Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising: Difference between revisions
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The objective in ''Black Hole Rising'' is to defeat the enemy. Except in some single player missions with special objectives, there are two ways to defeat an opponent: destroy every one of their units on the map or capture their headquarters. |
The objective in ''Black Hole Rising'' is to defeat the enemy. Except in some single player missions with special objectives, there are two ways to defeat an opponent: destroy every one of their units on the map or capture their headquarters. |
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The battle system is turn-based. Two to |
The battle system is turn-based. Two to five armies, each headed by a Commanding officer (CO), take turns building and commanding units on grid-based maps. On each turn, units, consisting of ground, sea and air units, can move amongst the different types of terrain featured on the map and attack enemy units within their range, or perform other actions based on various circumstances such as a submarine diving. |
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All properties (cities, bases, ports, and airports) owned by a player yield funds at the start of that player's turn, which are used to produce new units. Many factors can contribute to a player’s victory over an opposing army, such as fog of war, a phenomenon that prevents players from seeing enemy units on the battlefield other than those in the sight range of their units; weather conditions such as snow and rain that slow down most units; and CO powers, special powers that can be invoked by a CO to bolster the power of their army and perform other beneficial effects. |
All properties (cities, bases, ports, and airports) owned by a player yield funds at the start of that player's turn, which are used to produce new units. Many factors can contribute to a player’s victory over an opposing army, such as fog of war, a phenomenon that prevents players from seeing enemy units on the battlefield other than those in the sight range of their units; weather conditions such as snow and rain that slow down most units; and CO powers, special powers that can be invoked by a CO to bolster the power of their army and perform other beneficial effects. |
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Revision as of 09:04, 1 January 2008
| Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Developer(s) | Intelligent Systems |
| Publisher(s) | Nintendo |
| Series | Nintendo Wars |
| Platform(s) | Game Boy Advance |
| Release |  June 23 2003 2003 October 3 2003 November 25 2004 (as part of compilation Game Boy Wars Advance 1+2) |
| Genre(s) | Turn-based tactics |
| Mode(s) | Single player, multiplayer |
Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising is a turn-based tactics video game developed for the Game Boy Advance by Intelligent Systems and published by Nintendo in 2003. Nintendo of Japan had never released the original GBA game after it was postponed due to the September 11, 2001 attacks, and so the sequel was also not released until 2004, when both games were released together under the title Game Boy Wars Advance 1+2.
Black Hole Rising is the second game in the Advance Wars series of video games, preceded by Advance Wars and followed by Advance Wars: Dual Strike. This trio of games is a sub-series of the Nintendo Wars set of games.
Gameplay
The objective in Black Hole Rising is to defeat the enemy. Except in some single player missions with special objectives, there are two ways to defeat an opponent: destroy every one of their units on the map or capture their headquarters.
The battle system is turn-based. Two to five armies, each headed by a Commanding officer (CO), take turns building and commanding units on grid-based maps. On each turn, units, consisting of ground, sea and air units, can move amongst the different types of terrain featured on the map and attack enemy units within their range, or perform other actions based on various circumstances such as a submarine diving.
All properties (cities, bases, ports, and airports) owned by a player yield funds at the start of that player's turn, which are used to produce new units. Many factors can contribute to a player’s victory over an opposing army, such as fog of war, a phenomenon that prevents players from seeing enemy units on the battlefield other than those in the sight range of their units; weather conditions such as snow and rain that slow down most units; and CO powers, special powers that can be invoked by a CO to bolster the power of their army and perform other beneficial effects.
New features
Black Hole Rising is nearly identical to the previous game in terms of core gameplay. The new features as they pertain to this game are covered below.
Campaign mode
Black Hole Rising does not feature a field training mode like the original, instead integrating tutorial elements into the first several missions.
There are 32 missions in the campaign mode. The campaign is nonlinear in mission selection. The campaign is divided into five parts, each focusing on one of the game’s five fictional countries: Orange Star, Blue Moon, Green Earth, Yellow Comet, and Black Hole.
In each part, when a mission is completed, often two or more missions open up on that continent, and the player can decide to play one over the other or complete both for full credit. Depending on how a player completes missions in a part, the final mission of a continent can be opened up even when several other missions available beforehand still have not been completed. The player can opt to bypass leftover missions and complete the final mission for a continent to finish that continent and move onto the next part/continent of the campaign, therefore progressing faster, but a player can also take their time to complete all available missions and earn more G for use in Battle Maps.
Throughout the campaign mode there are four secret missions, unlocked by capturing a specific property in a mission earlier on. Each secret mission involves capturing an enemy lab, which functions as an enemy headquarters, and once a secret mission is completed, for the rest of the missions on that continent the player can construct the game’s new unit, the Neotank. Earning the ability to construct Neotanks for each of the game’s four continents helps make the final missions on the Black Hole continent easier for the player. Of course, all the neotank missions must be completed by a time.
Once the campaign mode is finished by the player, a Hard Campaign is unlocked just as in the previous Advance Wars. However, here the Hard Campaign is different in that some of the missions, including all of the missions on the first continent as well as the final missions at Black Hole, are completely new. As the difficulty is increased, the player earns twice as much G compared to the normal campaign. Once the Hard Campaign is completed, the player can unlock Hachi for use in non-Campaign modes.
Gameplay
Several new concepts and mechanics are featured in Black Hole Rising and are integrated into the campaign mode as well as the multiplayer mode. These have the effect of helping lend the campaign mode a far wider variety of mission objectives.
Commanding officers
Eight new Commanding officers (COs) join new versions of the previous game’s eleven existing COs for a total of nineteen. Of these, in the campaign mode, each continent features several missions where the player can choose between three COs native to that continent (and also missions where the player is forced to use certain COs for certain missions).
Most of the new COs, as well as most of the previously existing ones, are unavailable for use initially and must be unlocked by buying them in the Battle Maps mode after completing the various continents of the campaign modes, among other conditions.
A major new feature regarding COs are the new Super CO powers. Every CO now has two powers( except Sturm, who only has a super CO power), one stronger than the other, but the stronger one takes more time and energy from the CO meter. For example, while Olaf retains his initial power to cause snowfall that hinders enemy movement while supporting his own, his Super CO power has the additional effect of doing 2 HP of damage to all enemy units on the map. However, it costs twice as many stars (a new measure of a CO’s energy for using a CO power) to use as his normal CO power, and if he has the energy for the Super CO power he is also able to use the normal CO power twice in a row. It is up to the player to decide which approach to using CO powers works best for the situation.
Units and terrain features
One of the features of Black Hole Rising is the new Neotank unit, a direct-combat unit that is more expensive to produce than a Medium Tank but has higher firepower, slightly better defense, more fuel, and can move further. While the Neotank is initially available for use outside Campaign mode, in the Campaign mode it must be unlocked for each army to use by finding and completing secret missions.
The terrain of Black Hole Rising, aside from a slight visual alteration, remain the same. There are two new terrain features. The first is the Missile Silo. When an Infantry or Mech unit moves onto a silo, the player can launch the missile at any point on the map. After selecting the Launch command, a diamond-shape cursor will appear, and all units within the cursor will take 3 HP of damage. Units cannot be destroyed by a missile.
The other new terrain feature is the Pipeline, along with the Pipe Seams, which act as walls on the battlefield. Pipelines are often arranged to enclose key areas of a map to intensify the nature of a conflict, but they can also come with seams in their structure that can be destroyed, and flat land appears in the seam’s place which allows units to pass through.
Lastly, appearing only in the campaign mode are geographical features that specifically affect the gameplay of Campaign missions, often becoming the focus of these missions. These include Black Cannons that automatically fire upon any non-Black Hole unit in their range at the start of each turn; minicannons, smaller versions of the Black Cannons; giant factories that can freely produce Black Hole units and are always the focus of the final mission on each continent; an erupting volcano in one Campaign map that drops damaging debris onto the battlefield in a set pattern; and in the final mission, a giant death ray that fires every seven days damaging every non-Black Hole unit in its path.
Multiplayer and other features
Completion of a mission yields a rank for that mission and a currency reward corresponding to the rank, and that currency can be redeemed at Battle Maps. When a mission is completed, the Power, Speed, and Technique ratings for that mission are scored between 0 and 100, and they are added up to produce the total score for that mission (and doubled, if the mission was an Advance Campaign mission).
The maps available in Versus Mode and the War Room are expanded versions of the collection of 114 maps in Advance Wars. There are 22 new maps, 10 of which are in the War Room (which add up to 30 maps when taken together with the 20 existing War Room maps from the previous game). All of the new maps must be bought in the Battle Maps mode (while all of the existing maps are unlocked from the start).
The Battle Maps mode is unchanged in function and purpose. The points earned in Campaign and War Room are redeemed here for maps and COs to be used in Versus Mode. Other things that can be bought include new color palettes to change the appearance of each CO, a Sound Room, and an Image Gallery.
Story
While the Allied Nations were still recovering from the war in Cosmo Land, the Black Hole Army has already recovered and is launching a new attack on Macro Land. Since its defeat in Cosmo Land, the Black Hole Army has learned from its mistakes. It has built large factories to fund and amass a large force for an invasion. Lash has also invented several new war weapons that are put to liberal use in this invasion.
The Black Hole Army has also recruited four new Commanding Officers (COs). Sturm, with an ominous new look, commands each Black Hole CO to invade and capture each of the four countries owned by the four other armies from the original game: Flak is assigned to take Orange Star, Lash for Blue Moon, Adder for Yellow Comet, and Hawke for Green Earth. The four armies must now work together to drive Black Hole out of their world once and for all.
Near the end of the campaign, when the Black Hole COs have been driven from the nations of Wars World, the COs meet up in Black Hole's base of operations, where they fight Sturm one last time. The final battle takes place in front of the Death Ray, a powerful new weapon guarding the entrance to a missile, which, in 30 days, will destroy half of Wars World.
When the Death Ray is destroyed, the COs disarm the missile and corner Sturm, who attempts to blow up the base and kill everyone by self destructing. Andy steps forward to stop Sturm. Just as it looks like Andy will be killed, Hawke, second only to Sturm himself, betrays his leader by killing him with Black Storm, his CO Superpower. Afterwards, Hawke takes over as leader of Black Hole, and with Flak, Lash, and Adder, leaves Macro Land with the few troops he has left.
See also
External links
- Official website
- Official Nintendo website
- Official Intelligent Systems website
- Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising at MobyGames
| Intelligent Systems | |
|---|---|
| Kuju Entertainment | |
| WayForward | |
