X-Com & Jagged Alliance

[XLjedi]

:hmm: I've been thinking I haven't looked around lately to see what's become of the Jagged Alliance and/or X-Com series...

I recall having some fun with JA2 after waiting around for a decent X-Com followup. But it's been years since I've gone looking for squad-based tactical games. Looks like I may have to give this one a try.

[TteFAboB]

Brigade E5 is a JA2 clone but with a far smaller and dumbed down map, both strategic and in sectors: there are few enterable buildings, not to mention the inexistance of cool dungeons, secret bases, caves and everything else that made the JA2 so wild, varied, large and fun.

A follow-up to Brigade E5 is in the works: 7.62

While it will look better than E5, neither of these can come close to the gameplay of JA2. The only problem with that game is the crappy graphics, but it's definitely the best squad-based game to this date, though perhaps tied to the first two X-Com games.

[Dowly]

"ELLIOT, YOU IDIOT!!!" :rotfl:

JA2 =

[tycho102]

There a Jagged Alliance 2 mod that I just picked up the other day. I haven't had the chance to get everything installed and give it a try, but it sounds like it makes quite a few changes. Not sure if it included a no-cd executable or not -- which is one of my primary considerations.
http://ja2v113.schtuff.com/

Xcom 1 has been remade. I have it somewhere and just haven't gotten the chance to give it a try. There's also a speed-run of Xcom 1 which was pretty crazy to see.

As for the new game, it looks interesting. UFO:Aftermath looked interesting -- almost unplayable from all the crash and mission-critical bugs, but it had a few interesting things to it.

[XLjedi]

Update...

I picked up "UFO: Extraterrestrials" by Chaos Concept the other day. Hoping to maybe recapture some of that XCom/JA2 gaming experience.

What an utter piece of crap it turned out to be.

The graphics are juvenile in their implementation, to the point that I just can't look past it. I played it for about 20 mins before uninstalling it. I swear all the soldier graphics look like the Willis & Grommet claymation characters. It just comes across as goofy... and for some reason, no one dies in this game. The whole point of the original was that you were so technologically outmatched that you expected half your units to get killed every mission in the beginning. Your research was overshadowed by this hopeless life & death struggle. That all seems lost in this so-called remake.

I'll probably reinstall JA2 before I bother to put this one back on the drive.

[Dowly]

Aye, I read some reviews of the remake and nobody seems to like it too much. I'm looking at my JA2 box atm...

*Pops the cd into the driver*

[CCIP]

Originally Posted by Dowly

"ELLIOT, YOU IDIOT!!!" :rotfl:

JA2 =

I've been playing this lately (well, slowly for the past two months actually). I'm playing it on realistic mode. It's seriously one of the best games I've played.

I could say similar things for the X-Com series, though I haven't played that in a long long time.

I'd love there to be new sequels to both, but I'm cautiously skeptical if they can live up. I believe some Russian studio is still working on a JA3. X-Com itself I don't think we'll see anything of anytime soon though.

For those who don't have it, you can buy JA2 via Steam by the way. It's still well worth playing, and runs no problem for me even on Vista.

[Janus]

Originally Posted by CCIP

I'd love there to be new sequels to both, but I'm cautiously skeptical if they can live up. I believe some Russian studio is still working on a JA3. X-Com itself I don't think we'll see anything of anytime soon though.

At least there is a video on youtube: