"Another great Advance Wars game"

I've been a fan of the Advance Wars series since Advance Wars 2 and once again, another great edition to the series!

Let's start of with the story. If you played the earlier games, then you might be happy to know it's not another stop the whole Black Hole Army thing. This game has completely different new characters and armies but you might be sad to know that none of the earlier Advance Wars COs return.

So the main story is that meteor strikes have attacked the planet wiping out almost every living thing with few survivors. Ash filled the air and covered the planet from the sun making it harder to survive. There is also a new disease that spreads through the people called "The Creeper" or "Green Thumb". Once someone is diseased with this, a plant will grow inside of them slowly and once fully grown that person will become a plant. The story begins with a character named Will, a young cadet from the Rubinelle military academy, who escapes the ruins of the academy and becomes confronted by The Beast, a villain who turns crazy and just loves to kill anybody in sight. However, just in time Will was saved by Captain Brenner, the leader of the Rubinelle's 12th Battalion (also called Brenner's Wolves), and Lin another member of the 12th Battalion. Will learns that the 12th Battalion's goal is to search and gather up all the survivors and joins them. Brenner's motto is, "If there's life, there's hope." They find some survivors, some of the main ones are Dr. Morris and a girl who does not remember her name (but Will decides to call her Isabella), but somehow knows about detailed military information. She was the first person than the 12th Battalion discovered with The Creeper. It was also believed that it only spread through people under age 20. The first part of the game is stopping The Beast and his devilish plans. In this part Brenner discovers and uses a factory that makes crops so they can survive.

Then you will learn about a war going on between the NRA (New Rubinelle Army) and the Lazurians (leader, General Forsythe). The 12th Battalion took sides with the NRA and began to know more about the NRA's leader, General Greyfield. They find out he's just another power hungry person trying to be king. That's the second part of the story. Other events will happen like the Creeper is growing inside of someone over age 20. You will also be introduced to a mad scientist named Caulder.

The last part is about meeting up with a scientist named Caulder who makes clones and experiments with all of them. He has no means to take over the world but to experiment. But the 12th Battalion and Lazurians believe his experiments are horrible and just plain evil. In fact, it's revealed that he was the one who developed the Creeper and made it that it can spread through anybody. Why did he do this? Because he wanted to see how humans would react. He also has the antidote that's enough to cure everybody diseased with the Creeper. Trying to stop him, they gain more info about Isabella and why she can't remember anything, and more about Caulder's experiments.

A lot of other interesting events go on throughout the whole story that would be considered spoilers but hopefully I gave enough information on the story. Story 10/10

Moving onto Gameplay. There are some changes with the gameplay from the other Advance Wars that some people might love more or less. To start off with, there are now no more super powerful units and each one has a lot of use unlike the other Advance Wars games. Now my main beginning sentence is this game is in the turn based strategy genre. There a good range of units to choose from to use in battle, and several maps to battle in.

COs (Commanding Officers)

There will be a select number of COs you'll get to use and battle against. Each CO has their own strength(s) and weakness(es) making it more interesting.

CO Zone

Unlike other Advance Wars games, you get to have your CO in battle but you can only load him/her into a vehicle. When a CO is loaded into a vehicle, that vehicle will have a CO Zone. Every unit in the CO Zone will get an increased attack and defense. To increase the range of the CO Zone, you have to destroy units. The more you destroy the longer the range reaches. When the vehicle with the CO inside it is destroyed, nothing happens except the zone vanishing. Don't worry, you can load the CO into another unit and process repeats except the CO Zone goes back to normal. Each CO will have their own starting CO Zone range. This adds some strategy to the game.

CO Powers

Each CO will have their own different power that has its own abilities. You can only use this when your CO is loaded into a unit and when you destroy enough units or when your units get damaged enough.

Campaign Mode

There are 26 missions to beat to finish campaign mode. There will be optional missions called Trial Maps where you can test out your skill. In most of the campaign missions, each CO will have their own HQ. You either win the game by capturing the enemy's HQ by using certain types of units. The other way to win is destroying all the enemy units. Some missions, you have to win by doing another objective ex. destroying a certain object on the map. This mode is very entertaining and you will want to unfold the story. At the end of each mission you will get points for Speed (how fast you beat it in), Power (how much units you destroyed), and Technique (how strategic you were). Adding up all the points you will either get (in order from highest to lowest) an S, A, B, C, or (i think there's one) a D.

Funds

Funds are the money you earn during a battle. The funds are used to build units and each unit has a different cost (except some).

Capturing Process And Objects

In most maps, there will be objects that you can capture using a certain type of unit. For each object you capture, you get 1000 funds. It could be more or less because you can adjust the rules (unless it's campaign). The objects that you can capture are Airports (can build air units), cities (only useful for more funds), Factories (can build ground units), Ports (can build naval units), and the enemy HQ. This adds even more strategy to the game. You'll need to capture plenty of these if you want the map to be easier for you.

Online

This is what I like to do after beating Campaign. Once you find an opponent, the rules and map are randomly chosen. A lot of surrendering goes on during the matches I've been in which I don't like to see.

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The gameplay is really entertaining. You have to plan out and think about what you're going to do to win the match. It's not really smart to waste all of your funds on one strong unit that can get destroyed easily by 3 other cheap units. So you're going to think a lot of what you're going to do which in my eyes and a lot of others is fun. And this is one of those games where you won't get mad much and throw it. When I lose a battle I just replay the map and just think harder. Gameplay 10/10

Now to talk about the Sound/Music. With the soundtracks I expected some good ones since I enjoyed the other Advance Wars ones and yep, this didn't disappoint me. Each CO will have their own theme song. It doesn't play throughout the battle though. Once it's the enemies turn, it plays that COs song and when it becomes your again, it repeats yours. During the cutscenes it plays the music right on the spot. Each song fits the situation of what's going on. The sound effects sounded just like the previously Advance Wars games. When a unit is destroyed, it makes an explosion sound. All vehicle units have the same sound when moving and all foot (like infantries) units have their own sound when moving. There's not many sound effects to hear. But their not terrible either and the music makes up most of this rating. Sound/Music 8/10

Graphics-wise, I wouldn't say it was fantastic but it's not bad either for a Nintendo DS game. The drawings for the Characters and the detailed backgrounds in cutscenes are marvelous, though, and when units are zoomed in. The objects and units were not too bad, either. Graphics 8/10

When it comes to replayability, this is another term I loved about the game. I'd just want to replay the campaign or just do a quick match. And you could go back and try and get an S rank for the missions you didn't get one on. There is also trophies you can earn by doing the objective like Complete all Missions with an S Rank. There is also online where you can compare your skills with another player. This is one of the few games I've played over 100 hours (I checked and the total play time is 122 hours) because it's so fun. Replayability 10/10

In conclusion this is a great game in the Strategy genre. In my opinion, it's one of the best games that the genre can offer. So any Strategy fans, I STRONGLY recommend this game. Overall Score 9/10

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 08/20/08

Game Release: Advance Wars: Days of Ruin (US, 01/21/08)