Jagged Alliance

Jagged Alliance was developed by Madlab Software, a small studio founded by Ian Currie in Montreal, and published by Sir-Tech for MS-DOS in 1994. Currie had been working in the railroad industry when he began designing the game, and submitted it to Sir-Tech as an independent project. Linda Currie and Shaun Lyng were co-designers. During production, Madlab was absorbed into the newly formed Sir-Tech Canada, which was based in Ottawa, Ontario and would go on to develop the sequels. Sir-Tech USA, the publishing arm, closed in 1998; Sir-Tech Canada survived until 2003.

The setup is rooted in a specific piece of Cold War absurdity. In 1952, nuclear tests were conducted on Metavira, a fictional island in the South Atlantic. Decades later, scientists Jack Richards and his daughter Brenda discover that the radiation mutated the island’s trees. These Fallow Trees, rendered infertile by the same tests that transformed them, produce a sap with remarkable medicinal properties. Brenda’s assistant, Lucas Santino, recognises how much the sap is worth, sabotages Brenda’s research, manoeuvres Jack into splitting the expedition into two teams, and uses the resulting autonomy to take over the island by force. Jack Richards hires a commander from the Association of International Mercenaries to take it back. That is the player’s job.

Metavira is divided into sixty sectors. The player starts controlling one sector with a handful of Fallow Trees, a broken processing plant, and almost no income. Santino controls most of the island from the outset and, as the dominant producer of sap, can drive down the market price to limit the player’s revenue. As the player captures more sectors and more trees, their market position improves and income increases. The economic pressure is front-loaded and real: the player is chronically underfunded in the early game and must prioritise which sectors to take and in what order. Native tappers harvest sap from trees in player-controlled sectors and must be paid and protected; native guards hold captured sectors and must also be paid. Losing guards means losing income means losing the ability to expand.

Mercenaries are hired through A.I.M. and up to eight can be deployed at any time from a pool of sixty. Each has four attributes — health, agility, dexterity, wisdom — and four skills: medical, explosives, mechanical, and marksmanship. They gain experience in the skills they use and can be left at base between missions to heal, train, or repair equipment. The personality system was the element that distinguished the game most clearly from contemporaries. Mercenaries voiced their opinions, complained about conditions, commented on each other, and sometimes refused to work alongside specific individuals. Some would decline a contract until the player had demonstrated enough competence to be worth working for. The result was a roster that felt inhabited rather than interchangeable, which was unusual in a genre where units were typically anonymous and disposable.

Combat is turn-based, viewed from overhead, operating on action points. Each mercenary’s available actions per turn are constrained by their agility and stamina. Cover, line of sight, and terrain all factor into engagements. There is no overarching base to manage between missions, only the map of Metavira and the daily cycle of deploying mercenaries, paying staff, and choosing which sector to assault. Occasionally Jack or Brenda Richards contact the player with secondary objectives such as securing a clean water supply; these can be ignored but create complications if they are.

The game closes with Santino at his compound in Sector 1. When the player reaches him, he triggers a self-destruct sequence and detonates the building, killing himself. Whether the player recovers the only surviving Fallow sapling in the compound before it is destroyed changes the final cutscene.

Jagged Alliance received positive reviews on release and sold well enough to justify a franchise. Deadly Games, a standalone expansion focusing on discrete mission-based scenarios rather than the open campaign, followed in 1995. Jagged Alliance 2 released in 1999 to wider critical recognition and has largely overshadowed the original in retrospective coverage, though the first game established every system the sequel refined. Strategy First currently holds the IP. A proper sequel, Jagged Alliance 3, developed by Haemimont Games, released in 2023 to an 80% critic score. The original is available on GOG.