While tactical strategy games are bountiful these days, that wasn’t always the case. A couple of decades ago, it felt like Nintendo was one of the only companies keeping the genre alive, in large part due to its fantastic offering on the Game Boy family of systems. While Fire Emblem gets all the credit these days, Advance Wars was the franchise that truly perfected the idea of handheld strategy. That all came to a head with Dual Strike — a truly fantastic tactical entry that built on the rock-solid foundation of the first two for one of the best strategy experiences of all time.
Dual Strike is the third game in the Advance Wars series, and the first released on the Nintendo DS — making full use of the dual-screen feature. This was really the game that proved how smart the layout can be for tactical games, displaying the map on one screen and all of those vital stats on the top screen, from the cities you control to terrain bonuses, and battle forecasts. This exceptionally streamlines the experience by giving you instant feedback and reducing the amount of menu opening you need to do, drastically speeding up the experience.
