Actual Game
Jagged Alliance
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The Game
Deadly Games works much like your typical turn-based strategy game. You have units, each worth a certain amount of "action points." During each of your turns, your basic goal is to use the points to kill as many bad guys as possible. But what made Jagged Alliance such a treat to play, and what makes Deadly Games even more of one, is that each of your units has personality. Not in some abstract, Close Combat way - but real personality. You hire from a huge pool of available mercs, but you must pick and choose carefully. Some won't work together, some will scream at you if you ask them to do something they don't want to, and some won't stop doing something they really enjoy - such as shoot at an enemy, even when taking heat from all sides.
In this update to the original Jagged Alliance Sirtech added some nice touches to make the game more enjoyable. For one, you no longer have one huge map to tackle. You can either play single scenarios or take them on, one by one, in campaign fashion. Unfortunately, the most frustrating aspect of the game is also directly related to this mission-based style. In the original release of Deadly Games, each mission has a very limited amount of turns allocated for completion. Not only did this make some missions next to impossible, it made gathering items from the battlefield out of the question. Sirtech later released a patch which allows you to alter the time allotments by adding more turns or doing away with the limit altogether, a must for anyone who wants to truly enjoy the game.
For each completed scenario, you get a nice sum of cash, which you can then use to hire more mercs or buy equipment from Micky, an arms dealer who sporadically appears to offer you items. In another great improvement, you can now also buy equipment (even if the quality is questionable and the prices sky-high); even better is the fact that you can sell excess equipment. Also new are several new types of weapons, dozens of new mercenaries, and a few subtle touches, such as trails of blood behind wounded soldiers, that give the game originality.