Yea, yea - I know the animus directed towards Half Life, and Counter Strike in general - but NATURAL SELECTION is a good game - it'll be a DAMN good one as soon as that beta patch is released. But on to the goodness -

The game's background is important I guess if you play this thing in single player, but in MP its not really important. Basically there are MARINES and ALIENS, and you have to destroy either ones base. As the COMMANDER of either side (one per side), it is your job to co-ordinate the flow of battle, and issue orders to your men in the field, and also provide them with supplies like ammo and health. As a solider you can follow orders, but you'll more than likely NOT get anything from the commander if you tell him to fuck off. Teamwork is essential since as a one man army, you WONT beat the game, or accomplish your objective. Now, the game itself...

First and foremost, the game looks SWEET as all hell. The graphics in this thing are TONS better than COUNTER STRIKE, which isn't saying much I know, but still one look at it and - DAMN. I know CONDITION ZERO is coming out, and the graphical count has been MAJORLY UPPED there, but NATURAL SELECTION just can't be beat. If you were sick of "sprites" coming your way, and particle effects against black-polygons in COUNTER STRIKE, this game is a god-sentd for you.

Atmosphere wise, this game is CREEPY. Not CREEPY "omg I wet my pants", but it has great ambience. The sound in the game REALLY makes you feel like you are right there on some doomed Space Marine ship, about to see your team get wasted by an alien horde. And that's IF you play as the MARINES. Playing as the aliens is JUST as creepy. seeing all the cool "alien" shit infesting the ships.

As far as gameplay is concerned, you'll either love it or hate it. There is a COMMANDER at the beginning of the game. He will basically choose what you do, what weapons you get, and any life you get. Which is a bleesing if you have someone who knows a little something about strategy (and no, having "Voice-Chat" with a mouthpiece connected to your computer, and screaming about "flanking" is NOT the only thing you need), then the game will run very smooth for you. IF however you have a fuck who chooses to fortify your position with TURRETS, and thinks your soldiers can then just go out onto the level (and the levels are HUGE), and fight one-two-or three man wars, then you will find yourself ejected from the COMMANDERS seat VERY quickly. I've been on a server, as a MARINE, and we were CONSTANTLY being overpowered and overrun by these HUGE alien badasses that look like rhinos, are tough as hell, and basically just ram their way through whatever they see. Matches can last a LONG time, with both sides gaining and losing ground.

Basically, if you are looking for a Half-Life mod with more substanec than, "buy weapons, ammo - use AWP to put down n00bs - celebrate - one man war", then this mod will DEFINATELY help you wet your appetite in between bouts of boredom with other games.

Be warned though, the game LAGS like a mother fucker. There is a patch that is in beta, and on the servers I played that had this patch, the gameplay was increased 100fold. And you'll soon notice that this game NEEDS an auto-team balancer as the ALIENS are a difficult team to play on. The aliens are fast, but the MARINES are better equipped at the onset. I tell you though, that ONOS (the alien rhino) is one tough mother fucker. If your commander is kind enough to upgrade you, you wont regret it.

You can get this mod from a NUMBER of places, other than FILEPLANET. I'd suggest FILEFRONT, the same one this website used to store it's shit.