Jagged Alliance 2

Appeared : Feb 18, 2000
Developer : Sir Tech
Editor : Topware Interactive
Distributor : Ubi Soft
Official Web Site : sir-tech.com
My opinion : This is a great tactical game which is served by far better graphics than the previous iterations of this product.

The title page
Strategic Overview
In mission : sniping




Wonderful sequel to the ground-breaking tactical game that was Jagged Alliance. Well, actually XCom was first, but I never played it.
Having played JA:DG (Deadly Games, 1998), and having been totally thrilled by it, I was regarding the sequel with high expectations and I am pleased to say that I have not been deceived. ja2 is everything I expected and more.

If you do not know about this game, check here for an explanation.

Gotcha !
Mayhem
Waiting for a delivery


There are a small number of things that are lacking, athough these items do not distract in any way from the experience the developers have obviously made great efforts to give. The two things I find lacking are:

No multiplayer

Now I would first like to point out that, although this is probably the complaint that got the most postings on Sir-Techs web site, I do not mind all that much (see here for my explanation). Of course, having seen the tactical capabilities of the game engine, I do sympathize with all those squad leaders out there. ja2 would definitely be a smasher in multiplayer.

It hurts even more when you realize that Deadly Games (the previous version) DID HAVE multiplayer.

No Custom campaign mode

JA:DG (read Jagged Alliance : Deadly Games) had two neat features that I used and abused a lot: the mission editor was built-in with the game, and you could create an infinite campaign based on a set of missions that could be called randomly or in order.

That meant that once you had finished the game as it had been intended, you could build your own environment and play to your hearts content. You could therefor build custom missions that were as simple or as hard as you wished, and create a set of the missions you created plus some missions from the standard game. Then you started a new Custom Campaign and off you went for months of lurking, sniping and lockpicking. It was really good fun.

Unfortunately, the mission editor and the custom campaign mode have also been left out of the game. Shame really.