‘Then someone threw a flashbang through the window and I was blinded.’
‘OK.’
‘But I spun round and fired at the door’, Chris mimed a rifle, staring down the sights he loosed an imaginary burst. ‘And I caught this guy in the head. So I grabbed the hostages and ran outside using a smoke grenade as cover.’
‘It has smoke grenades?’
‘Yeah!’
I listened on, chewing an apple, a look of bored scepticism masking my burning envy, as Chris from school continued to relate his antics in a recently discovered Half Life mod called Counter-Strike.
He made a habit of this, partly to wind me up as my computer was nowhere near able to run the thing, and partly I guess to simply relive the excitement in an act of verbal gaming onanism. For a period of months, most lunchtimes I’d be told about Counter-Strike.
As a kid who – I’ll admit it readers, cus you’re all such a nice, fluffy lot – was quiet, scrawny and quite into SAS books, hearing about Counter-Strike’s real-life weapons, hostage rescues and last second bomb defusals juiced the eager Tom Clancy lobe of my young brain. It gave me that once rare, now impossible, feeling; it made me think ‘if I am ever able to get this working, I’ll never need another game ever again’.
When I finally got my hands on a meaty 400MHz processor, Counter-Strike was straight on the hard drive. And it was good. So, so good. It made all other games feel like a pair of safety-scissors. ‘Here’s a shitload of weapons and equipment’, CS says, ‘some probably aren’t right for the job but they’re here – take whatever can afford, big boy.’ Then it looses you into an environment where a single stray bullet can end your game, taking you out of the fight to think over your inadequacies or just terrible bad luck.
The uninitiated would watch CS and think ‘well, that’s nothing – you’re just repeating the same few minutes over and over. Spawn, buy weapons, attack/defend, win/die, repeat.’ Yes, this is absolutely the case, but it’s absolutely the point. CS encapsulates this moment of brutal, high stakes close quarters combat; the point when two highly trained, heavily armed entities crash against each other like kevlar-coated waves. Each round was a distillation of the greatest action movie set-pieces or the most exciting engagements recorded in all those SAS books I’d squandered my summers reading. It’s a moment that bears repeating.
To a point.
Of course, I eventually got bored of Counter-Strike – play something enough and you inevitably will – but there was something else about CS that was different. After a break from a year or two’s gleeful shootery, I returned to check out the Source upgrade and only played for maybe two hours at most.
There was something about its identity that had fundamentally changed, moving away from the game that attracted me in my youth.
Play CS today and you’ll probably see what I mean.
At least half the servers seem to be hosting maps like these. I’ve nothing against them, I can’t say I’ve found any particularly fun, but experimentation with map design and mechanics is all gravy – as long as there’s an alternative.
What’s the alternative? A regular old game of CS, right? A good selection of maps, rotated regularly; sensible server sizes, nothing fancy?
Well, this isn’t really on offer. If, like me, you aren’t a huge fan of dust2 or office, and if you preferred some of the more unique (by which I mean: actually interesting and characterful) maps like militia or prodigy, your enthusiasm will soon be washed away in a torrent of servers titled ‘dust2 24/7′ or ‘Office Only’. And many are augmented with the UT voice bellowing HEADSHOT! and RAMPAGE!!!!, or some other audio gimmick, all adding about as much fun as would grafting an incensed cat onto your shoulder. Add a community that always seems reluctant to approach the game as a team and there are few servers on which to enjoy a conventional game; I didn’t find any of these, after three evenings’ searching, that rotated their maps beyond two.
The game I used to love is dead. This once noble soldier wears a death-mask disfigured by a glut of repetitiousness and his corpse has been impaled, through the arse, upon a jagged spike called ‘achievements’. Counter-Strike now has achievements. If ever there was a game whose character least suited this most unpalatable, emersion-breaking of gaming fads.
If you’re asked to describe Counter-Strike you’ll likely say something along the lines of ‘an online, team-based, tactical FPS that combines realistic damage and weaponry with bomb-planting and hostage-taking scenarios.’ This is what CS is known for, but it really isn’t what CS is any more if you browse the server lists and play it casually. On one side it’s a parade of custom games, on the other an almost e-sport-like obsession with the blandest maps cum frag factories.
CS continues to be popular so there are people enjoying whatever it is the game has become. Call me a wanky romantic but Counter-Strike today seems soulless.
Wanky Romantic. Honestly though, the one thing that has ruined counter strike is the fan base – the pc’s very own XBL crowd. Every server, like you say, is Dust2 or Office with everyone using AKs and M16s exclusively, coupled in with the odd twat piping trance music down his mic.
Now I can only play CS:S if it’s a gun game server because it’s the only way to get some bloody variety – people are forced to use different guns and the map rotations are often stupid stuff. It’s nothing like CS but it’s fun.
And on achievements, don’t be so grumpy you old coot.
You kids – being able to play a game with sound and in colour are all the achievements I’ll ever need.
I’ve never played any version of Counter Strike.
Counter-strike was never a team game. Everyone was only interested in their own scores. I used to know people who would disconnect and reconnect if their KDR was as bad as 29-4, just to reset their scores. Or people who run around chasing someone for ages trying to knife them while the other guy kills the rest of the opposition team. It was always a game that attracted 13 year olds who have no interest in teamwork. The awards system will make people less interested in cooperating.
Dust2 and office are miles better than prodigy and milita, they were always widely considered to be wank. Maps such as fy_iceworld and other custom maps made the game more hyperactive and detracted from the real meaning of the game. Give me the classic maps anyday, although 24/7 ‘rotations’ of a single map are poop.
The zombie mod for CS was bloody brilliant to be honest. Having to run into a toilet and block the door with a table (not sure why there was a table in a bog) to stop the hoards. It was pre-Left4dead Left4dead where all those killed turn into zombies until the timer runs out or all players are zombies. That mod made me crap my pants everytime. I might buy CS again (seen as paul has my copy) just to play that mod.
I disagree. Dust2 is not interesting; office is, within a rotation. I don’t know what criteria people judged maps by but I preferred militia and the like for their atmosphere, the sense of narrative they created and the simple fact that they were fun.
The one with the creaky house was bestest
There was a poo in the upstairs toilet!
That’s not Counter Strike, that’s Counter Skat
END OF THE JOKE
The poo you could shoot and it would explode? Man, why doesn’t anybody play that map? What was it called?
cs_militia
It’s sorta sad when this happens. I disagree with your notion about dust2, however. Overplayed, probably, but terrible? Nah. It should be noted that when I took a course with Robert Yang (Radiator mod series) in regards to level design, he used dust2 as a good example of, well, a level.
I don’t actually own CS, though (1.6 is tragically lost to an older Steam account of which I don’t know the name of). So this was way back then. Good times. I fortunately played the servers back when they were good.
I didn’t say it was terrible, it’s just uninteresting. It may be technically well constructed but where’s the heart? What story does it tell? What is dust2 even supposed to be?
It doesn’t create atmosphere it’s just an artificial arena which removes CS from the realistic game it was intended to be, turning it into a bland, efficient shooting machine. It just goes to show what CS has become that it’s the most popular map in the community.
Not every map needs to have a story. Emergent gameplay.
I don’t think I’d play CS for the story. Just sayin’. ;)
It’s not an explicit story I want, just a sense of narrative in the map design that makes an effort to immerse you in the whole counter-terror shtick. If you enjoy CS for the mechanics I guess you don’t need that, which seems to be how most people play CS today.
thread from the dead! As someone who had played CS since beta, I can say that the game has truly lost what it used to be. Granted trends change over time, but the game used to be so much more of an experience. Militia was THE best map in my opinion, you never know if you went in the front door if someone was behind it to the right, and as you make your way thru the house, someone could be behind the sofa or the bar or up on top of the range above the stove; or even on a box of fuckin cheezits by the hostages! No other map had the ability for the CT’s to rush the house via sewers with lights on OR off. or for the terrorists to fend off the rush, whether it be by sitting on the roof, in the windows or finding your favorite hiding spot as mentioned before waiting. With so many options in that map for both T’s and CT’s, its a lost art really, now all it is, is dust or dust2. or stupid warcraft servers, or gungame mods. Not one server I have found lately actually plays a NORMAL round of CS. I love cs_italy, or cs_assault even fy_iceworld; I have so many memories of such great times playing probably my favorite game of all time, but sadly… that is all they will appear to be now are just memories…
I’m the man. I run train in every server I step into. That is honestly what makes me feel sad: the amount of noobs I shit on in a single match. Where are all the experienced players?
[slow clapping]
congrats… would you like some modesty with your glass of pompousness?
As a fellow powergamer, I feel your pain, son. I feel your pain.
whoever thinks dust2 is a fun server is a retarded arab who lobes dust dust2 is the most boring thing in the world and it seems admins are purposely trying to make people as bored a spossible by having nearly 100% of servers with players actually playing on dust2 or some weird maps with a deathmatch whioch gets boring or a modded game where you have super powers its stupid i also cannot find 1 server where there is map rotation and players who work as a team,they should work as a team but hardly any do infact they most of the time help you die,they let you get shot while they are hiding or they block you so you get shot,and then you have got admins who say NO CAMPING ALLOWED!!! and they dont metntion this anywhere youl camp like 1 time and maybe get banned,and im getting banned all the time for no bloody reason becuase of evil admins loving thier control,control freaks,and then you have got nearly 100 percent of people is not english so you cant understand them then youve got people who are insanely good and you look around a corner and your dead in a 100th of a second,and i keep asking how do they become so good and noone wants to tell you,i belive they are only so good becuase of the settings they have and thier fast computer and then you have got the stupidest system where only people who are absolutely computer freakazoids know what to type into thier console so they can have fast switching and turn of mouse acceleration and then you have got people saying change your name or somthing becuase they dont like it and then they kick you and ban you just for having a name and i dont know what name i want so i just call myself aaa whats the problem in that but no some admins want to be evil and start bossing everyone around and this is nearly every server and every server is dust_2,why,why,why,is people so strange,id probably think dust_2 was the most boring map of them all and assault i think is boring.i also remember when there was at least some other maps than dust_2 for goodness sakes.it at least used to have a variety of maps now all there is is dust_2 and if it is a different map you think yes!! finally a map not dust2 then you go on it and it has loads of annoying sounds,headshot,singapore when terrros plant the bomb why singapore? i dunno,godlike, loads of annoying sounds and you just think why cant there be 1 normal REAL LIFELIKE SERVER?IS THAT TOO MUCH TO ASK?YES IT IS DEFINATELY!!!hahahahahahah
Cool story, bro.
I agree in the main, I was a big fan back in the beta days of cs, but I do think source was a good remake, it’s cs with better graphics.
It’s the servers that are the problem, in original cs there would be at least 3 maps rotating on most servers and it was vanilla Cs, the style of play seems to have been restricted to clan matches now.
I pity those who never experienced 1.5 in its prime. That was CS.