Insurgency

Insurgency Mod was released. Insurgency is a Half-Life 2 total conversion that has been in development for the last 4 years. It was released a few days ago, I wanted to play it for a while before I made up my mind about it.

 

What I Like.

I love the sniper rifle view. I’m pretty sure they did it in Red Orchestra, but the problem in RO was that the view was a tiny circle in the middle of the screen. In INS it’s massive, so it’s great. The only problem with it is that it gives really low FPS on bad computers. But that’s a good thing if you don’t have a bad computer because it means they can’t snipe for shit.

I love one hit kills. It’s near to what CS was like around beta 5, before the damage system turned more like TFC. I also love the fact that your bullets go where you’re aiming. I really fucking hate aimcones and all that shit. Basically, I love the harshness of the weapons.

I like that I’m good at it. Not great, but not last on the list.

The graphics are really good. I’m not a big fan of the art being the game, but it never hurts. At least two of the maps I’ve played have been really good.

The scoring system seems to work well. Players playing properly are at the top of the list, the jackasses prone in the spawn are at the bottom.

Moving with deployed MG. This just makes everything so much easier, and where’s the harm.

Limited Classes. Seems like it should be shitty, but it forces you to enjoy other roles.

 

What I Don’t Like.

Bugs. I don’t really think the “it’s a beta” shit justifies anything, it’s been in development for 4 years. Unless they started over again 6 months ago – and didn’t let the beta testers play this version – then most of the bugs should have been fixed months ago. But still, bugs happen, I know that. So, off the top of my head here’s the bugs I’ve come up against. Server crashes, Stuck in grenade throwing mode, Bullets firing too low – a lot of the time hitting the wall you’re looking over, Last player to join a server missing from scoreboard.

The team/class selection thing is kinda shitty. It’s a vgui box with numbers. Yeah it doesn’t NEED to be anything more than that, but at least let us cancel. [UPDATE: You can press ESCAPE to cancel selection]

The scoreboard is just the standard scoreboard. Again it doesn’t have to be more, but you expect something as basic as the scoreboard to be changed (again, within the 4 year dev period). Highlighting the local player’s name would be a huge help.. as would showing who your commander is etc. I don’t know whether that’s a part of the “remove useful features in the name of realism” stuff – but I’m sure a soldier would know who their commander is.

The movement can be shitty. I was constantly getting stuck on door frames because strafe is disabled when running (or strafe speed is akin to forward speed). Maybe disable sprinting when you run into something so you can strafe out of the way and sprint. Maybe this is just a ‘get used to it’ thing though. Apart from that the movement speed and everything else is pretty spot on.

Awful voice acting. Yeah they’re indie guys so you don’t really expect them to have Morgan Freeman voicing it.. but they must have noticed that it sounds like a 17 year old kid reading a comic book.

 

Summary

It took 4 years to make for some reason, and even when it was released it was riddled with bugs (even delaying the release by a day or two). Some areas lack polish, but others are really good. The gameplay is nothing new, it’s America’s Army on the Source Engine - but it’s free, so who cares. And now it’s out I’m sure they’ll be adding and improving it regularly.

To be honest, I didn’t expect it to be any good and kind of scoffed at the whole thing. But it is really good if you forget the 4 years dev time.

Source Mod Todd has the lowdown:


UPDATE: VIDEO NOW WORKS AGAIN