I have been having fun with my Ayn Odin while setting up my retro games finally. My Anbernic 351 is great but had a few things that annoyed me a bit, including the inability to dock like the Switch. A title that I have been waiting for on Switch is Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp, but that has been delayed again. So I decided to play the original Advance Wars with my Odin!
Advance Wars is a turn-based strategy game. Think of the original Command & Conquer games, but turn-based instead of real-time. You don’t play the commander though, you play an adviser to the commanders in each scenario. This allows for a range of commanders in Advance Wars, which allows for different powers in each scenario.
It still amazes me that so much game is included in a Game boy cartridge! Intelligent Systems know how to maximise player satisfaction with limited hardware. This is also seen in their other well-known series – Fire Emblem.
The initial training missions do a good job of letting you get a feel for the game. There is a lot happening in a battle, and if someone started playing the campaign they would quickly get overwhelmed. But Advance Wars teach you one aspect of the game at a time in the ‘Field Missions’ (training).
These missions don’t overwhelm you but aren’t dumbed down either. Advance Wars starts each mission holding your hands showing you the aspect it wants to highlight, and this lasts for a few units. Then everything is up to you. The training missions feel like a proper game, so the ‘tutorial grind’ doesn’t really exist.
I was flipping up if I should put Advance Wars in my gaming journal. Most gaming has been up to an hour each week retro-wise, so I have been mentioning it but I haven’t gone into full entries. Advance Wars was a good 5 hours of my gaming this week – how could I not add it?
I am not sure how I am going to go with Advance Wars going forward. I have a few things I need to sort, not the least of which being my Odin’s R1 button. I will say, playing like this has made me even more excited for Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp when it does come out!