Some of you may have tried it, others just heard about it, but now I've given it a play as well.
The installer was, unusual. Not in the way it worked, but by the nonsensical EULA they wrote. Most of it's an attempt to be funny.
On to the actual game. Only thing of note on the menu is a customisation option for the crosshair and for the explosives beep sound. Bit random but each to their own.
So I started up the Find Servers list and there were quite a few. Unfortunately only 3 of them had players, and just one gave me a decent ping. Off to a good start there, I thought.
So I join, and for a mod, the gui is well done. Almost as good as a retail game's in fact. A bit cluttered but not bad nonetheless. Then I picked my class. Went for soldier first, usually being reliable, and quite enjoyed it. Can't really say why, but it's probably the speed of the proceedings. This is more old style quake speed.
Next up was engineer, and confusing is a term I'd use. Now I've never played TFC, but if dispensers were as seemingly useless as they are in FF, then maybe I'd steer clear of engi. The sentries werent particularly effective either. 2 rockets and kaboom. And thats a Lvl3.
Can't say the other classes made that much impact on me. They all seemed useless for anything other than what they're meant for. With the exception of the Demoman, he just seemed completely useless.
But the spy, certainly more annoying to face than his TF2 counterpart. Having an infinite cloak that only slightly distorts when you move means they can stay in position for an eternity. Wouldnt matter so much if it was easy to pick out the distortion, but because of the "gritty" style of terrain texturing, its difficult when everything around you is running at a million miles a minute. The speed also means its difficult to distinguish disguised spies from team mates. In fact, if it wasn't for the colours and who shoots what, you would know who was who half the time.
Ah, the grenades. What an awful, cheap way of killing someone. I couldnt even see what use nade jumping was half the time. Probably just personal preference, but I really don't care for them.
At the end of it, I felt detatched from the whole experience. Like a lot of things, fun for a few minutes, but with ever diminishing returns. And with not a lot of people playing, it's perhaps testament to how much better TF2 is in some ways (though by no means perfect).
As for the game itself, the graphic style put me off. After the colourful TF2 style this just seemed gritty and ugly.
