Jagged Alliance 2

The Good
This has to be my favorite game ever. It's a perfect mix of strategy and role-playing. You control a squad of up to 18 characters as they try to wrest control of Arulco from the evil dictator Deidranna and return the country to its former monarch. You take control of sectors on a map, gradually leading up to Deidranna's seat of power in Meduna. Along the way you combat green and elite troops, meet individuals who help you along the way and upgrade your units.

The game runs very smoothly on even low-end systems. There's no interface lag like in many other video games. The graphics are nice and the controls are functional. The sound, music and humour are also great! The tactical gameplay is superb and some of the best you'll find in any video game. I'd rate the tactical combat even higher than X-COM's. The interaction with characters and side-quests, while less prevalent than in some other role-playing games, is interesting and adds a nice break from the combat.

The Bad
The only complaint I can think of is the lack of multiple levels in structures as in X-COM. While it is possible to walk along the ground and climb on the roof of some buildings, multiple storeys within buildings would have been nice. The sci-fi aspects are also not so good.

The Bottom Line
Probably as close to perfect as any video game as ever come! The game is always interesting and never leaves you wanting to play something else.

The Good
Strategy, tactics, and a well thought out plan. This is what you need to play this game. X-COM was a lot of fun. The original Jagged Alliance was a blast. This game made me think in tactical terms for weeks (and still does from time to time). Jagged Alliance 2 is a rather large step up from the original in terms of scope, graphics, and all around gameplay.

The basic gist of things is that you have been hired by the ex-ruler of a country called Arulco. He is thought dead by its citizens and his ex-wife/queen of Arulco. Your job is to make contact with the rebels, and take the country back. You do this by hiring mercs and basically going to war with the country's army. This is a pretty basic plot, but there are so many side quests and extra NPC's and other things to keep your interest throughout the game.

One of the differences with this and the first game is that you can actually make yourself a merc in the game, instead of leading from some invisible command center. Depending on how you answer some questions, you will have certain abilities or quirks. Trust me, you WILL get attached to yourself. (Um... yeah. You know what I mean...) You hire your mercenaries from AIM (Association of International Mercenaries) by signing contracts (1 day, 1 week, 2 weeks) instead of just paying by the day. The mercenaries that you have access to are mostly new, with some returning from Jagged Alliance and Jagged Alliance:Deadly Games. While there are not as many as in the previous game, they all still have rather unique personalities. Some will simply not work with others, while some may go berzerk upon seeing the enemy. This was one of those things that I loved about the original. Personality. These are not mercs that you hire and use carelessly. Each one has their use in your team. When you lose one, you don't just feel it in the bank account...

As for weapons, there is a large selection that can be scrounged, stolen, looted or bought. There is even an option at the beginning of the game where you can use a larger range of weapons. There are handguns ranging from the Desert Eagle, to rifles such as the Colt Commando. Then of course there are the attachments. Bipods, scopes, silencers, even an underbarell grenade launcher!

The Bad
The AI in this game is very good. Sometimes too good. Even on the easy setting, the enemy is no pushover. The enemy will rarely fire a shot that they know will miss. Supposedly, this is due to the fact that the enemy always knows their chances of hitting, and will only fire when those chances are good. Its a fairly even trade-off to play on normal, so you can get the better guns earlier on. Like in any real-world conflict, weapon and armor quality mean a lot.

Another quirk is the line-of-sight. The manual states "you only see what your mercs see". There are some instances when you KNOW that they should see the enemy, but they don't. That and hiding behind trees/bushes is iffy. Sometimes it helps sometimes it doesn't.

My final gripe is damage rules. Some of those weapons should be dealing a lot more damage than they do. One shot to the head, maybe two should kill a man regardless of what kind of helmet they wear. Three! Four! I don't think so.

The Bottom Line
Jagged Alliance 2 is a very enjoyable game. Despite a few quirks here and there, it does provide a very good squad-tactics kind of game. Once again, I'll refer to that tactical great, X-COM. Anyone that enjoyed that game, will also enjoy this one.

The Good
Though sometimes very hard, this game is one of the best squad-based combat games I've ever encountered. This game even best's X-COM by allowing the user to control every aspect of his sqaud's movements and actions.

The game runs in real-time until your squad gets into a battle, when it switches to turn-based combat. Here you can control every movement and shot fired by your squad members. The more experience they obtain, the better they get (just like in real life).

The controls are intuitive (once you get the hang of them) and allow you to quickly deploy orders to your team. Once you take control of the airport, you can order refreshed supplies of ammo and other items and can recruit more mercs to help you in your task of taking back Arulco.

The game is completely non-linear: you can accomplish your missions (taking over cities) in any order you like. If you want to barrel-on through and take out the head cities first, you're free to try.

The graphics, though 2D, are perfect for this game. The picking is almost flawless and movement fluid. The voice-acting, usually a stumbling point in such games, is just right. The interface is free of clutter: the information it displays in useful and pertinent. The music for this game also seemed "right on."

The enemy is finely tuned. The enemies don't seem to have any artificial education to help beat you. They seem to know what they can see and nothing else (a Good Thing(tm)). Many enemies are difficult to defeat but rarely "impossible."

I just wish there were a Jagged Alliance 3 on the way... (there are rumors, but nothing confirmed)

The Bad
The game usually runs fine, but seems to have trouble with NTFS disks. It ran flawlessly until I redid my installation as NTFS. It will run a ways, but then die and refuse to load saved games.

It would be nice if this game were higher res and 3D. But I think these are more of wish-list items for the next version instead of complaints of this game. I never found myself thinking, "Man this game needs to be in 3D."

The Bottom Line
A great squad-based combat game. One that needs to be played to be appreciated.