Jagged Alliance 2

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I received my boxed copy of Jagged Alliance 2 in Italy during the spring of 1999 after playing it’s Demoville level the year prior, installed from some PC magazine CD, for longer than I play most full games.

JA2 is a simulation of an omnipotent commander, you, that is, in charge of weirdoes with guns from around the world, hired to work together to topple the dictator of a tropical country.

HyperTextHero Jagged Alliance 2 videos originally streamed live on Twitch:

A representation of a 1990s laptop interface with an operating system running an email client and a web browser is your first stop after the introductory cutscenes.

A strategic map of the land with various filters to plan where to send your mercenaries to fight is next, followed, finally, by the heart of the game: An isometric view of little humans made of charmingly animated pixel graphics, who take turns doing things like walking or looking in a particular direction, crouching or laying prone, talking, hiding, throwing, opening, closing, and shooting.

Excellent voice acting brings the humorous writing to life, a good counter-balance to the difficulty of the early game (try to get one merc with a long rifle, like Lynx, for a day or two, or you’ll be cursing the gods).

Keeping track of everything, from missions and side quests, team dynamics with incompatible personalities, cashflow from captured mines, and a toybox full of items from sunglasses and camouflage makeup to gun trinkets and different types of ammo for the tactical battles is challenging, and shapes the game into a peculiar strategic and tactical problem solving exercise that few games can muster.

The source code of the game was put in the public domain years after its release, leading to mods like JA v1.13, an excellent expanded version of the original game with a cult following, and versions for Linux and Mac computers.

Here’s how to play the classic version of Jagged Alliance 2 on a Mac with an M1 ARM processor:

  1. Buy and download Jagged Alliance 2 from Good Old Games or elsewhere. Open the jagged_alliance_2_2.0.0.4.dmg downloaded from gog.com and drag and drop Jagged Alliance 2.app to your Applications folder.

  2. Download the macOS bundle of Jagged Alliance 2 Stracciatella and follow the instructions to install it, after which you should have the JA2 Stracciatella.app in your Applications folder.

  3. Double-click the JA2 Stracciatella.app to start it, and under the Data tab, put the following in the JA2 Game Directory text field: /Applications/Jagged Alliance 2.app/Contents/Resources/game/Jagged Alliance 2.app/Contents/Resources/drive_c/Program Files/GOG.com/Jagged Alliance 2 then click Play Ja2 Stracciatella under the Play tab!

Yay!


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