The War room is really hard, so make sure you mastered the Orange Star campaign. The Versus mode is less rewarding ( you receive no points for a victory ), but also incredible fun, especially when you play against another AW2 owner. Or make a perfect team in the three- and four-player mode. You can do this alone, and that's also a very good way to spend your lifetime on. The War room and Versus modes have an almost infinite amount of maps, and the Versus mode let's you decide the game goals ( conquer cities, fog of war on or off, time limit, etc. ). To keep you busy, you can save up to three self-made maps. The map editors interface is limited but just like the rest of the game: fantastic!
Is there nothing bad to say? Yes, there is. Some battles are a bit long-thready, keeping you too long away from a certain victory. Sometimes you're stuck on a map. Then you'll take so many losses that you will just move one grid square ( look at the screens ) in six turns. Sometimes I thought the developers couldn't make a choice between kiddy and dark setting. You'll often hear an annoying soundtrack that doesn't change. And the story is lame and the CO's ( generals with special CO-powers, like causing blizzards ) are too kiddy. Easy to overlook, I think.
Must have? Yes! It's the best title I played on a handheld! It survived my three-weeks holiday, and I'm still playing it. It's just extremely fun!