Super Famicom Wars is that SNES strategy game you probably missed unless you were deep into imports or later emulation. It’s basically Advance Wars before Advance Wars existed—same grid-based battles, same rock-paper-scissors unit matchups, but with that chunky 16-bit charm. You start off moving little pixel tanks and infantry around, thinking you’ve got it all figured out… until the enemy bomber wipes out your whole frontline in one turn.

The sprites are tiny and colorful, the music’s got that classic SNES synth punch, and the AI doesn’t mess around. I remember getting wrecked my first few matches because I treated it like a straight brawler instead of actually positioning units properly. Pro tip: Don’t sleep on recon units—they’re cheap and great for scouting ahead before committing your heavy hitters.

If you’ve played any of the later Wars games, this one feels like stepping into a time capsule. It’s simpler in some ways (no CO powers, no fancy terrain effects), but that just means the strategy’s more raw. Still holds up if you’re into slow, methodical turn-based clashes.