I’ve been playing it for a few days. I’ve come to the conclusion that I really really like it.
The graphics are amazing and it kinda serves as a little tide-me-over while waiting for Half-Life 2. Some thoughts:
Again, the graphics look great and the enhanced textures and lighting actually serve to really improve the gameplay, rather than being only eye candy. Kinda hard to explain, but as one example, the hallways/tunnels (e.g. Dust) aren’t ridiculously black, but are appropriately lit which is a lot less frustrating for me. When someone is shooting, the area around him is nicely lit up (in addition to the muzzle flash).
The guns seem tweaked, although I can’t put my finger on exactly how. Tweaked for the better, for sure. The TMP has a nice touch.
Zooming on the zoomable guns is actually a smooth zoom in rather than an abrupt jump to the zoomed view. Don’t think this goes for the snipers, though I can’t remember.
Breakable/moveable stuff in the maps is really cool.
Smoke grenades have a nice dark smokey effect as opposed to the white/grey of 1.6.
There is only 1 skin each for CTs and Ts. This is kind of a bummer, but maybe will be expanded in an update?
Anyway, I’m a happy camper.
…not that I would ever think of camping.