Desperados: Wanted Dead or Alive

I use to play this game so much when I was a kid and to see it updated to run on windows 8 and 10 brings tears to my eyes ;) Now If only Robin hood the legend of sherwood gets the same treatment too :)

Desperados is a Real-Time-Tactics stealth game, in the same vein as Commandos. Shooting is a bit more viable, but you still need to be careful if you want to complete each level. Presentation is isometric, with pre-rendered backgrounds and characters. Everything is obviously low resolution, but it also has a lot of details, making for a visually appealing design. The game also features pre-rendered cutscenes of fair quality and voice acting in various languages (I played the italian version, which is not bad). The music is good and the sounds are nice (there are quite a few background noises, which breathe life in the maps). The story is a bit silly when you stop and think about it, but the setting/clichès surprisingly carry it. It's also not overly present, helping its score. Gameplay is fairly standard for the genre: each character in your team has his/her own abilities, you can distract enemies with sounds or items, knock them out by throwing rocks or punching them, throwing knives for the kill and so on. You examine the map, formulate a plan, see it fail, and reload to tweak it and try again. The AI is inconsistent. They have different individual behaviours, but in practice this just increases the trial and error, as you figure out which ones can be distracted. They are also too good at shooting (if you don't shoot first, you are dead 90% of the times, despite any range advantage) and the visual cones are not 100% accurate on rare occasion. At the same time, the AI can be pretty stupid: watch them clown car their way to the corner and get shot by the dozen as they peek in your view, with your gun ready. Also, most enemies that can't be distracted normally rush when they see a body, so once you knock down the first guy, you can often get the stubborn ones that way. Despite the flaws, several of the missions are very fun, the stealth is entertaining and when you can go all out, destruction is a blast. Recommended if you don't mind the genre's difficulty.

Desperados: Wanted Dead or Alive is a fantastic classic in the real-time tactics genre. The gameplay is smart, challenging, and rewarding — each mission feels like a handcrafted puzzle with multiple creative solutions. The characters are memorable, and the Western setting is atmospheric and full of charm. The story is simple — even a bit simplistic — but it leans into classic Western tropes so effectively that it feels more like a strength than a flaw. You'll find all the familiar elements: outlaws, ambushes, duels, and a showdown with a larger-than-life villain. It fits the genre like a glove. That said, there's one major issue: a serious performance bug causes the game to overheat modern systems, even when idle or in menus. It seems to max out CPU usage unnecessarily, and the problem becomes especially noticeable during the final mission: inferno, in the battle against El Diablo, where system temperatures can spike dramatically. In my case, it even froze my PC completely, since I didn’t notice the issue at first — after all, this is a 2D game from the early 2000s, and you wouldn’t expect it to push your hardware like that.

Desperados is an excellent game marred by all the worst characteristics of the RTS genre. At its best it pushes you to utilize many different strategies. At its worst it is a hopelessly frustrating click-fest. I can't help but recommend it for the excellence of it's good parts, but that's not to say it doesn't have some considerable flaws. CONS: Your characters have no AI of their own, so unless you're telling them what to do at all times, they stand immobile like masterless puppets. They won't even defend themselves when attacked. No active pause (barring use of the TIMELESS cheat code, which I recommend) means you cannot issue orders to your characters while the action is stopped. You have up to six characters in your party at one time, and you're supposed to control them all simultaneously while battling dozens of enemies in real-time. It can be a nightmare. PROS: Great Old West setting backed up by sumptuous graphics. The character movements and backgrounds are similar to what you might have seen in games like Baldur's Gate. They look superb and really immerse you into the game. During the course of the game you gather a party of six characters. All are interesting, charismatic individuals with unique abilities. This allows you to use them together in many different combinations to achieve your objectives.

Desperados: Wanted Dead or Alive is in the vein of Commandos 2 and Robin Hood. ike the aforementioned, it is 2D Iso Style, which has some flaws. The art is great and far more beauteful in those games, then their 3D counterparts, because it has this handmade style. The controlls are flawed sometimes though. Sometimes it doubleclicks and therefore lets the charakter run instead of walk, which draws all attention to oneself (unwanted). Sometimes a shot, knifethrow, etc that would clearly hit in a 3D environment, if properly programmed, doesn't hit and so on. However, the game has a great style, good charakters and a well made atmosphere. All those games have, be it Robin Hood, Commandos 1, but especialy 2, and a bit less in 3. By the way, there was a game like those in 3D, which was called Korea:Forgotten Conflict, which I would love to have on GoG, since it was a masterful made game, with a very nice recording of action chains, to precisely sync. all charakters actions, I definitly recommend Desperados, and so I do the other mentioned games !!