Did anyone here play this back when it came out? I lost my copy so I had to grab another when I finally found one again, at what I feel was an inflated price. I beat Advance Wars 2 and half played a significant amount of Dual Strike and Days of Ruin, but only played a bit of the original as I only rented it when it came out, and owned a used copy (playing it infrequently) until I lost it. I actually really like the subtle differences from the other games; the art style is a bit different with power meteres and health meters being different, the buildings and bases slant inward instead of straight down like the rest. I also like the premise better, the fact that it is the four fictional countries in conflict initially is more interesting to me than the whole Black Hole Army stuff.

If you have played this, did you like it? And if you like the series, which Advance Wars is your favorite?

I have some nostalgic ties to it, it cost me 34.99 CDN which I thought was really high, but the best I could do was trade Castelvania IV in to get it for 15.99...trading a game and then paying cash seems redundant. I saw it for 20 at another place a month ago but passed it up assuming I'd find my older copy in my house, but no.

That being said, while it's high priced (worse in Canada probably, since i stopped using ebay, import and customs fees have been introduced so prices have gone up) I do find the original to have a unique charm. The art style all around in game is slightly different than even Advance Wars 2: Black Whole Rising. I also like the more realistic units used in battle, Neo-Tanks in the sequal always slightly bothered me. Additionally, I prefer the story (if one is even needed, so maybe a minor thing) as it is essentially a war between four fictional city states, as opposed to those four states coming together to fight the black hole army (a la AW2).