Introduction: Perhaps one of the greatest early games for the GBA, Super Dodge Ball Advance is a sequel to the immensely fun and widely acclaimed Super Dodge Ball for the NES. There are no other games really that are in the same genre. It breaks boundaries and is a cross between a sports game and a fighting game-- and a whole lot more!

Review: The object of the game is to defeat the opposing team by bombarding them with a dodge ball. In championship mode you start the game by choosing a name for your team and their country of origin. Then you are assigned a team manager. Now for the action. You can choose your opponent team from a list of 9 other teams ranked best to worst. The higher the placement of the team, the harder they will be to beat. Before each match you can customize a few options such as player position and names.

The matches are played on a court that is divided in half. Teams consist of 7 players. Your four main players are inside of the left half in a square formation. The other 3 players are on the opposite side but outside of the court. They are used as extra players to pass to, making your game more strategic. The three outside players do not take any damage and therefore, cannot die. So you must throw the dodge ball only at the four opposite players until you kill them. You win the match when the four main opposite players are killed or you lose when your four main players are killed.

There are three types of throws. The standing/walking throw (which does the least damage), the running throw (which does more damage), and the super throw (which does the most damage). The controls are rather simple because of the GBA hardware but it couldn't be any better with more buttons. In offensive mode the A button is for passing, the B button is for throwing, the R button is for switching between targeted players, and the L button is to make a player on your team charge the half-line, a great attack strategy. By pressing the A and B buttons simultaneously, you can jump. This helps when making long passes so that they do not get intercepted. If A+B is pressed while jumping then you will do a flip. It helps to confuse the other team. In defensive mode the A button duck's and the B button catches. The B button (catching) must be depressed at the precise moment because the hands are only prepared to catch for about 1-2 seconds.

Going back to the super throws; each character has two different super throws: one done in the air and the other while on the ground. To do a super throw you must run a certain amount of steps and then throw the ball or for the air throw, jump and throw. Running is done by tapping the D-pad twice. As for strategy, you can confuse your opponents quite a bit. Here are just a few examples: make a team member charge the half line and while they are in the air, pass to them and then make a super throw; run, jump, do a flip and then make a super throw; run, jump, pass to a sideline player and then make them do the super throw while they are still in the air from catching the ball. This gives the game so much more depth. There are a total of 50 super throws!

Conclusion: Well anyway, there's something very fun about hurling a ball at your enemy and watching them fly across the screen 20 feet in the air. When they finally come back down you hit them again! If you do actually get bored with this then you can link up with a friend and vs. him. You will each need a gamepak though. Also, the longer you play the game, the harder the AI gets, giving you a challenge even after you have played for a long time. Did I mention that you can customize your team formation, player specs, player positions and names? Lots of depth that you wouldn't expect from such a game. This is a must have game!

Ratings: (scale of 0.0 - 5.0)