Short review of GBWG

[Kunik]

When i first bought GBWG i expected a horrible tablet game that would just feel bad and run like ass, but boy was i wrong.
It's by far the best Nintendo Wars inspired strategy game iv seen on PC so far. It takes the lighthearted cartoon style and unit variety from Famicom Wars, mixes it with gameplay elements form popular pc strategy games, and the result is a very enjoyable, smooth and dynamic TBS everyone sitting down playing will enjoy.

The game world consists of hexagonal tiles, allowing you to move each unit in 6 directions rather than the checkerboard 4 in the Nintendo Wars games.
The units themselves can use their multiple movement points and single attack point freely trout the turn, meaning for example a unit with 5 movement points can move forward 3 tiles, attack an enemy, and then retreat 2 tiles, all in a single turn. This makes the gameplay very dynamic, resulting in less frustrating long drawn out 'tile per tile' fights that tend to happen in the Nintendo Wars games.
And to discourage stacking tons of units in a single cluster, Grenadier's, Artillery, Rocket units etc. got area of effect damage, hurting all 1tile away from the hit unit. (Can also cause friendly fire.)
And unlike most direct combat units, such as Tanks, Infantry and Bazooka's, they all can attack beyond 1 tile, meaning your not forced to move an unit hugging an enemy to hit it with another more direct combat unit.

[Edit]
And if you wonder about the turrets in the game screenshots, Technician's are an unit that can be consumed to build defensive structures (costs money, so can be quite costly) such as Mine Fields (7mines/field, both enemy and friendly units can be damaged by them), Sentries, Anti Air cannons, etc. The turrets can easily get overthrown by a gang of units or long range weaponry, while the mines got both benefits and drawbacks, as they are a hinder for you as well, so its all very balanced.
[/edit]

The game got a lot of customization for your nation, you can make your own flag from bases styled like many real world flags, add pre-made symbols, color each induvidual part of the flag and symbols to make something nice for you.
You can also select your and the enemy's unit color.

Only few bad things i can say about the game is that it lacks a map editor and don't support 'Windowed Mode' yet. (So you can only play it in full screen, but thankfully, the engine detects your desktop resolution and adopts it for the game, so it wont just scale like bad ports tend to do.)
On another note, the game also makes you drag around in menus to scroll rather than using a slider, but this isn't a problem at all really. (And the devs in their forum mentioned they forgot to implement it, so might get added in an future update.)
The Textures are crisp and clean, but the models are a tad low polygon, but the optimization and core gameplay makes up for those drawbacks.

Other than that, IMO its pretty much the very best Famicom/Nintendo/Advance Wars styled game on PC at this time and moment. (Future Wars was pretty rubbish and lacked multiplayer, and all fan made Advance Wars PC projects are all dead and no longer in development.)
And the amount of re-playability and gameplay you get for the 10bucks makes up for its price tag. (The PC version of the game also contains all DLC and will get content patches for free unlike its handheld equivalent.)

So if you got 10 bucks to spare and love Advance Wars, give this unsuspected gem a try.



And for others who buoght it, how is your feel for it so far? Buyers remorse or money well spent?

[GioCor87]

Good review, now I've got a clear idea about what I'm going to buy. Thanks!

[MetalHealth]

Money well spent! My only gripe is that when you select a unit and do anything with it - it becomes unselected. So you move 1 hex, only to think you have to move another1. You have to reselect the unit. Small trouble really but would be nice if things stayed selected.

[Kunik]

Originally posted by gtameister:

Money well spent! My only gripe is that when you select a unit and do anything with it - it becomes unselected. So you move 1 hex, only to think you have to move another1. You have to reselect the unit. Small trouble really but would be nice if things stayed selected.

Hmm, sounds like a nice feature, maybe you should suggest it in the forum as an optional setting? Who knows, maybe they add it in an later patch.

[DarkDragonDK]

Maybe the v1.01 300 mb patch fixes this, but they seem to lazy to push it to steam.

[Kunik]

Well it was said it will be up this week, what day on the other hand, i got no clue.

[bumbleone]

The game is a good deal for the price i think. for years, i was looking for something similar to advance wars, but with a new approach. i played advance wars I + II through and through on all difficulty levels over and over again. but with "days of ruin" and "dual strike" i was kinda bored, because it would be the same mechanics again (it's strange... i loved the gameplay, but i didn't want to go through all of it again. i could have used the same tactics again to complete the game. i think i could have completed the sequels without actually using any brain power. like playing a game of cards where, at a certain point, you play automatically)

i didnt play it for long now, but i like the similarities and the fundamental differences already (hexagonal fields, longer firing range, move 2 times per turn), im really looking forward to go through the campaign. i will compare every aspect to advance wars , though, the game i loved so much that i know it too well and, hence, can't play it anymore... life is paradoxal!

btw: i don't like the fact, however, that you can't move your own troops past each other. i mean, realistically, would you not stop out of the way if your fellow-soldiers wanted to hit the front?!?

[Kunik]

Originally posted by rayray24/7:

The game is a good deal for the price i think. for years, i was looking for something similar to advance wars, but with a new approach. i played advance wars I + II through and through on all difficulty levels over and over again. but with "days of ruin" and "dual strike" i was kinda bored, because it would be the same mechanics again (it's strange... i loved the gameplay, but i didn't want to go through all of it again. i could have used the same tactics again to complete the game. i think i could have completed the sequels without actually using any brain power. like playing a game of cards where, at a certain point, you play automatically)

i didnt play it for long now, but i like the similarities and the fundamental differences already (hexagonal fields, longer firing range, move 2 times per turn), im really looking forward to go through the campaign. i will compare every aspect to advance wars , though, the game i loved so much that i know it too well and, hence, can't play it anymore... life is paradoxal!

btw: i don't like the fact, however, that you can't move your own troops past each other. i mean, realistically, would you not stop out of the way if your fellow-soldiers wanted to hit the front?!?

I gausses we are the same then, AW2 is one i can go back to play over and over again, due to it was such an improvement over the first i cant help but love it. (Less linear campaign, harder more interesting missions, new environmental dangers like black cannons, etc.) But DualStrike just felt cheap, granted i liked the new additional CO's, but it just felt like poor sequel to Advance Wars 1, where you got less choices on missions to select trout the whole thing, (In other words, an underwhelming linear campaign.) nothing changed graphically, (Its a DS game, sort of expected bigger changes in comparison to GBA.) and badly balanced new units, (The Stealth plane absolutely broke the game, due to a supply truck or black boat can keep em running forever, meaning ONLY 2 things in the whole game can attack it, Fighters and your Stealth Planes, meaning you just need a few fighters babysitting in the distance and you can steamroll.) and last, a underwhelming map editor, where you still cant make your own mission maps with all 5 nations and use all environmental hazards in it... (Something that really disappointed me, as it isn't limited by save space this time, nor the 4 player only link cable from GBA era.)

And Dark Ruin had some nice improvements gameplay vise with some unit rebalance, (The flare guns that counters bush camping in Fog of War, and the battleships that can move and fire in the same turn.) and for once a better map editor where you can select x and y hight and width of the map and save it in like 20 free slots. (Forgot the number of slots.)

But the games feel and grimmdark storyline that takes itself way to serious, killed it for me, as i played Advance Wars size the Famicom Wars era, and what made it fun is its colorful, lighthearted and unserious view of war, bundled with fun strategic gameplay and infinitive replay value. granted its still playable, but it lacks the charm of its older brothers, and thus just sit there like a black sheep in the series.

Oh and about the 'cant move over other units thing' im pretty okay with, considering it punishes you for poor movements or spending all movement points inappropriately before using all other units to their biggest potential trout the turn.
But thankfully the developers made air units more logical by allowing air units to not only move over tiles already covered by other units, (So a Fighter cant get immobilized by land units when surrounding them anymore like they could in Advance Wars.) but taking the same tile as a covered unit as well. (Meaning you can have a Attack chopper over your infantry unit at the same time etc.) And that it requires you to land said air unit to do Base repair or resupply, and as its repaired/resupplied, its no longer weak to anti air, but instead land units. (Meaning you can theoretically save a chopper in a AA heavy area by landing it.)

Overall i think its the best Advance Wars styled PC title out there of the rather small bunch, especially how it got good multiplayer and how its cake to replace visuals, sound and music. (Sound and Music is stored in .ogg format while the visuals is just .dds files, so you can pimp it easy the way you want with just Audacity and gimp with .dds plugin.)
Just hope it one day get a map editor for us to toy with.

Cant wait to see your review of it, as i would love to hear someone else's full experience with it.

[TehShrike]

Thanks for the review! I'm glad I got to read the opinion of another TBS player before buying.

[Kunik]

Originally posted by d20 Duff Man:

Thanks for the review! I'm glad I got to read the opinion of another TBS player before buying.

Only sad thing is... their PC publisher is a bunch of bricks, they have yet to update it a single time in 2months, its behind by 2 versions already, thus ended up as i feared, their laziness split the community in two and the cross playability is killed by the version difference.
And no matter how much devs seem to forward complains they don't seem to give a crap...
I royally wish it was possible to patch it using the stand alone drm free PC updates from another distributor, but considering i cant seem to extract the files form the patch installer it prevents me form attempting to hard merge it. (The game is very easy to modify considering all material is stored in a zip file, much in a way Minecraft sort of do with its textures. Then the exe basically runs all stuff in the zip and reads your saves in its roaming directory in AppData, but all the stuff like stats and such is handled by the exe itself.)

Is anyone who bought it good at sending angry letters? Considering think it might be a good time to make some noice about it, as ones patience has sort of run out...