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Jagged Alliance 2, the classic tactical RPG continues living in modern times thanks to Jagged Alliance 2 Stracciatella, a cross-platform game engine reimplementation.

Like a lot of such projects, the aim is to stick close to the original game to preserve it while making it work better on modern platforms with quality of life updates. JA2 Stracciatella has a GUI launcher, high resolution support, Wildfire support, an integrated editor, a new Dead is Dead game mode, optional bundled mini-mods and much more.

Here's what's new in the 0.18 release:

  • Modding improvements
    • Several hardcoded values and assumptions are now externalized to additional json files for easy editing (SAM sites, merchants, game items, M.E.R.C. soldiers, sector info, weapon cache location, strategic AI policy, NPC placement)
    • Initial scripting support via lua scripts
    • Supporting Unfinished Business tilesets
    • Support for ogg and mp3 audio formats
  • Configurable game speed (set ms_per_time_slice in game.json)
  • Self-contained AppImage Linux builds
  • Preliminary Android build (beware: not adapted for touch input)
  • A chance-to-hit F hotkey

See more on the official site.

It needs the data files from the original game which you can find on GOG and Steam.

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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6 comments

Tchey Apr 24, 2021
Hi,

Can you play 1.13 with it ?

(edit : i tried, and searched, and it seems it’s vanilla only. Big down, as 1.13 brings quite a lot to the table, even from the Options screen.

Plus, the french version 1.13 supports special characters like éèôà etc, while Stracciatella doesn’t.

Plus, the "large resolution" seems to be the same as 1.13 : if you play high, the game window goes tiny with big black all around in fullscreen, so worthless more or less.

With 1.13, i play 1280*720 while my screen is 1920*1080, and it’s "fine", my eyes are bleeding only after a long session.

Would love a Stracciatella for native Linux launcher + some options, with 1.13 for everything it brings, with french because it’s my first language.


Last edited by Tchey on 24 April 2021 at 12:59 pm UTC
d10sfan Apr 24, 2021
You may want to make a note in this article that wildfire requires a additional mod setup to run: https://ja2-stracciatella.github.io/features/#bundled-optional-mini-mods
doomwarriorx Apr 24, 2021
Quoting: TcheyCan you play 1.13 with it ?
No and it is not suppose to do so. The name straciatella already suggest this. I was in touch with Tron back in 2008 or so and he explicitly made the decision to stay "vanilla" and focus on bugfixes and smaller addition which doesn't change the behaviour of the original game. But I do wonder the accent-issue of the french translation. Afaik tron changed the char encoding to UTF8, but not sure ... it is more than 10years ago...

I never followed 1.13 devolopment in detail but afaik they patched alot in the code thus it isn't easily possible to support both. But saying this the current changes done by the new devs seems to go in the direction of making the game easier moddable.
Tchey Apr 24, 2021
I understand one wants to stay close to vanilla, no worry.

Simply here, 1.13 exists and is massively popular, and is quite the "best tactical ever", so, me myself, i’m sad not to be able to play it via Straccitella.
Tchey Apr 24, 2021
Hi again, any hints for these two points ? They are "fun stopping".

- supports for french with special characters like éèôà etc

- the "large resolution" seems to be borked ? If i set it high (ie 1980*1080), the game window goes tiny with big black all around in fullscreen, so worthless more or less, and unplayable. It has to be 640*480 to actually be fullscreen, but then it’s deadly...

That’s the full screen result by the way :



(edit : actually the battle maps are indeed fullscreen, so it’s "only" the main map and the options going tiny.
Full screen 1080p is not really playable as everything is very small, but at least, it’s working.
I think i’ll try with 1280*720 or something alike, and try playing a little.
The french version is not correctly working sadly, but the english part is fine.




Last edited by Tchey on 24 April 2021 at 7:06 pm UTC
miro Apr 25, 2021
@Tchey

Just start the game in windowed mode and maximize the window - this way the 640x480 resolution will be stretched to your entire screen. Should that be too big you could also adjust it to e.g. 800x600 and more, just as you did, and maximize that one as well.

it works perfectly fine for me with a 4k monitor, I can see the screen in a classic 640x480 view, at my monitor's full resolution.
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