'Tactical Intervention' Opens Today

Since I'm not very quick on the draw, that whole wave of fast-paced shooters that washed over us in the late nineties and early aughts was something I was able to surf over. Unreal Tournament? Quake III? Counter-Strike? Yeah, didn't play any of those. You may find yourself in love at the sight of Tactical Intervention though, Counter-Strike creator Minh Le's ten-years-in-the-making follow-up. Because the game's totally not in my alley, I decided to give it a try, anyway.

The free-to-play Tactical Intervention, above everything else, is a scenario-based team shooter in which you work together to accomplish your goals in specific situations, something that many mods sought to do in those early Half-Life and Quake days. Installed, I played a number of rounds of the game's "Infamous Highway Chase" mode, which I suppose is some kind of flagship for the game, in which terrorists must whack a VIP and steal his briefcase. The problem with scenarios like these versus simply throwing players into a map and having them kill each other, ironically, is that these gameplay loops get old quick. I wasn't tuckered out by the situation, but I can't imagine wanting to play it that much longer.

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