Topic: Advanced Wars Series of Games

[Shecky]

I will update this thread as new info becomes available.

Next release is officially titled "Advance Wars: Days of Ruin" and releases January 21, 2008 in North America.

Word is that the game will feature online play and asset trades (maps) with voice chat.  The game play has been streamlined to promote quicker play, so CO powers are less pronounced.  The game overall is redone story and art wise, although the basic functions and play mechanics remain the same.  Stylus and D-pad control options are available.

IGN Hands-On

Intel that I can muster from what we have so far:

Units seem to have rankings I, II, Ace... likely as a result of surviving enough battles (similar to Age of Empires and other games).  The result of the ranking will likely be a slight stat boost.

New terrain "types" such as scorched earth, as well as terrain "skins"
The flaming/scorched earth may actually be a result of the new flame tanks

KDR:  Looks like most the tanks are back save the NEO Tank, but quite frankly I'm glad to see that go.

Units:

Infantry
Mechs
Motorbike Infantry

APCs
Recon

Light Tanks
Heavy Tanks
Mega Tanks
Flare Tanks - Capable of visibly exposing a large 6x6 area in Fog of War (unknown if it lights area for everyone)
Anti-Tank Units - Capable of heavily damaging tanks via indirect fire, also has machine guns for direct counter fire
Anti-Air
G-G Rockets
G-A Missiles
Artillery

Carriers
Cruisers
Submarines
Battleships
Landers
Gunboats - Can fire on ships and carry one ground unit.

Bombers
Fighters
Transport Copters
Attack Copters
Duster - Air units that can fire on both air and ground units.
Scramble Fighters - Produced by carriers, same properties as dusters

Assets:
HQ
Cities
Bases
Naval Ports
Airports
Towers?
Radars?
Silos


Older info follows:

Thanks to Vudu for the find.  New rumors suggests the above title was playable at Micromania Games Show 2007 in Paris.  I'll suppose if this is true, we may see more coverage from the major news outlets soon.  Art style is supposedly updated - likely to take advantage of the hardware.  I never battle with animation on so I'm curious how the map style looks more than anything.  I wouldn't trust any news about story or cast from a floor demo.

Original Post:

Thanks to Bill for the Official Nintendo Europe source

Advance Wars 2 (Nintendo)     Q4 2007      

[Chozo Ghost]

I think WiFi playability is pretty much a given.

Other than that, what else would they add to improve over the first DS iteration?

[Shecky]

I hope it's proper WiFi, that lets me play the main game wirelessly.  However, it would be a challenge to do that... given the length of time those matches can take.  Even with friends it would be nice to suspend a match per friend or maybe keep 5 suspended matches.

[S-U-P-E-R]

At last! It's been too long as it is. I've put in lots and lots of hours on each Advance Wars despite being a giant action game jerk, and I definitely look forward to melting the faces off of various NWR forum members with my dirty tricks.

[Mario]

Heck yeah bring it on

[Shecky]

I am king of "dark" tactics... just ask WuTang or thatguy  (or many of the others offline...)

So bring it on S-U-P-E-R, Mario....

I was thinking of a way to bridge the earlier advance wars games.  However my biggest forseen problem that I couldn't work around was inherent to the game itself.  Mainly what to do when one guy drops in a 3 or 4 player match... and no way to suspend a game (as that's a deal breaker for most cases).  So I gave up on trying to bridge DS/DS local play.

So what's the best way to play Advance Wars Online?

1) The "early game" seem the most important to me... trying to manage building plus capturing of assets is better than just starting with an army and fighting.  However, the former option takes much longer to play out and both are valid play styles so .... keep existing play types and custom maps for online.

2) Implement a disruption tolerant (and not DTN! ) game mechanic for these matches.  Such that a turn can be entered and stored for when the opponent logs in (where he can then do the same).  Sure the game would continue over days, but why not... it's turn based, it can handle that.  To start a match, your both present so you can get most of the capturing and quick, early turns out of the way early.  The stored turn need to be played out exactly as inputed for the opponent (exact path) since it may be critical in fog of war.  For example, you opponent moves in a path that crosses your field of view in fog of war.  So you don't see where he started or where he stopped, but you do a) ID the unit and b) get a general idea of it's possible location.  This is where I was getting at with suspended matches, so the idea is you could have multiple of these to handle a day against different opponents.  That alone could take an hour of time, and you haven't even received an opponents move!

If your opponent logs on simultaneously you could of course make several moves and continue "live" play.

3) Have optional forced surrender terms that can be set by the host of the match.  Not sure what would be effective, but the goal would be to try and prevent stalling from someone who has "lost".  (Basically the options allow you to control the heuristics for what is considered "lost")


Thoughts?  

[WuTangTurtle]

Quote
Originally posted by: Shecky
I am king of "dark" tactics... just ask WuTang or thatguy  (or many of the others offline...)

So bring it on S-U-P-E-R, Mario....

First off, I believe my "dark" tactic against you was better.  You selfdestructed in a doubles match to force a draw, I had my Lopunny use endure while my Golem used explosion.  Me = 1, Shecky = 0

Second, if Wifi play is to be done they need to shorten matches.  Here are my ideas:

Match Types:

1.  Blitzkrieg Match:  Basically setup for a 15, 30, or 45 turn match where the victor would win by total damage if not won in a regular fashion.
2.  Liberation:  A Co Op Challenge to save a city in a limited set of rounds (turns).

Rules:

1.  Turns are timed (1min, 2min, or 5min caps).
2.  Turn time IQ:  Based on how many possible things you have to do, the timer is adjusted.  For example you have 1 unit and only 1 factory, the timer would then only give you 30 seconds to finish your turn.
3.  Leaving a game or disconnecting is an automatic loss.

[that Baby guy]

Yes, but Shecky uses a Gengar on his team.  Explosion/Self Destruct in a double battle works best when the Ghost doesn't even have to worry about surviving it.

[Artimus]

Hopefully new graphics and a much more sensible, intuitive touch-screen control system.

[Shecky]

I actually can't stand the touch screen controls.  As long as you have the choice....

And WuTang.... a 45 round match would take several hours!

[Artimus]

Quote
Originally posted by: Shecky
I actually can't stand the touch screen controls.  As long as you have the choice....

And WuTang.... a 45 round match would take several hours!

That's why I said intuitive touch screen controls. Just slapping them onto an old system doesn't do any good. You need an interface that's designed for them.

And if they have the same graphics...ew. How many times are they going to remake Advance Wars? Do something fresh with the series!

[Shecky]

Quote
Originally posted by: Artimus

Quote
Originally posted by: Shecky
I actually can't stand the touch screen controls.  As long as you have the choice....

And WuTang.... a 45 round match would take several hours!

That's why I said intuitive touch screen controls. Just slapping them onto an old system doesn't do any good. You need an interface that's designed for them.

And if they have the same graphics...ew. How many times are they going to remake Advance Wars? Do something fresh with the series!

Well the touch screen controls made sense before, they just were slower to me than using the normal layout plus I'd often pick the wrong location/command b/c things were a bit small.  They could fix picking location by zooming in on the unit you tap (so that its range takes up the whole screen).  The zooming is something they could do if they brush up the visuals.  Then fade to HUGE buttons for the action commands (Fight, stay, capture, etc).  Problem is that wouldn't work to well for D-pad setup as the time zooming and producing buttons would slow input down.

Ideally, the game should force you to pick in an input option in the options menu and make changes to the UI to accommodate, none of this on the fly stuff.

Part of me want to play the Advance Wars we've had for the past 3 games against other humans though.... I've been deprived of that.  So I guess if they kept the same assets and put it online, I'd actually be OK with that.

If that realtime combat mode is the only thing we get online, and the assets are the same, I will not buy the game out of spite - even though I've likely put over a months worth of time into the series thus far.

[Artimus]

AW should be stylus only. It should be fast and exact. There's no excuse for anything else.

[Mikintosh]

Quote
Originally posted by: Artimus
AW should be stylus only. It should be fast and exact. There's no excuse for anything else.

Yeah, except the stylus controls were in AWS and they weren't exact, which is why I personally never used them. I personally think the original GBA controls work the best, but they should keep the stylus controls in for those who want to use them. But if they made it stylus-only...I'd be pretty sad inside.

[jakeOSX]

stylus only??? did you play the gba games? i try the stylus, but i am so used to the buttons it can be confusing. just preference i suppose.

as for the online, i suspect something like civ's 'play by email' system would work well. otherwise the boards would have to be, dare i say, even smaller... i mean a small board, two players it was still a two hour game where we quit out of need, rather than the game was finished. there could be a 'save' but then that would bring in friend codes i suspect.

i'd like to see being able to 'post' your homemade boards for download via wifi. that would be cool. downloadable missions as well. i mean, isn't the only bad part about this game is that it ends?

[Artimus]

What part of "new" did you guys not understand? If the current version had good stylus control it wouldn't need a new one.

[UltimatePartyBear]

On the other hand, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.  Improved stylus controls would be fine, but why dump the tried and true button controls?

[WuTangTurtle]

Quote
Originally posted by: PartyBear
On the other hand, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.  Improved stylus controls would be fine, but why dump the tried and true button controls?

Traditional controls aren't broken, yet we have the Wii now don't we?

However I agree stylus controls for AW doesn't seem like a good possibility.  If everything wasn't so small maybe things would work better.

[Shecky]

New info: Thanks to Vudu for the find. New rumors suggests the above title was playable at Micromania Games Show 2007 in Paris. I'll suppose if this is true, we may see more coverage from the major news outlets soon. Art style is supposedly updated - likely to take advantage of the hardware. I never battle with animation on so I'm curious how the map style looks more than anything. I wouldn't trust any news about story or cast from a floor demo.  

[Shecky]

Quote
Originally posted by: Shecky
Well the touch screen controls made sense before, they just were slower to me than using the normal layout plus I'd often pick the wrong location/command b/c things were a bit small.  They could fix picking location by zooming in on the unit you tap (so that its range takes up the whole screen).  The zooming is something they could do if they brush up the visuals.  Then fade to HUGE buttons for the action commands (Fight, stay, capture, etc).  Problem is that wouldn't work to well for D-pad setup as the time zooming and producing buttons would slow input down.

Ideally, the game should force you to pick in an input option in the options menu and make changes to the UI to accommodate, none of this on the fly stuff.

Part of me want to play the Advance Wars we've had for the past 3 games against other humans though.... I've been deprived of that.  So I guess if they kept the same assets and put it online, I'd actually be OK with that.

Oh, and I'm guessing the new style is so they can actually do the zooming thing I mentioned before.

[Bill Aurion]

As much as I will miss the old characters, I am digging these character designs...

[Mashiro]

Ah that's a relief. When they said they got rid of the cartoony style I thought it was going to be very realistic. Instead it's just a more realistic anime style. Good stuff ^^!

[Arbok]

Art style looks good... very good... but I hope at least one or two familiar COs show up for the game.

[NWR_insanolord]

The game is titled Advance Wars: Days of Ruin, it's coming to North America January 21.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6180807.html

[Kairon]

Post apocalyptic... AWERSOME.