As much as I love Advance Wars, I understand why the series has laid dormant for over a decade. At a root level, the franchise’s game mechanics simply weren’t built for the long haul. Fighting with replenishable nameless and faceless units led to levels that could drag while also lacking emotional weight.

Advance Wars and Fire Emblem are both turn-based strategy games made by the same company, but the latter’s focus on individual characters with names, faces, skills that develop over time, and the threat of a shortened lifespan makes for an easier-to-renew franchise with each set of fresh faces to care about. Eventually, fighting with the same tanks and planes got stale, to the point where Nintendo disastrously attempted to resuscitate Advance Wars with a gritty reboot that sank the whole franchise to this day.

When I first saw Into the Breach, I came into it with expectations of it playing like Nintendo’s wartime strategy franchise. Even with the latter’s design faults, it’s been so long that I’d be okay with it as long as I got to manage units on a battlefield again. What it ends up being is a really clever twist on the formula that breathes new live into a formerly-stale concept.

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