PicoWars - Advance Wars Demake
by Lambdanaut
Play the full game with story mode HERE
What's that!
Picowars is an 8bit homage to one of the greatest Nintendo games of all time. Advance Wars.
That may just me by opinion but it's the right one.
Picowars is a turn-based strategy game where the objective is to build up an army from your
bases in order to capture more properties on the map and eventually capture the opposing
player's headquarters.
New to the franchise?
Controls
Move your cursor with the arrow keys, select with Z and deselect with X
Enemy's HQ
This is your target. You want to move your infantry and mechs onto this property and capture
it. You do that, and you win.
Your HQ
And this is your HQ. Keep the opposing player away from it. If they capture it, it's game
over.
Bases
This is one of your bases. This is where you build your army, and it's the first thing you
want to select when the game begins. Move your cursor over it and click Z to open up the build
menu. There you can build any unit that you can afford with your current gold.
Neutral properties
This is a neutral city. Right now it's not doing anything for anyone, but if you move an
infantry or mech onto this tile and capture it, it'll change to your team's colors and provide
1 gold for you per turn. Every property you own, including bases and your HQ generate 1 gold
per turn, so the more you have the better.
A property has 20 capture points. Each turn you can capture once, and the amount of capture
points that is deducted is equal to the amount of hp the capturing unit has. Each unit starts
out with 10hp, so optimally it'll take 2 turns to capture a property. If a unit has 1hp, it'll
take 20 turns. Yeesh.
Cities also heal any unit standing on them for 2hp per turn. In fact, all properties heal by
2hp, so keep that in mind when a unit is damaged and needs to retreat.
Infantry and Mechs
And these guys? These are the most basic units of your army. Infantry and Mechs. They don't
always do as much damage as the bigger boys, but they have the special ability of being the
only units that can capture properties.
The Info Bar
This is where you can see information about the selected tile. Each tile has a defense rating
that you can see by the number of stars next to the tile. This base has 3 stars next to it so
it's a pretty beefy defensive posture. If your unit is attacked from this tile, they'll take
less damage.
Terrain Mobility
Of note, only infantry and mechs can traverse rivers and mountains, and they're slowed quite a
bit from it! All terrain types affect units differently. It's up to you to figure out which
units are affected by terrain and by how much.
Ranged Units
These units are special. Rockets and Artillery. They can't attack up close, as they're ranged
units. They attack from multiple tiles away from their target. They also cannot move and
attack in the same turn, so place them strategically where you expect the enemy to walk into
their range.
You can check their range by holding down X while your cursor is over them.