History VideoGame / JaggedAlliance

* GodSaveUsFromTheQueen: Deidranna is a total prick.

* ArbitraryGunPower: Played straight in the first game with the weaker guns, but mostly averted in JA 2, especially 1.13, a shot from any old pistol with glaser ammo on an unarmored opponent is almost always lethal, and nearly all of the 5.56 and 7.62 weapons do the same amount of damage. Zig-zagged in the third game, when outdated guns like the Gewehr 98 can be about as lethal as their more modern equivalents in type and ammo, such as the PSG-1. However, the same 7.62mm NATO round will do roughly a third of the base damage when fired from an assault rifle, compared to a sniper rifle.

** Initially played straight early in the third game, however. The citizens on Ernie Island couldn't care less about the simmering three-way civil war and just want to be free from the Legion. They become more willing to be involved, eventually fielding militia soldiers with the help of your mercs, if you've liberated the region.

** Justified somewhat in Jagged Alliance 3. Saving cultural artifacts instead of selling them will give [=Emma LaFontaine=] more legitimacy and be able to raise militia to reinforce locations you already liberated. However you only get one squad per artifact as National pride only goes so far.

* FlavorText: A ton of item descriptions do these, with a ton of ShoutOuts on gun descriptions.

** Say goodbye to the [[HollywoodSilencer Hollywood Silencer]] in v1.13. Sufficiently close enemies will still hear the gunshot of your MP5SD especially if he is wearing an Extended Ear (basically acoustic headphones). While you can now put suppressors on assault rifles and sniper rifles, they are nothing more than a heavy flash suppressor if you don't use subsonic ammo. Even then, if you're using said subsonic ammo, enemies close by will hear you. The in-game sound effect ''is'' the standard Hollywood "fwip".

* ArbitraryGunPower: Played straight in the first game with the weaker guns, but mostly averted in JA 2, especially 1.13, a shot from any old pistol with glaser ammo on an unarmored opponent is almost always lethal, and nearly all of the 5.56 and 7.62 weapons do the same amount of damage. It's similarly averted in the third game, when outdated guns like the Gewehr 98 can be about as lethal as their more modern equivalents in type and ammo, such as the PSG-1.

* DifficultySpike: In Jagged Alliance 3, early on you are mostly facing the Legion who are mostly armed with World War 2 weapons and old [=AKs=], though they do have a few better armed EliteMooks to watch out for. However, after [[spoiler:Santiago decided that YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness]] you will start facing [[spoiler:Colonel Facheaux' army]] who are much better trained and equipped.]]

** Justified somewhat in Jagged Alliance 3. Saving cultural artifacts instead of selling them will give Emma LaFontaine more legitimacy and be able to raise militia to reinforce locations you already liberated. However you only get one squad per artifact as National pride only goes so far.

* InVinoVeritas : One of the first missions the player gets in JA2 is to organise food shipments to the besieged rebel base. The only person who is capable of doing so is Father Walker, a priest sympathetic to the rebel cause, but he initially refuses to help out of fear. However, he is also a well-known drinker and once you give him some alcohol, he drunkingly agrees to supply the rebels with the much-needed food.

** There's repeated e-mails describing how Arulco, the country JA 2 is doing, including 419 scam emails. Apparently they turned Deidranna's old castle into a tourist attraction.

* MegaCorp: The Adonis Corporation in ''Jagged Alliance 3'', which owns several diamond mines in Grande Chien [[spoiler:and is responsible for why the Legion not only exists but has gone rogue]].

* OddlySmallOrganization: You and the rebels in [=JA2=]. Justified by your lack of starting capital and a small pool of mercs to hire from in your case. And in the rebels' case, having being nearly wiped out by a Deidrannan air-strike on their village.

* PrivateMilitaryContractors: A.I.M. and M.E.R.C., although the former are more of a guild for individual mercenaries than an actual private army. The latter on the other hand...

* RidiculousExchangeRates: In Jagged Alliance 3, you can collect literal duffel bags full of the local currency that none of the locals will accept, only taking good old US Dollars. You have to exchange them to Istadi the Fisher in Port Cocoa for items as he uses it for wallpaper. TruthInTelevision in many countries that have or are experiening Hyperinflation.

* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: In ''Jagged Alliance 3'', [[spoiler:the Adonis Corporation]] eventually turns on you after The Major is dealt with [[spoiler:using Colonel Facheaux's forces as a proxy for its RegimeChange plans for Grande Chien]].

* WitchDoctor: Used in JA 3, fitting for a DarkestAfrica setting. He's in the Refugee camp and is much more slanted to the Doctor part of the job. He flat out tells a Legion thug he can't regrow something that was blow off.

** ''Jagged Alliance 3'', while overall lighter in tone compared to ''Rage!'', is darker and more serious than the prior mainline games. The plot deals with a brutal paramilitary takeover of a West African nation that isn't above slavery and openly displaying dead civilians as warnings, [[spoiler:a form of Rabies turning people into zombie-like homicidal maniacs,]] and [[BigBad The Major]] is a far more serious villain than the [[LargeHam hammy]] Deidranna. Fitting for the darker and edgier tone Action Movies took in the 2000's.

** ''Jagged Alliance 3'', while overall lighter in tone compared to ''Rage!'', is darker and more serious than the prior mainline games. The plot deals with a brutal paramilitary takeover of a West African nation that isn't above slavery and openly displaying dead civilians as warnings, [[spoiler:a form of Rabies turning people into zombie-like homicidal maniacs,]] and [[BigBad The Major]] is a far more serious villain than the [[LargeHam hammy]] Deidranna.

** ''Jagged Alliance 3'' is even darker. The game's plot deals with a brutal paramilitary takeover of a West African nation that isn't above slavery and openly displaying dead civilians as warnings, and [[BigBad The Major]] is a far more serious villain than the [[LargeHam hammy]] Deidranna.

* CharacterCustomization: ''Jagged Alliance 2'' allows you to create mercenaries via I.M.P., the Institute for Mercenary Profiling. In the vanilla [=JA2=] it was done using the PlayerPersonalityQuiz and was changed to PointBuildSystem in ''Unfinished Business. ''v.1.13'' uses the latter and improves on it in other ways (including expansing the number of created characters to six).

* AllYourBaseAreBelongToUs: In 3, either after you meet with [[spoiler:Biff]] or you are contacted by [[spoiler:Santiago]] to 'clear' the confusion and meet up in a certain place, you will be too late to realize that [[spoiler: your former employers have decided that [[HeKnowsTooMuch you know more than they want you to]] and is [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness planning to Order 66 you and your associates.]]]] After escaping the encounter all the towns and mines you control will come under attack by by an overwhelming force by [[spoiler: not the Legion, but rather the rebellious Grand Chien Army]].

* RegimeChange: In ''Jagged Alliance 3'' [[spoiler:it's revealed that the Legion was originally set up by the Adonis Corporation to have Grande Chien's President [=LaFontaine=] replaced with someone more amenable. The Major, however, went rogue and decided that working for himself was more fun than answering to his corporate superiors.]]

* RenegadeSplinterFaction: [[spoiler:The Legion]]] in the the third game is revealed to be this [[spoiler:to to the Adonis Corporation]].

* ContinuingIsPainful: Losing your best mercs in a botched operation or running out of funds to keep said mercs on board at the worst possible time in most games can make things significantly more difficult. While not impossible to recover from nor an automatic game over, more often than not it's better to start over.

* OnlyInItForTheMoney: As soon as the mercenaries' contracts expire and you don't have funds to renew them (or just bankrupt in case of M.E.R.C. and the first games), they will immediately leave the theater of operations. Averted with the created mercs the PC can make and the resistance fighters, for obvious reasons. Also, many characters work for free (such as your created mercs) so you can really make it through with just the 'free' characters.

* UniversalAmmunition: 5.56x[=45mm=] and 7.62x[=51mm=] NATO rounds are used in many of the guns. This is, of course, TruthInTelevision. v1.13 also averts this hardcore - 9x18, 9x19, 7.62x25, 7.62x39, 7.62x51, 7.62x54, and upwards of two dozen other calibers, in ball, hollowpoint, Glaser, cold-loaded, match-grade, armor-piercing and many other varieties.
** At least they do try to avert it further by increasing the reloading AP cost if you try to reload with an inapropriate magazine type.
** The [[AllThereInTheManual official]] HandWave is that whenever a merc picks up a new gun, they pick up a few empty clips as well. These are stored in the merc's "pockets" (the same ones where the credit cards that let you withdraw U.S. cash at any point in a BananaRepublic go). The increased AP cost comes from removing bullets from one clip, and inserting them into one that is compatible with the weapon.
*** Or, you know, just [[WillingSuspensionOfDisbelief look]] [[BellisariosMaxim the other way]].

** The first game has random [[HeatWave heat waves]] at the start of days which gradually drain stamina from your mercs outside of Hector and the native guides, who have the Heat Resistant trait.

* BreakOutTheMuseumPiece: In addition to the usual suspects like the AK-47 and FN FAL, both of which seeing considerable action in post-colonial African conflicts during the Cold War, among the weapons found in the third game are German firearms from ''World War II'' such as the Gewehr 98 and MP-40. Justified, however, given how it's discovered that the Kriegsmarine had operated around Grande Chien at the time, and that the Legion isn't above scraping the bottom of the barrel when it comes to equipping its low-tier CannonFodder.

* UnintentionallyUnwinnable: In ''Back in Action'' and ''Crossfire'' tutorial (it is the same mission), you must do a succession of actions (move the cameras, move your team, shoot, perform various advanced actions) in a specific order. One of them requires to have each of the units to shoot targets at a shooting range. One of the mercs wields an Uzi; if you didn't make him switch from autofire to single shots (the action isn't required by the tutorial), he risks to consume all his ammunitions before hitting his target and you'll be stuck in the tutorial.

* ArbitraryGunPower: Played straight in the first game with the weaker guns, but mostly averted in JA 2, especially 1.13, a shot from any old pistol with glaser ammo on an unarmored opponent is almost always lethal, and nearly all of the 5.56 and 7.62 weapons do the same amount of damage. It's similarly averted in the third game, when outdated guns like the Gewehr 98 can be about lethal as the more modern PSG-1.

* ArbitraryGunPower: Played straight in the first game with the weaker guns, but mostly averted in JA 2, especially 1.13, a shot from any old pistol with glaser ammo on an unarmored opponent is almost always lethal, and nearly all of the 5.56 and 7.62 weapons do the same amount of damage.

* PaintingTheMedium: [=JA2=] laptop sections are designed to look like late 90s websites (much better designed, thankfully), and the M.E.R.C. website may crash periodically in-game, complete with a 404 error message.

* TookALevelInBadass: ALL of the mercs from M.E.R.C became much better in ''Crossfire''. Flo now knows some firearms basic to stay alive in building combat. Gumpy makes even the most expert explosive specialists blush and Haywire is a cheaper Gus Tarballs.

* AKA47: For some weapons in ''Jagged Alliance: Back In Action'', this trope is used for the first time in the history of the series. The Glock 17 is the Klock 17, and so on. The ''Combat Evolved'' mod reverts all the firearms to their real name. This is averted with 1 and 2 in which all guns use their real name.

* ViolationOfCommonSense: The stats for weapons in ''Back in Action'' are poorly explained which doesn't help how some of them function not how you'd expect, Pistols are fast to fire and heavier rifles take longer to aim..except for Light Machine Guns, which despite being some of the largest weapons, actually are faster than handguns to fire.
* WaterSourceTampering: Lucas' men try to poison the water source early in the game.

** BattleInTheRain: Fighting in the storm (1.13), which greatly reduces your vision, forcing you to fight your enemies almost toe-to-toe. If you're lucky, a [[LightningReveal lightning bolt will reveal]] enemies and can make an interrupt - for ''both'' sides. The upside is that rain greatly reduces the enemy's vision as well, making stealth significantly easier.
** HeatWave: Sometimes, the day in Metavira will be hotter than usual, tiring the mercs faster.

* GrandfatherClause: Lampshaded in ''Jagged Alliance 3'', as it retains the much of the same irreverent action movie satire from the '90s titles, even while taking jabs at contemporary issues. This is extended to the tongue-in-cheek disclaimers at the start of the game.