These early installments were released in Japan, with Advance Wars (2001) being the first to reach the North American and European markets.
The success of Advance Wars in the West is frequently credited as a driving force for Nintendo bringing Intelligent Systems' franchise Fire Emblem outside of Japan, as both series share a similar tactical gameplay style.
In 2005, Advance Wars: Dual Strike was released on the Nintendo DS family of systems, which followed and expanded on the basic format of its predecessors.
That same year Battalion Wars, developed by Kuju Entertainment, was released for the GameCube in Japan under the title Totsugeki!!
The last major title in the franchise, Advance Wars: Days of Ruin, was released internationally for the DS in 2008 and departed from the series' light hearted tone.
In the single-player campaign of the Advance Wars games, each level consists of a new map and opposing CO to defeat.
Otherwise, the rules remain identical, and only in Game Boy Wars 3 were unit levels and a new resource introduced.
[3][7] Conditions such as fog of war, rain, and snow affect the abilities of units to reveal the map and move around.
[8] Days of Ruin removed many of the features added to previous Advance Wars games, greatly weakening CO Powers and reintroducing a unit level system.