Finally Source gets it's Modern Combat mod and I really hope Valve get all their greatest mods and release them with their next Orange box type package or even buy out some of these mod teams. Team Insurgency is a developer that deserves to have Valve's praise because their game Insurgency is just fantastic and feels like it was made by pros. The game has some downfalls to it but you can't expect a free mod made by people in their spare time to be perfect.
Basically Insurgency is a Modern Combat game set in Iraq that focuses on realism. There arn't any crosshairs and you have to use Ironsights to aim, I believe some of the developers from Red Orchestra worked on the game which explains the focus onr ealism and quality. Theres two sides, The Insurgents and US Army and both of them are very well balanced with their own unique weapons. Each side is split up as two squads and each squad has certain classes you can pick like rifleman, support and so on and each squad will have some different weapons to the other like one might have snipers and the other machine guns. Basically it depends on what map you're playing on but the typical goals are to capture every point or an assault type of gameplay where one team is defending and the other team has to push them back slowly by capturing points.
The UI in Insurgency is fantastic and for the most part animations are great and so are the gun models. The only things I didn't like is the voice overs and the character models which are all fine but they're abit bland and could be alot better. They've tried to add some character customization in the form of being able to pick different items of clothing and head equipment etc etc. However atm theres very little options and I would personally prefer just to have 4 unique models to choose from per side like CS has. Also the menus could be better, they are abit cumbersome to use at times like switching teams or class is a pain in the neck and it often doesn't let you join a team, which means the team is full but it could atleast have a message that says it's full. These are minor issues though which they're addressing in future patches and don't take away from the enjoyment of the gameplay.
The best parts of Insurgency however which is what will draw you into the game are the amazing level designs and the realistic combat. Each map is big, but not too big and really well designed with lots of places to hide and take cover in. Another great thing is the assault maps are very challenging for the offensive team and it's really hard to break down the enemies defenses which makes for great gameplay. Made even better with all the cover and places to hide which means you have to sneak past the defending teams main view over the map as they're usually on the high ground. Insurgency is a very unforgiving game because one shot and you can be taken out by sniper fire from all the way across the map so your'e constantly on your toes. This kinda gameplay isn't for everyone but for people who are into realism over arcadey shooters and owns HL2 or anyother Source based game like CS or TF2 then download Insurgency for free and give it a go.
Theres plenty of people playing, lots of full up servers which got a boost since it got put onto Steam for free. They've done an AMAZING job with the graphics, it looks sooo much better than alot of other Source games. Just give Insurgency a go because it's one of the most important online FPS mods for valve since CS or TFC.
