Barking At The Moon... Again.

God I hate it when the difficulty of games gets too high. You know, that moment when you find the vain on your forehead at bursting point and you struggle not to unload your wrath on the poor old controller? Well it's happening again. I've returned to the video gaming equivalent of crack that is Advance Wars, now on it's second DS iteration under the guise of Dark Conflict. Whilst the story and visual style in the cut scenes has changed, the game play remains the same, which if you're an Advance Wars fan is a fantastic thing. Trouble is, I haven't played Advance Wars for a really long time. The last title was released in 2005, and that was the last time I played Advance Wars, a good 4 years ago. So I'm a little rusty, but willing to prove that I still have what it takes to be a good tactician.

And I was, I plowed through the first few levels, and even took the side missions in my stride, but I should have known something was up when the side missions started to become a bit on the difficult side. Oh well I thought, might just stick with the main quest, that seems to be moving along at a reasonable pace. But then, it happened. Yup, the main quest is starting to become aggravatingly difficult. Oddly, the side missions have become easier. I may need to write a letter to Intelligent Systems to ask what they're playing at.

I know grumbling about an uneven difficulty curve is a bit of a petty thing to do, especially as previous entries into the Advance Wars series have had moments of insane difficulty, but I do remember getting along okay on the higher difficulty modes on the previous games. Maybe I've been blunted by mindless first person shoots. Perhaps my recent love for Unreal Tournament III is to blame. Either way way I'm going to keep at it, after all, if the difficulty curve remains this wobbly I can always trash it in a review. Isn't life grand?