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    Jagged Alliance: Back in Action

    Game » consists of 1 releases. Released Feb 09, 2012

    A 2012 remake of Jagged Alliance 2, the 1999 tactical strategy game, with a new real-time "Pause & Go" tactical combat system.

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    Jumanji

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    #1  Edited By Jumanji

    Only German mirrors so far... Someone grab it and tell us if it works!

    1

    2

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    CannonGoose

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    #2  Edited By CannonGoose

    ON IT.

    (I've never played a Jagged Alliance game before)

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    Jumanji

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    #3  Edited By Jumanji

    @CannonGoose: Jagged Alliance was like... an A-Team simulator. It was a neat hybrid of light RPG mechanics with a fairly deep TBS isometric shooter, and it was sugar coated with a lot of character and merc fluff.

    Jagged Alliance 2, the last entry in the series, was released in '97. Since then there have been crazy people modding the game pretty much constantly. The big mod is "V1.13". If the HARDCORE 1.13 HEADS give Back in Action their seal of approval, I will get on board.

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    CannonGoose

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    #4  Edited By CannonGoose

    It's legit! Feel free to download it at your leisure.

    I found it to be a bit clunky and really difficult, but I think it's quite cool.

    Not sure how it compares to the original games though.

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    Dredlockz

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    #5  Edited By Dredlockz

    oh sweet!

    The steam demo download link is not working for some reason.

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    strangone

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    #6  Edited By strangone

    I read somewhere that this game is real-time, is that true?

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    DocHaus

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    #7  Edited By DocHaus

    The demo seems to work but I apparently suck at it. I can't seem to do the stealthy approach because I have no idea of the line of sight of the enemy units (or friendlies for that matter) and simply moving my units a few steps left causes every enemy in the shed to start shooting at my units. The action is real time but my men only fire one bullet and then just sit around blocking incoming bullets with their faces until given another order or death. I guess you have to keep right-clicking the same enemy but it gets really freaking frustrating.

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    Dredlockz

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    #8  Edited By Dredlockz

    @strangone said:

    I read somewhere that this game is real-time, is that true?

    I think it's realtime but you can (and probably are expected to) pause and give directions to your dudes at all times.

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    sanchopanza

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    #9  Edited By sanchopanza

    @Dredlockz said:

    @strangone said:

    I read somewhere that this game is real-time, is that true?

    I think it's realtime but you can (and probably are expected) to pause and give directions to your dudes at all times.

    What? ...I'm out

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    Dredlockz

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    #10  Edited By Dredlockz

    Just played the shit out of the demo.

    I loved it!

    It has some serious rough edges, and it's definitely a niche game, and not for everyone.

    The trick is not to play it as an RTS, but you have to be pausing the game constantly. There is a queue of actions for each merc, and you can drag those actions together to synchronize them. So you can have a dude go to a spot and shoot, and anotherone to throw a granade. and you sync those actions to happen at the same time, so they will wait for each other to be ready.

    It takes a while to get used to the interface, but they have nice hotkeys for everything, so after getting used to the learning curve, you can do some pretty cool stuff.

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    Dredlockz

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    #11  Edited By Dredlockz

    @sanchopanza said:

    @Dredlockz said:

    @strangone said:

    I read somewhere that this game is real-time, is that true?

    I think it's realtime but you can (and probably are expected) to pause and give directions to your dudes at all times.

    What? ...I'm out

    Did you ever play Silent Storm?

    You know how you can switch between real-time and turn based for combat there? It's pretty much the same thing, they just took it one step further. It's not as bad as you might think.

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    Vodun

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    #12  Edited By Vodun

    Holy crap that was hard, but soooo good! Some jank, especially relating to enemies being able to see you due to weird clipping in the 3D but otherwise it's really kewl.

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    azrailx

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    #13  Edited By azrailx

    no fog of war and realtime = no sale

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    Twinblade

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    #14  Edited By Twinblade

    there are a bunch of small little issues that bother me. the biggest is probably not being able to target enemies if theres a tree or bush in the way, forcing you to constantly rotate the camera.

    i liked it quite a bit but i think ill wait until they patch it up a bit before buying it.

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    Stahlbrand

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    #15  Edited By Stahlbrand

    @Dredlockz said:

    @sanchopanza said:

    @Dredlockz said:

    @strangone said:

    I read somewhere that this game is real-time, is that true?

    I think it's realtime but you can (and probably are expected) to pause and give directions to your dudes at all times.

    What? ...I'm out

    Did you ever play Silent Storm?

    You know how you can switch between real-time and turn based for combat there? It's pretty much the same thing, they just took it one step further. It's not as bad as you might think.

    I wish they would make another game like Silent Storm (hold the panzerkleins though). I'll have to check out this demo, but I'm not expecting great things.

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    Dredlockz

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    #16  Edited By Dredlockz

    @azrailx said:

    no fog of war and realtime = no sale

    The real-time is not a problem, I actually enjoyed the plan&go a lot more. If you set in the options all the triggers for auto-pausing, it's pretty much a turn-based game. You can micromanage everything really nicely.

    The fog of war tho, that's a huge bummer. I don't see it as a huge technical problem to have implemented it , i'm curious as to why they went that route.

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    DarkbeatDK

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    #17  Edited By DarkbeatDK

    Well this sure is hard, much like JA2.

    Only complaint is that it's hard to location-aim on enemies who are in cover because the buildings get in way of the camera.... Oh and I wish the portraits had been pixel art.

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    Arabes

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    #18  Edited By Arabes

    @sanchopanza said:

    @Dredlockz said:

    @strangone said:

    I read somewhere that this game is real-time, is that true?

    I think it's realtime but you can (and probably are expected) to pause and give directions to your dudes at all times.

    What? ...I'm out

    Really ? Did you really think this was gonna be turn based? Did you think they were going to make the exact same game as they did in 97 ? come on man, they want people to buy this. I love JA 2 and just finished it with one of the user created patches, can't think of the name but it was really good. Gave you specific equip locations depending on the gear you were wearing and literally thousands of new weapons and much upgraded AI which made it far more difficult. really good though. Anyway, looking forward to this. This game has great personality.

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    Anund

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    #19  Edited By Anund

    @Dredlockz said:

    @azrailx said:

    no fog of war and realtime = no sale

    The real-time is not a problem, I actually enjoyed the plan&go a lot more. If you set in the options all the triggers for auto-pausing, it's pretty much a turn-based game. You can micromanage everything really nicely.

    The fog of war tho, that's a huge bummer. I don't see it as a huge technical problem to have implemented it , i'm curious as to why they went that route.

    Having kept up with this game some, they actually had fog of war but disabled it because it "made the game boring". Apparently they felt there was too much trial and error involved if the location of the enemy wasn't clear. You know the drill: Run up and scout, die, reload, take the cautious approach.

    Personally, I would like fog of war, at least as a toggle, but the game sure is challenging enough even without it so it's not a deal breaker for me. I also hold out hope that they will bring back the FOW as a toggle in future patches.

    Saying that the game is "realtime" is a bit of a misnomer too. It's no Dawn of War 2. It actually plays a lot like Baldur's Gate except with better graphics and modern weapons. Having just gone back to play some JA2 in anticipation for this game, I have to say I think I prefer the plan-and-go system even though I am a huge fan of the old games.

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    Dredlockz

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    #20  Edited By Dredlockz

    @Anund: Completely agree. I've been also playing JA2, and the new plan&go mechanic seems like the natural evolution of the turn-based genre. I hear that the Firaxis guys are actually sticking to the original turn-based with X-COM: Enemy Unknown, so we'll get to try both out soon and compare.

    It's a bummer about the FoW stuff, I didn't find it particularly annoying, but having it be a toggle would make sense.

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    sanchopanza

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    #21  Edited By sanchopanza

    @Arabes: The reason people bought the originals (in my case at least) was because of the turn based mechanics. I will only be getting one of the new X-Com games too, want to guess which one? Also, by your logic no one would buy 2d platformers, turn based rpgs, rts games etc. etc. because why would they make the same games as they made in the 80s...whaaaat?

    Either way its a niche, as I don't really care about the 'franchise', its no longer a niche I care about. This just seems like it would have been a better Commandos reboot.

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    Arabes

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    #22  Edited By Arabes

    No FOW is a bit shitty. It gave stealth a bit more tension.

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    Arabes

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    #23  Edited By Arabes

    @sanchopanza said:

    @Arabes: The reason people bought the originals (in my case at least) was because of the turn based mechanics. I will only be getting one of the new X-Com games too, want to guess which one? Also, by your logic no one would buy 2d platformers, turn based rpgs, rts games etc. etc. because why would they make the same games as they made in the 80s...whaaaat?

    Either way its a niche, as I don't really care about the 'franchise', its no longer a niche I care about. This just seems like it would have been a better Commandos reboot.

    No man, by my logic turn based turn based tactical are not being made any more because they're not popular and most people wouldn't buy them. I didn't mention 2d platformers or anything else. That's a bit of a leap you took dude. Those other games have a huge following so it makes sense to still make them. You see the difference there? Personally I fucking love turn based tactical, I still play X-com and JA2 every year. Along with Civ and SMACX (more strategy but similiar). My point was you can't be surprised that these games are not being made turn based as the market for that doesn't exist for tactical games. Civ is about all I can think if that still work. maybe next time you should read what I said intead of going off on some tangent.

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    sanchopanza

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    #24  Edited By sanchopanza

    @Arabes: Chill out you, maybe next time don't say something stupid in the first place and then you wont have to respond with an inflammatory comment with very poor grammar.

    As far as I'm aware aside from Civ: Disgaea, Advance Wars, Tactics Ogre, Fire Emblem, all those FF Tactics games and a whole bunch of indie games all did OK, so I'm not sure that people don't buy turn-based games anymore. I really don't see where you are coming from, and what I said doen't seem to be such a great leap.

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    spacebutler

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    #25  Edited By spacebutler

    Wow, I tried the demo and it's brutally difficult. Not really the way to get new players. I wanted to turn down the difficulty a bit, but there was no option for that.

    I took out about 5 guys by running away, equipping the Dragunov and shooting them while they approached. Then I realized that I only cleared about 10% of the guys on the map and still almost got killed. Adjustable difficulty would be great. The no fog-of-war thing is a bit strange, but I didn't need something that increased the difficulty even more.

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    VooDooPC

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    #26  Edited By VooDooPC

    I tried the demo a few times. The first couple of times I tried to assault the house directly and got demolished. I then tried to go south and then around and then go up north. I killed the guys in the south with no problem, then sniped 2-3 guys in the north from the south checkpoint. The guys wised up and starting rushing us in the south and I ended up getting creamed again. If the whole game is this hard I think I'm going to have to avoid it.

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    KirePDX

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    #27  Edited By KirePDX

    @SpaceButler: I was able to beat the demo once (with two deaths, but I got careless after awhile) by basically just setting up ambush scenarios like that. I had to redistribute the weapons based on people's marksmanship, Lynx got the scoped m-14, dragunov went to magic, then the Aug to Fidel and the last guy got the shotgun. Set up Lynx prone with a good field of view, overlap angles a bit with Magic, and then support each with the other two and you can lay a solid ambush for the taking the building to the west (first take out the 3 dudes in the Southwest).

    I also just treated the game almost entirely as turnbased, otherwise enemies get into their kill range way too quickly to react or set up shots.

    Being a huge fan of JA1 & 2, I was initially turned off by the game, but after figuring the way to play it; I went ahead and pre-ordered it. I can't tell if I'm doing a good thing by supporting a brand I like; or a bad thing by encouraging reboots...either way, I know I'll never put in the time to beat the game, but it'll be fun to waste a few hours in it.

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    Jimbo

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    #28  Edited By Jimbo

    I enjoyed the demo, despite the rough edges. Kind of a mix of Soldiers: HoWW2, Commandos 2 and Hidden & Dangerous. I didn't have too much trouble with the demo mission - possibly because the first thing I did was turn on all of the auto-pause options. Maybe give that a go if you're having trouble with it. The biggest concern for me is the AI. It seems incredibly retarded even by the usual low standards, which could become easy to manipulate and boring after a while.

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    benspyda

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    #29  Edited By benspyda

    I never played the originals. Were they regarded highly? This seem to come out of nowhere.

    I enjoyed company of heroes, is it anything like that?

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    Desiant

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    #30  Edited By Desiant

    @benspyda said:

    I never played the originals. Were they regarded highly? This seem to come out of nowhere.

    I enjoyed company of heroes, is it anything like that?

    The originals are regarded fairly highly, yes. I myself have only played JA2, but found it to be insanely entertaining.

    I'd say it's a little bit like Company of Heroes, except you're not only controlling entire squads, you're also controlling the soldiers within those squads. If you've played Men of War (WW2 RTS like CoH, but with more soldier micromanagement), then it's a lot like that.

    It's really tactical. I enjoy setting up my mercs for suppression fire and using my sniper to pick them off from a distance. Being able to pause in real-time gives a lot more flexibility in giving orders, which is really helpful.

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    KirePDX

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    #31  Edited By KirePDX

    @benspyda: The originals were niche, but they provided something of a 2nd generation for X-COM like turn-based strategy (TBS) games. JA1 introduced a lot of new mechanics that were really perfected in 2, such as mercs with distinct personalities (included likes/dislikes for specific other mercs), a broader economy, and a strategic layer for conquering, and protecting, territory as your progressed. There wasn't anything earth shattering on its own, but they were packaged together in a smart game that also had a sense of humor.

    In comparison to CoH, you should compress the tactical scale, so you're only controlling one (or two) squads of soldiers; and only attacking the equivalent of one or two blocks of buildings...and expand the strategic level, so you're selecting each territory to grab, managing resources and an economy, and protecting against AI incursions on conquered territory.

    So, it got kind of complicated, but had a good interface to make it manageable; and a layer of humor and personality to keep it from being too serious.

    To me, they were kind of like tactical puzzle games. You enter a sector, and have a selection of tools (soldiers) to clear it...you could stealth it, go guns blazing, aggressively chase guys, lay ambushes, all sorts of fun stuff. I'm concerned this new version is taking away some of the flexibility (you used to be able to add 4 attachments to most guns...now there is only one slot), but it seems like it should be still be fun.

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    fentonalpha

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    #32  Edited By fentonalpha

    Tutorial Mission: "Oh hell yeah! This is awesome, i just love this. The guns look great and i just made Cowboy eat a spider."

    Actual Demo Mission: "Oh God Oh God Oh God i just want to go home!"

    I get that the actual game itself will probably have some build up to where you don't just leave boot camp and get mowed down by 20+ enemies in a dark swamp. But the demo sure made me think twice about getting this. JA2 is hard as hell too and ridiculously unforgiving (IE: Having Raider, kitted out in Riot Gear and many big guns just fall over and die in 2ft of water.) but at-least the TB combat gave me some feeling of being in control of what was going on.

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    Sarx

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    #33  Edited By Sarx

    You probably made the mistaking of launching an assault on the fortified hut near your starting point? That equals suicide. Simply clear out the guardpost at the street in the south then camp with the dragunov at the road and weep when you see how retarded the AI is. You shoot one dude - his friends come running right out of any cover running out in the open right into your field of fire.

    With this "tactic" you can clear the whole map.

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    krapduude

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    #34  Edited By krapduude

    Played the demo last night and was completely sold, and then I haven't played JA since the first game. Pre-ordered on steam and can't wait to get him from work now and try the full version out. Plan&Go is brilliant!

    I had some initial issues with the demo mission (bloody hard! awesome!), was attempting to get up close and take them down silently. Soon discovered that it was a lot easier to snipe from a distance, and take them out as they approach after discovering you.

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    Gizmo

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    #35  Edited By Gizmo

    That JA page spread on the front of Steam if fucking ugly as sin. Makes me not want to play the game.

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    CptBedlam

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    #36  Edited By CptBedlam

    Played the demo, it's not terrible but very mediocre at best. I'd advise everyone who has some interest in this game to play Jagged Alliance 2 ... it's a masterpiece and infinitely better than this mediocre attempt at making a JA game.

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    Arabes

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    #37  Edited By Arabes

    @sanchopanza said:

    @Arabes: Chill out you, maybe next time don't say something stupid in the first place and then you wont have to respond with an inflammatory comment with very poor grammar.

    As far as I'm aware aside from Civ: Disgaea, Advance Wars, Tactics Ogre, Fire Emblem, all those FF Tactics games and a whole bunch of indie games all did OK, so I'm not sure that people don't buy turn-based games anymore. I really don't see where you are coming from, and what I said doen't seem to be such a great leap.

    I didn't say something stupid in pal, you did. You were surprised that the game wasn't going to be turn based for fucks sake.Turn based games don't do well in the modern market, there are very fucking few of them becuase for the most part you have to have gotten into that style when it became popular in the 90's. The games that you mentioned may have done ok (FF games always do ok regardless of what formatthey take) but they did not do well. They want to appeal to more people with this game rather than just the hardcore JA followers so it was pretty obvious that they would implement some sort of pause and command system.

    You seemed to think that I was saying that any game style used in the 90's would not be used any more. I wasn't. Now, can you see the fucking differnece between what I said and what you were talking about? Is it clear now? Are we good.

    Oh ya, one other thing, what part of my statement was inflammatory? I wasn't rude, I didn't call you stupid or insult your grammar (heaven forbid someone would not write with pristine grammar on a gaming web site). I just asked if you really thought they would make the same game with better graphics and hinted that maybe this wasn't a likely proposition if you thought about. You were the one ignored what I said and shot off on some fucking tangent.

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    Arabes

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    #38  Edited By Arabes

    @CptBedlam said:

    Played the demo, it's not terrible but very mediocre at best. I'd advise everyone who has some interest in this game to play Jagged Alliance 2 ... it's a masterpiece and infinitely better than this mediocre attempt at making a JA game.

    Have you played JA v1.13? Its a user mod, well worth a look if you like JA2. Improved AI, equipment, weaponry inventory etc but the world and missions remain the same. Pretty tough though, especially at the start.

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    sanchopanza

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    #39  Edited By sanchopanza

    @Arabes: How will this format, as opposed to having it turn based, appeal to more people you dipstick? Its still a niche, and this way they alienate the existing fanbase. Like I said, turn based games still do well and I dont remember the original JA games being blockbusters, so you seem to be mostly talking out of your arse. No I didn't think you were saying that any game style used in the 90's would not be used any more, I though that was the only logical conclusion based on your amateur market analysis.

    If it were up to people like you we would not have gotten Dragon Age Origins or Street Fighter IV cos' "those type of game aint popular anymore yo"

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