Front Mission[a] is a tactical role-playing game developed by G-Craft and published by Square for the Super Famicom.

[1] Front Mission is part of a serialized storyline that follows the stories of various characters and their struggles involving mecha known as wanzers.

A remake of the game developed by Square Enix Co., Ltd. was released for the PlayStation in Japan on October 23, 2003, titled Front Mission 1st.

In Front Mission, players use playable units called wanzers, a term for mecha derived from the German word Wanderpanzer, or "walking tank".

An OCU reconnaissance team led by Royd Clive is assigned to investigate a USN munitions factory in the Larcus district, located on eastern Huffman Island.

The USN publicly frames the event as an enemy attack, later known as the Larcus Incident, which reignites tensions and begins the 2nd Huffman Conflict.

The Crows initially consists of Natalie Blakewood, Keith Carabell, Joynas "JJ" Jeriaska, and Ryuji Sakata.

Royd is permitted to recruit anyone else he chooses, including war journalist Frederick Lancaster, and child soldier Yang Meihua.

Although Hans finds a conspiratorial connection between Grey Rock Hospital and a mysterious "Nirvana Institute", with no further leads on Karen's fate the Crows collaborate with the OCU to fight the UCN, and liberate Freedom City, the capital of eastern Huffman.

Gentz claims they are solely targeting Sakata, who are actually the creators of B-device technology, revealed to be the grafting of soldiers' brains into wanzer CPUs, and that Nirvana is responsible for finding and capturing candidates with extensive combat experience.

Willas Blakewood, founder of the Crows and Natalie's father, arrives to assist Royd's faction, and informs them that Koichi is on a Sakata ship nearby.

Their conversation reveals that Zafra, despite being PMO's benefactor, is also involved in Sakata's research[9] and they share a secret facility on Longrivers Island (publicly restricted as a nature reserve) nearby.

Zafra, speaking remotely, disregard Koichi's B-device technology as they have already made significant progress with its successor, the S-device.

Royd's Crows kill Koichi as they proceed through the facility, coming across the first S-device: a large weaponised Driscoll cyborg.

Although the OCU and USN admit partial blame, and the PMO suffers reputational damage, Zafra denies any involvement and evades consequences.

In the PlayStation and Nintendo DS remaster titled Front Mission 1st, the player can also play a second scenario revolving around USN officer Kevin Greenfield.

Months before the Larcus Incident, Kevin and his teammates in the Black Hounds special forces unit are participating in an operation against a terrorist organization known as "The Star of Freedom".

In a last-ditch effort to remain in service, Greenfield accepts a post to the USN special weapons research division known as the "Nirvana Institute".

As the new leader of the Silver Lynx strike force, he aids the USN offensive to defeat the OCU and help end the war quickly.

[10] Tsuchida also had difficulty explaining how much of a role robots would have in the proposed game, and so he obtained some development hardware to create a prototype of the title.

[10] Hashimoto insisted that lighter moments be included, such as the characters hanging out and playing cards, in order to balance the mood of the game which was dark and moody.

[10] Hironobu Sakaguchi, Shinji Hashimoto, and Toshiro Tsuchida all loved robots and did a lot of brainstorming to discover elements that could be in the game.

[10] Yoshitaka Amano painted an illustration for the game, and it was intended to be used as the front cover of the cartridges packaging, but it was too “imposing” and only a portion was used.

[13] Two songs composed by Shimomura from Front Mission, Take the Offensive and Manifold Irons, were orchestrated for the Drammatica album.

This remake served as the basis for the Nintendo DS port, which was released in Japan on March 22, 2007, and in North America (as Front Mission) on October 23, 2007.

The Nintendo DS version features battle sequences that make use of the console's dual screen setup for an easy view of the action.

A number of characters from other Front Mission titles were added to the game's storyline, such as Griff Burnam and Glen Duval.

[19] In April 1995, Famitsu magazine gave the Super Famicom version of the game first a 9 out of 10[41] and later an 8 out of 10 in their Reader Cross Review.

[28] Nintendo Power called the game "a stark, futuristic Advance Wars without the happy combatants and vehicle variety.