Difficulty levels of Advance Wars: Black Hole Rising or Dual Strike?

boyward

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I own Black Hole Rising, but it was too hard for me to really enjoy it. Yeah, I know, I stink. But that's how it is.

I was really interested in Dual Strike, but I don't want to put the money down for a game that's just as hard as Black Hole Rising? Is Dual Strike harder, easier, or about the same?
 
I'm starting to see consensus here. So far only 1 out of 7 voters thinks Dual Strike is harder.

Please vote if you haven't!
 
I beat Black Hole rising's normal campaign with minimal difficulty - I managed to beat almost every mission on my first try until I got to the last Green Earth mission. Dual Strike - I'm on mission 21, and I'm fucked.
 
I noticed the game being not too terribly difficult until 20. That one is pretty rough. I'm on 21 right now but am yet to try it.
 
Funny, I'm on 21 and have failed that several times. Though on my last try I think I was past the hard part but had to do a quick save as my airplane was landing :D. I need to finish that one off soon. That mission is particularly hard because you have to get to several missile launchers before the enemy does. If they get to just one, you lose.

It is definitely an order of magnitude harder than any mission before it. I think I might have lost 1 or 2 before that on the first attempt.

I never played the previous AW games, so I can't compare. I'll say this though, I couldn't see playing this game WITHOUT the stylus. Seems to be perfect for the DS. The stupid IGN review says it is a perfect D-pad game and that this is one DS game that is not suited for the stylus. They are fucking insane. I jump all over the map selecting different units. How the fuck do you do that with a D-pad?

Some reviews I've read go on about how hard the game is. At least until mission 21, I found the game very easy. I find it much easier to play this type of game than button-mashing combo fighters for example. But maybe that's just me - I grew up with turn-based PC type gaming and not action fare (stopped playing consoles around NES).

I played this game Friday on my 4 1/2 and 2 1/2 hour plane flights. It made the flights go by VERY fast. I couldn't believe on both that we landed as soon as we did! All hail Nintendo for the long-lasting battery-life of the DS! AWDS is perfectly suited for the plane. I have played Kirby on the plane before but the turbulence makes that a bit diffidult. I wouldn't even attempt Mario 64, or any other thumb-strap game :D
 
It sounds like a strategy guide might come in handy around level 21, eh?

Does the difficulty taper off a bit after that particular mission?
 
[quote name='boyward']It sounds like a strategy guide might come in handy around level 21, eh?

Does the difficulty taper off a bit after that particular mission?[/QUOTE]

I haven't played past 21 yet... I looked at the Strat Guide today - looks like there are only 25 missions, so there's not much left after 21 anyway!

The strat guide has all 25 missions covered on both "normal" and "hard" campaigns. I didn't know there was such a mode as "hard". Looks like this game will keep me going for a few more airplane trips - being to replay the missions on hard will probably more than double the gameplay! Cool...

Edit: Just wanted to correct myself here - there are 28 missions. I must have been dsylexic when I read the strat guide. An AW: DS FAQ i read shows 28 missions though. I'm on 25 now... 24 was semi-challenging, but I got through it on the second try.
 
I played it again last night - it was actually MISSION 22 that was the hard one with the missile launchers. 21 must have been easy - don't even remember it. I mopped up the rest of 22, and then finished 23, which was much easier than 22. So, 22 is definitely the peak, so far anyway.
 
Hehe - I tried Mission 25 last night and it kicked my ass twice. It is a 2-front war with both being pretty difficult. I'll have to rethink my strategy and try it again. So, 22 and 25 are the hard ones, in my opinion, so far. Everything else I did in 1 or 2 tries - probably all but 3 of those in 1 try.

Looking at gamefaqs it looks like there are 28 missions total - I must have misread the strat guide the other day when I saw 25... I am NOT going to use the FAQ to beat the missions, but if you have trouble (since you are concerned about it being too hard) I'm sure you could get through some of the harder ones with the FAQ. It seems like the AI does the same thing every time (or at least starts out the same way) so once you know what to do it should be pretty easy.

Interesting thing I saw in the FAQ - if you plug AW or AW2 into the GBA slot on the DS, apparently you unlock extra maps! I'll have to see if I can borrow a copy of those games :D. Or maybe my GR will let me pop in one of their used or rental copies.
 
[quote name='io']
Interesting thing I saw in the FAQ - if you plug AW or AW2 into the GBA slot on the DS, apparently you unlock extra maps! I'll have to see if I can borrow a copy of those games :D. Or maybe my GR will let me pop in one of their used or rental copies.[/QUOTE]

That's interesting.... I have the other two and have even had both in at one time or another but didn't notice any change. I'm going to have to read up on that.
 
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