Nice visuals, terrible gameplay... kills the original sequel
Cons:
- The controls are rather awkward but I guess possible to get used to but what strikes me is the lack of options. One of the major problems is inability to set the soldier's direction of view (the tiny eye icon) you can only set it after the soldier reaches the destination. In other words you come out of the cover and get your head blown away before you even turn to face the opponent.
- Your soldiers are dumb as hell waiting for the enemy to chop their head of yapping and complaining instead of firing. They're too slow and what's worst 50% of the time they can't even reach the destination, get stuck half way or chose the worst possible way (seriously is this game released in 2012?) . Not to even mention that they can't climb or jump over even the smallest obstacles. (1 foot tall fence can be battle deal breaker... huge step back compared to JA2!)
- Your enemies are even dumber (AI pretty much worst than in JA1)
- The story behind is boring as hell but the conversations with other characters (or mercs) are just pure garbage (this would have failed in 90's)
- You end up spending most of the time running around the map, picking up and exchanging items (no such thing as select items found on the map). To recruit merc on the map you physically need to locate him and hand him a gun... you have to do everything manually because "it is so much fun" and it is still 20th century for some game developers.
- Navigation is awful and you even have to circle around buildings to find entry doors (seriously something like highlighting the doors on the building was already in JA2)
- No turn base any more. You set what your mercs should do, then they attempt to follow those steps in real time... which usually results in major fail.
- Whoever developed and designed gameplay for this game never played Jagged Alliance (and most likely any strategy game made after 1990)
Pros:
- I guess kalipso is good with visuals and the scenery is pretty rich (on the same note the whole environment feels very static as you can't ride the car or blow something up)
- There are some fun moments as you progress and your mercs get better guns and stats
Verdict:
Why would anyone waste resources to produce something that can barely be called pre-alpha version and only to disgrace great name of Jagged Alliance is beyond me for the rest of us JA2 is still the best in the series.