Jagged Alliance 2

I have been playing this game on and off for 13 years. I still have a saved game backed up somewhere that represents 3-4 months of continuous game play, and I could still never beat it, or even get close really. I continuously built up better and better squads until I could pretty much over-power most parts of the map, but the SAM sites and other treachery (and bugs) were too much to handle. Still, for all it's difficulty, and strange archaic interface, I think this is one of the greatest game experiences I've ever had. It's a difficult game and you have to put your time in but it pays you back by challenging you and treating you like an adult who wants a deep strategic challenge. The hand-written interfaces are priceless and wonderful. Calling the graphics "dated" just isn't the correct way of going about it. I've read the code. This is the old days when things were blitted into DirectDraw buffers using brute force assembly language, before hardware acceleration. That basically means that the original devs wrote the graphics engine along with the masterful gameplay, story, design and everything else. and it's wonderful! It wouldn't be done that way now, where current devs rely on lots of 3rd party solutions, engines, etc, and write to APIs, then they just wrote the whole thing lock-stock and barrel for the IBM PC system which seemed to be the market leader at the time. Consequently, I think you get a better product in the end. Something that probably represents the blood and sweat and life-essences of tens of thousands of man hours of pouring over code and other nerdy goodness. Pretty unconventional review as I never addressed the game itself, but I'll leave that to others. Jagged Alliance is as great as they come for classic games.

That word "masterpiece" is often used too easily to describe a game you really loved, but in this case, it is entirely appropriate. The core mechanics, premise and writing in this game are so pristine that even today, there are very few games that come close to the breadth and depth of its scope. Why it hasn't been remade by a reputed developer for modern day systems is an abiding mystery to me. But fear not - the original is still so good a game, and has aged so well (even graphically) that it will suck you into its retro addictiveness almost immediately. I won't bother giving you details on the setting or gameplay - other reviews here have done so well enough. I will tell you, though, that this gem will be hailed in decades to come as one of those rare examples of an art form at its absolute pinnacle. This is a game you owe it to yourself to play, just so you can experience game design and execution that has often been imitated, but rarely - if ever - equaled. Buy it NOW. It is a landmark in the evolution of games as an interactive entertainment medium.

I'm not an old fan of Jagged Alliance. I just played the demo in the time when it was launched, but my english was so bad that i didn't understand what i was doing nor how to do it. I bought JA2 recently here in GOG and i have currently conquered 3 territories, so i'm starting to get used to the game mechanics. And oh boy this is a masterpiece. The mercs you hire have very well made personalities, you will actually feel bad if one of them dies in combat. Also they have some hilarious dialogues. Combat is intrincated and satisfying, you have to use your brains if you want to survive. Sometimes you will have to retreat and wait for a better chance to attack. The learning curve is steep and i had to get past lots of problems to understand what i was doing wrong. Some battles got me frustrated for hours, until i thought it was just impossible. But once i planned carefully and used every merc according to their roles, it all went pretty smooth. Highly recommended if you like combat tactics and are a patient, persistent player.

When I played Jagged Alliance 2 Unfinished Business and later the original Jagged Alliance 2 in the early millenium it blew my mind, because I had only known the X-Com series in turn-based so far, and Jagged Alliance took it to a whole new level. It's great combat, great fun and also features a humorous story. For me it's well worth the full price. If you get it, be sure to also get the v1.13 community mod, that brings more fun, guns and inventory system into the game. (Be aware though, that if you choose the enemies drop all inventory option you're bound to be micromanaging the squads' inventory as a part-time job)

Genuinely one of the best games ever created. In terms of turn based strategy, I can't think of another game that draws you in quite as much as this. One of the greatest underrated games ever made.