Released in the golden year of 1999, Jagged alliance 2 is one of a kind... seriously, no one has ever made a game like this. It could be described as a turn based Rainbow Six/Sims 2 game, the game focused on leading a group of mercs through a war torn country. The Mercs all had unique personalities and would form relationships between one another and comment on how everything was progressing. If a friend died they might leave the team while if their nemesis croaked it their efficiency would improve. Determining which team would work well together was a critical part of the game strategy.
When it came to combat nearly everything you could think of was implemented into gameplay. Ammo conservation, bleeding factors and environment destruction were all implemented in a game that is now hitting it's tenth year. Which makes it 896 in human years, so it is surprising how the old bugger can get busy like the best of them.
You could also tackle overthrowing the country in whatever way you felt worked. After being dropped at a static insertion point it was pretty much up to you how you wanted to proceed. You could destroy ammo dumps to disadvantage enemies. Cut off their supply lines to gain more income, take over towns to make the populace revolt, take over airports to open up new insertion points, it goes on.
It wasn't completely perfect however, the game featured an optional scifi mode that will good in the sense that it added different enemy types, really didn't fit with the rest of the game. Also, Until recently the game and it's excellent but brutal expansion pack was reasonably difficult to find. With the rise of sites like Good Old Games however, it has become more available. A DS port of the original reportedly is coming out in may though it has been delayed several times before.
Jagged Alliance took up weeks of my time and is replayable as hell. I booted it up today and became addicted once again. A true classic. The graphics are a little dated by today's standards but fans of games like X-com and even Full Spectrum Warrior and the Swat series should definitely check it out.
Awesome Character Expose:
There was a German character that kept saying 'Shizer', you can't teach that.
Next up: The only game on this list set in Arabia
Quest for glory 2 is officially now the ugliest game in the series (as the first was remade) however it remains my favourite. It was ugly even when it came out I still remember a friend trying to convince me to start a petition to get this game remade. Graphics aside it was quite fabulous and had a quirky sense of humour. While it is from one of the lesser known series, of all the Quest games this is probably the best... though the original space quest is a serious contender.
Newcomers to the game will note that the game seems to play like Sierra's other early adventure games such as Police Quest, King's Quest and the legendary Leisure Suit Larry... which probably should have made this list but I didn't want people to say:
The story follows the hero as he travels through the mystical lands of the the middle east, Djinn and magic carpets flood the land etc etc. The story is pretty predictable but at the time it was a huge contrast to all the other fantasy games which were usually confined exclusively the medieval Europe inspired locales.
There is a decent sense of humour in the game, sure it is not up to the level of humour in Space Quest IV where you travel in time through the different games in the series and the world was destroyed by a virus contained on a pirated copy of leisure suit larry... that's awesome, but it is still serviceable.
Again, QFG2 is graphically dated today, it was dated the day it came out, though while it has never been officially remade, fans have taken it upon themselves to completely recreate the game in a new engine, so head over here for some of the best freeware money can not buy.
Awesome Character Expose:
Aside from the main character there are few characters in this game who are actually memorable. The text based dialogue of the narrator probably carries the most wit of the entire game so I guess he gets the AwesomeLarsen thumbs up for the day. The designers themselves deserve an award for allowing you to kill yourself via an opium pipe. Going out like a rockstar.
Next up: The Final Frontier.
22.Freespace 2 PC. 1999.
The second game on the list to come from the golden year 1999. Freespace 2 brought atmosphere like nothing else. Small space flight fighters have never come close since, in fact, no one has really released one since... hmmm. Anyway this game was way ahead of it's time. Being the leader of a small squad, you were thrust into a war that your side was losing from, badly. This was one of the first games where it truly felt that what you were doing was inconsequential. No bad arse one man save the world and throw money at hookers here, you were fucked from the get go, pure and simple.
Principle Skinner described it best: 'They promised me a parade, instead they spat on me'
It was common to see and hear your comrades go down in balls of flame and as massive capital ships tore into each other you really felt like you were just annoying mosquito. I still remember being in shock when your home base (where you had to land every mission) was blown to fuck and I kept thinking I had failed the mission.
There were spoilers in that last paragraph by the way.
On top of a brilliant singleplayer campaign Freespace had some excellent multiplayer, Friends would call me up on the eve of a major assessment and convince me to play just one more game. Of course I did which goes a long way to explaining why I live in a syringe filled gutter today.
At times we even had a few other people join in, even though the game had been out for several years. I recall one guy taking it way to seriously and actually referring to us as his superiors and requesting permission to fire.
What a fag.
Oh wait, it was me.*
Freespace 2 still holds up ten years on, mainly because nothing of note has been released since then but also because the graphics were revolutionary for the time and since then, mods have been released to update the game to today's standards.
The developers of the game have moved on to developing, surprisingly, the Saint's Row series. While they may have gone, their legacy lives on with custom campaigns being released almost monthly... that sounds less impressive than it is as Starcraft has forty two mods released per nanosecond and there are TWO cable channels dedicated to it in South Korea (bless them) but compared to the majority of games it's age, Freespace 2's mod community is going fairly strong.
*actually wasn't but.
Awesome Character Expose:
The Lucifer.
While this behemoth played a much larger role in the original game, the Lucifer was still mentioned in FS2. Initially it was a Capital ship that could decimate planets within seconds. The vessel was three times the size of anything else in the game and was immune to all attacks.
In the second game the starship existed solely for comparison purposes with the designers of the game saying "You thought the Lucifer was huge?? Well the standard new ships you'll be fighting are 14x the size!'. What was cool however is that this vessel that nearly destroyed humanity in the first game turned out just to a probe from this larger amarda. It took everything Earth had to destory this demon, can they possibly win against a force even more powerful and epic?
The answer is yes.
Sorry, I just totally spoiled the ending for you.
Next Up: Cel-Shaded Twilight Princess.
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