A Review: Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising, GBA 2003
Strangely enough, I actually completed this game before I did the original without even really realizing it, but I made a proper playthrough much more recently. Play is pretty much the same as the first game, just with better balancing and more focus on telling a story. The player also gets access to some new units, and there are new enemy CO's to battle against. Originally, this game was not released in Japan and was cancelled until a compilation of games was released as a bundle with this title in it. In 2015, Black Hole Rising was put on sale for the WiiU via the Nintendo e-shop and could be played through an emulator that came packaged with the game. The original had a new multiplayer feature added that allowed for players to battle each other via linked Gameboy's, which was praised by critics of the time. I never personally played the multiplayer, but it was a nice addition to the game, I thought.
Personally, I liked this game quite a lot. I knew what I was getting into and found that the ease of play from the first game translated well into this one. The new units and CO's were cool, and I liked that this game had a heavier focus on telling a story. The missions were a little grindy at times, but they weren't terrible overall. I liked the new map layouts and thought that the new fog of war added to the gameplay nicely. I would have liked there to have been a different player faction, though, but this wasn't something that bothered me too much; I still loved this game and its play style. Really, there isn't anything that I can state here that I haven't already said in my review of the first game. The simple controls are lovely, and I liked that the simplicity of the first game was retained. I will also say that this game was far less punishing if you made the 'wrong' choices, and sometimes it would let you get away with some absolute howlers. The units were better balanced overall, and some of them also had an increased movement radius. I would have liked a mass movement command added to the game, but I also recognize that this would probably have caused issues with the difficulty progression. The maps were well laid out and allowed for a variety of tactics to be used. I also liked that this game seemed to favor the computer far less; battles were less about luck and more about positioning and defensive forethought. I generally thought that this game made little improvements and changes to the core gameplay more than anything and seemed to be all about refinements over any type of major additions or new features.
I also think that the graphics for this game got a little upgrade from the first. The little sprites, units, cities, and objects are all a little sharper and seem to have a higher pixel count; at least that is what I think anyway. The fog of war was well implemented, and I loved the various little animations just as much as the first time around. Explosions and fire detailing are improved again with a noticeable jump in pixel count. The world was well drawn, and the CO's and their portraits were also improved. The little battle screens had some solid animations, and I liked that the planes and other aircraft had moving backgrounds, the same with the ships and boats. It was little touches like those that really helped to lift this game above some of the competitors and clones of the time.
Overall, I liked this game and honestly enjoyed my playthrough. While I can see that this game wasn't a drastic improvement from the first, it was still a solid game that had some noticeable refinements.
8/10 – A Good Game!
Signed Off – Leonardo – PSJ
Personally, I liked this game quite a lot. I knew what I was getting into and found that the ease of play from the first game translated well into this one. The new units and CO's were cool, and I liked that this game had a heavier focus on telling a story. The missions were a little grindy at times, but they weren't terrible overall. I liked the new map layouts and thought that the new fog of war added to the gameplay nicely. I would have liked there to have been a different player faction, though, but this wasn't something that bothered me too much; I still loved this game and its play style. Really, there isn't anything that I can state here that I haven't already said in my review of the first game. The simple controls are lovely, and I liked that the simplicity of the first game was retained. I will also say that this game was far less punishing if you made the 'wrong' choices, and sometimes it would let you get away with some absolute howlers. The units were better balanced overall, and some of them also had an increased movement radius. I would have liked a mass movement command added to the game, but I also recognize that this would probably have caused issues with the difficulty progression. The maps were well laid out and allowed for a variety of tactics to be used. I also liked that this game seemed to favor the computer far less; battles were less about luck and more about positioning and defensive forethought. I generally thought that this game made little improvements and changes to the core gameplay more than anything and seemed to be all about refinements over any type of major additions or new features.
I also think that the graphics for this game got a little upgrade from the first. The little sprites, units, cities, and objects are all a little sharper and seem to have a higher pixel count; at least that is what I think anyway. The fog of war was well implemented, and I loved the various little animations just as much as the first time around. Explosions and fire detailing are improved again with a noticeable jump in pixel count. The world was well drawn, and the CO's and their portraits were also improved. The little battle screens had some solid animations, and I liked that the planes and other aircraft had moving backgrounds, the same with the ships and boats. It was little touches like those that really helped to lift this game above some of the competitors and clones of the time.
Overall, I liked this game and honestly enjoyed my playthrough. While I can see that this game wasn't a drastic improvement from the first, it was still a solid game that had some noticeable refinements.
8/10 – A Good Game!
Signed Off – Leonardo – PSJ
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