Jagged Alliance

The Good
Thanks to my father, I got started with strategy games early. Chess, Stratego, a few of the old Avalon Hill board games, etc. It doesn't necesarily mean I'm all that good at them, but I enjoy them immensly. When I got introduced to computers, my love of Strategy games was already set. X-COM was my first squad-based tactical game, and I loved it. After I was done kicking alien butt, I wanted something a little more recent. I never found it until recently. I found Jagged Alliance on an old abandonware site, and instantly fell in love with it. It had money management, a strong tactical game, a little bit of adventure-game-like inventory management, and it had personality. I'll get to that in a bit.

In Jagged Alliance you have been hired by Jack to take back Metavira island from one of his renegade assistants, Santino. The prize? The sap from a tree that only grows on Metavira. This sap is turned into a medecine that can heal many sick people (of what is never really mentioned). You, in turn, hire other mercenaries to do this job.

This is where the personality is. Each merc (there are about 50 of them) has their own voice, and personality. Some mercs will not join you because they hate someone you already have on staff. Some grow to hate certain mercs over time. I have hired some of the worst ones, just so that I could hear them speak. This reason, among others, made me want to buy my own copy.

Once you have a team, you go sector by sector, reclaiming the island. Of course there are always a few side trips, like the poisoned water supply, a stolen headstone, and of course, the kidnapping of Brenda (Jack's daughter and head scientist).

This games does many things well. The character personality is good, the controls are fairly intuitive, and the challenge is good, especially on the hardest level.

The Bad
There are a few things wrong with the game. The music, while appropriate in mood, can be pretty repetetive. I usually turn it all the way down, and turn my radio up. The enemy AI does leave a little to be desired. There will be times when the enemy just seems to want to die. They stand out in the open emptying their clips from out of range of their weapons. And while the challenge is good, sometimes it translates into more enemies, rather than smarter ones.

The Bottom Line
In the end, this is a good game. The positive outshines the negative very well. Anyone that enjoyed X-COM, or any other squad-based game should really check this out.