Insurgency: Sandstorm is getting mod support and two new modes this year

The developers of excellent multiplayer shooter Insurgency: Sandstorm will add two new maps, two new game modes, a hardcore rule set for every mode, and mod support before the end of the year—all in free updates.

New World Interactive revealed the roadmap for the rest of 2019 yesterday, which also includes night versions of maps, new weapons and upgrades, and improved character customization. It hasn't put an exact date on anything, and says it's "possible that some content may need to get pushed back", but it's aiming to get it all out before the end of the year alongside additions that it hasn't yet announced.

The level editor and mod tools will no doubt be put to good use: the original Insurgency has more than 18,000 mods on the Steam Workshop, and itself started as a Half-Life 2 mod. "That same treatment is coming to Insurgency: Sandstorm as well," the team said. "This includes but is not limited to community created levels, game modes, rulesets, gameplay modifications, factions, weapons, and weapon upgrades." Players will be able to share mods on "either the Steam Workshop or a similar service".

Alongside the roadmap, we got our first look at one of the two new planned maps. It's a snow map, and it's a remake of Sinjar from the original Insurgency. "Characters will breathe cold puffs of air as they run and fight, and they’ll leave snowprints which can be tracked by other players," the team said. It didn't reveal anything about the other planned map, but said it would separately add "a night time version of every map we have", with new equipment such as flashlights, night vision goggles and infrared laser sights. Enemy AI in co-op modes will also be adjusted for the low-light conditions.

In terms of new modes, New World Interactive is adding a PvP tug of war-style mode called Frontline and a co-op horde mode called Outpost, where you defend multiple points. It's also working on a new mode based on Ambush, which was a PvP VIP escort mode in Insurgency, but that won't arrive until next year.

After testing out a hardcore version of its Checkpoint mode, which had slower-than-normal movement, the team is rolling out a hardcore rule set for every mode, available to all community servers. You'll also find a hardcore playlist in the main Play menu, letting you jump in through normal matchmaking. The team is still working out exactly what the hardcore rule set will involve, but expect the slow movement from hardcore Checkpoint to remain. The new rules will arrive "sooner than many of the other things on our roadmap", it said.

If you want more detail on any of the changes, including a look at some of the new weapons and character customisation options coming to the shooter, you can read the full Steam post here.

Samuel is a freelance journalist and editor who first wrote for PC Gamer nearly a decade ago. Since then he's had stints as a VR specialist, mouse reviewer, and previewer of promising indie games, and is now regularly writing about Fortnite. What he loves most is longer form, interview-led reporting, whether that's Ken Levine on the one phone call that saved his studio, Tim Schafer on a milkman joke that inspired Psychonauts' best level, or historians on what Anno 1800 gets wrong about colonialism. He's based in London.