Game:

Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising (2003)

Duration: 31:15

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Didn't you hear? The war is un-postponted and will be arriving soon!
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...I say that, but... because of the delay, the only reasonably accessible way to play these games right now is on the Wii U Virtual Console... which is dying imminently. Like, as in the day after I'm writing this.

Which means most of a MONTH without being able to wage colorful, comic mischief style WAR on people?! This. Will. Not. Stand.

So. I mean, if you had any misgivings and wanted to experience it for yourself in that time and/or wanted to NOT pay $59.99 MSRP for the privilege (and still wouldn't be able to get the DS games' content), I guess this is your super last-second, low-penetration caliber warning shot?

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Campaign
Mission "10": Tanks!!!

That sure is a lot of excitement over tanks, y'know? What's all the ruckus and all that? Oh, it's *Md.* Tanks. That's a bit more to holler about, I reckon. (At least for now!)

That said, this is a totally pre-deployed scenario, so there's a lot less excess rope with which to hang ourselves... ... ... in theory. It's also Fog of War, so any foolishness in our unit placements will hit all the harder as a result.

... ... ...all the more so if you don't account for Adder's signature CO Power abilities, because counting tiles is nice and all, but not when you didn't realize you fed him THAT much meter and he's hungry for a chance to bite back.

It just kinda goes to show that the map layout design is much more thoughtful than even someone who's trying to act all "smart"...

And this is even with the foreknowledge that the AI has always "cheated" in Fog of War, playing to the letter of the law, but not its actual spirit. That is, it won't fire on any unit it's not "allowed" to see, but it definitely knows it's there... willfully ignoring it, until it no longer has to.

This doesn't actually make enemies TRY to exploit this limitation to the limits placed upon their logic, mind you. They won't ACTUALLY park units next to things they're not allowed to see under the fog's rules hiding stuff in Woods or Reefs, but if their full range movement should uncover them as a matter of course, well, that's just how things go, isn't it?

The fact remains that giving Grit this many ranged units and forcing even the fastest CO's units to wind their way through a tangled mess of mountains and trees... is just not sporting at all.

I think Adder had a really bad case of not being able to read the room.

So even making some unforced errors by deviating from the script in an attempt to be clever... it's still like shooting a pig in a poke. With a barrel full of fish. Gathering no moss.

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The one thing actually bugs me about the way they "localized" Grit... they took away his cowboy hat, but they let him KEEP the long-barreled revolver? Isn't THAT a thing that should be most potentially objectionable in his design?

Y'know. In a game about war. With automatic weapons. And high-yield explosives. Heck, we've even got long-range ballistic missile silos!