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Counter-Strike (A Diary of Video Games)

Blogs > DRTnOOber
Post a Reply
DRTnOOber
Profile Blog Joined February 2012
New Zealand476 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-08-21 23:08:41
August 21 2012 22:02 GMT
#1
Preamble: This isn't a review. It doesn't contain critical analysis, just the subjective opinions of one person. The intent is to remember the games I've come across in my life and share the nostalgia, nothing more. And some of those games I didn't play in great depth.

Finally a game we get sink our teeth into. This is one of those games which changed the world and certainly something I spent a big portion of my life immersed in. I haven't played this game for many years (maybe 7?) and I'd like to know whether many people still play this game, whether Counter-Strike: Source was a good successor, and also just stories about back in the day when you played Counter-Strike.

Counter-Strike (Clarification: This is the original Counter-Strike, refered to as "1.6" by the version number now, although when I played it was from versions 1.3 to 1.5).

Developer: Valve
Platform: PC (as a modification for Half-Life)
Release Year: 1999
Impact on my life: 10/10
Impact on the world: 9/10
Objective rating: 9/10

[image loading]

Counter-Strike is one of the most famous video games in history.

Basic Plot

Counter-Strike is a multiplayer only modification for Half-Life. There is no story, but the basic scenario revolves around the idea of opposing teams of terrorists and counter-terrorists doing battle within the confines of a map.

Gameplay

The game is a multi-player co-operative first person shooter for the most part.

Players choose (or are automatically placed) into one of two teams (terrorists and counter-terrorists) at the beginning of each map. The goals for the map vary but usually fit into a few categories:
  • Bomb placement. On these maps the terrorists need to work together to get a bomb to a bomb site, plant it, and then defend it until it goes off. The counter-terrorists are trying to elimnate all the terrorist players but also defuse the bomb if it has been planted.
  • Hostage rescue. The terrorists are guarding a set of NPC hostages. The counter-terrorists need to infiltrate the terrorists' lair and take the hostages to safety.
  • VIP. One player plays as the VIP (who only as a pistol). The counter-terrorists must bring the VIP to a rescue point, and the terrorists are trying to kill him.

There became many other versions of the game over time including a deathmatch mode where everyone was out for themselves.

Teams usually consisted of 8-16 players on each team. Although the game was technically co-operative a lot of the competition was around which player could obtain the most kills during a map. Often the best players were worth many times the strategic value of hordes of newbies. But at its essence Counter-Strike is a team based game. A team who worked together were able to complete their objectives. A team of individuals who went their own way would more often than not get ambushed by the enemy time and picked off one at a time. Playing on the internet it was difficult to find a good team, but I did have my favourite server (Recoil I think it was) which I would join every night. I got to know a lot of the other players and if they were ever on my team we'd work together pretty well.

Players could chat to each other, use voice chat (later on), and there were also pre-set commands you could access with a few shortcut key strokes for common requests such as "hold this position" or "go go go!".

A game was split in to rounds. Each round was maybe 3-4 minutes long, and if you died you would simply spectate the other players to see how your team went. Then a new round would start and you could play again. This was part of the game's success, you could die often but always be back in the game after a short period of time.

[image loading]
Two of the terrorist models.

There was a secondary mechanic in the game which involved money and purchasing weapons. At the beginning of each round there was a small amount of time set aside for buying weapons and items. You obtained money from killing enemies or winning a round. Additionally, if you stayed alive in the previous round you got to keep the gear you had - whereas if you died you lost it all.

Unlike its mother game Half-Life the weapons and physics system was much more realistic. Headshoots killed an opponent with a single bullet (unless they were wearing head armour), if you ran and shot at the same time your gun would spray bullets around and you'd miss everything. Falling from any great height would kill you. It was this realism which really made this game stand out for the time period. It meant that you could obtain actual skill that would set you above other players.

The kinds of skills involved were aiming guns (obviously), managing movement and aiming, knowing the maps and where all the choke points and shortcuts were, how to use terrain to your advantage, specializing in certain weapons and understanding their recoil pattern, etc.

[image loading]
Counter-terrorists running out to start the round. When you held your knife you ran slightly faster than if you held a gun. Good, as long as you didn't get caught.

Positives

The culmination of both a co-operative and competitive multiplayer made this game extremely addictive.

I really liked the skill based aspect of the game. When I first started playing I died within seconds of each round starting. I was frustrated and annoyed, but as I played and began to consciously think about strategy I was able to keep up. There is something very satisfying about pitting your skills against others in an arena where it actually matters (i.e. it's not just random luck).

Because the game was so popular there were hundreds of local servers up and running 24/7 so there was never a shortage of players or modifications on the original game.

I also really liked some parts of the sub-culture of the game. When there was just one player from each team left at the end of a round sometimes they would have a knife fight to decide the win. It was kind of a comradery that was great when there weren't a bunch of 12 year olds playing.

Overall it was an extremely well balanced game from a lot of angles which didn't have a lot of flaws. The only reason that it lost popularity is perhaps that new and more interesting mechanics have been developed since. Although it is still played around the world (to this day) and there are professional tournaments.

[image loading]
Arctic Warfare Rifle...

Negatives

There were some really horrible people who played the game, who would type in abuse and then later speak abuse using their microphone.

It kind of ruined my life a bit in my third year of university. I was playing 3-6 hours a day... I don't actually know how I got a degree at the end of it.

Memorable Moments

There was a modification to the game called WC3 in which you chose one of the races from Blizzard's Warcraft 3. Each "race" had their own special abilities and you could level up your character to obtain them all. The skills added to the complexity of the game and I really enjoyed it. Some of the abilities included partial invisibility, improved speed and jump distance, keeping your weapons if you died, improved grenades (devastating), and evasion.

When I was at my peak, I could jump on any server and always be in the top 1-2 in terms of kills at the end of a map. It came at the expense of the rest of my life though My favourite weapon was the AK-47 but it took a while to get used to. If I ever had a break and didn't play for a few weeks or more I'd go back to using the MP-5 to get my aiming back up to scratch, and then transition to MP4 and AK-47 once I was ready.

What were your memorable moments?

****
But I'm off creep... and so I slow down, what are hellions doing here? I don't belong here...
MisterD
Profile Blog Joined June 2010
Germany1338 Posts
August 21 2012 22:57 GMT
#2
hahaha wc3 mod with undead on suicide bomber, 6 players, map: poolday - HOURS of mindless stupidity of the first one dying starting a chain explosion taking everybody down. But, it somehow was fun. x)
Gold isn't everything in life... you need wood, too!
zakmaa
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
Canada525 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-08-21 23:06:32
August 21 2012 23:06 GMT
#3
Note: CS:S not 1.6

Unfortunately a lot of my fondest memories of my life (only 16) are memories of playing CS:S (a sequel to the one in which OP writes about). Kind of wish I had spent more time outside doing stuff with people in real life, but either way I had an amazing time playing this game. I guess I've had a lot of memorable moments playing this game. I can still remember the first time I landed dozens of tricks on surf_skyworld, or playing aim_ag_texture2 for hooouursss non-stop. The dozens of clans that I was in, some that I started with friends, those that lasted and those that didn't. I can remember updating my Graphics Card for the first time, not understanding that the Source Engine is processor based. It made me able to play de_dust2 with about 30 fps, though, which was an improvement from 9...

I got competitive in this game and played tons of seasons with tons of teams, from being a leader, to scheduler, AWPer, Rifle, support, strat caller. Everything you can do I did, other than succeed I can remember making really successful teams rage games against one of my favorite teams that I ever played with, and having them call us cheaters, even while playing on client. A lot of my friends still play this game, though not that many. One of them is particularly successful, on the breach of becoming one of the AWPers at the forefront of the CS:S community, to add to his already growing popularity.

I can remember laughing at stuff in this game until my sides hurt, really, really badly. Staying up until the wee hours of the morning (jk more like 9-10am) talking to friends/teammates in vent/mumble and just having a good time playing various games together. I can remember crying about this game for various reasons, and being mad. Mostly happy times, though.


Sorry for the incoherent rant; you asked what my most memorable moments were and I just don't really have any "most." If I had to pick one, though, it would be winning a 1v3 on Nuke against three extremely good players, two of them CGS players. On client, too. Even though we lost that scrim terribly :p

In the end, CS:S will always be my favorite game, even though I no longer play it (can't seem to get in to it, anymore). I've never had more fun more consistently doing anything else, I think.

Thanks for bringing back some good memories.
:')
DRTnOOber
Profile Blog Joined February 2012
New Zealand476 Posts
August 21 2012 23:07 GMT
#4
On August 22 2012 07:57 MisterD wrote:
hahaha wc3 mod with undead on suicide bomber, 6 players, map: poolday - HOURS of mindless stupidity of the first one dying starting a chain explosion taking everybody down. But, it somehow was fun. x)

Yay! Another WC3 mod player! I *usually* played Orc because the weapons respawn was priceless and orc grenades were hilarious... but I also used to play human and sometimes I'd get multiple knife and pistols kills. Do you remember when human had the teleport ability and is was unrestricted? Players used to teleport up onto rooftops and areas they weren't meant to, and they were impossible to stop.
But I'm off creep... and so I slow down, what are hellions doing here? I don't belong here...
MisterD
Profile Blog Joined June 2010
Germany1338 Posts
August 21 2012 23:13 GMT
#5
On August 22 2012 08:07 DRTnOOber wrote:
Show nested quote +
On August 22 2012 07:57 MisterD wrote:
hahaha wc3 mod with undead on suicide bomber, 6 players, map: poolday - HOURS of mindless stupidity of the first one dying starting a chain explosion taking everybody down. But, it somehow was fun. x)

Yay! Another WC3 mod player! I *usually* played Orc because the weapons respawn was priceless and orc grenades were hilarious... but I also used to play human and sometimes I'd get multiple knife and pistols kills. Do you remember when human had the teleport ability and is was unrestricted? Players used to teleport up onto rooftops and areas they weren't meant to, and they were impossible to stop.


nah, i never really played any cs. we played a bunch on these "couple of kids make byoc lan party at home" x) poolday is a tiny map if you don't know it. so essentially you couldn't walk more than 10 meters without being shot until there were only like 2 people left and they ran the same direction in circles behind each other. There was really no point to aiming or anything, the first guy that dies is close enough to kill the second with his suicide bomb explosion, that would then kill the next because the map is so damn small, and often enough simply everybody died at once xD brain dead "gaming" to the maximum.

kreedz maps though .. uhh i loved those, and actually played them on public servers a bunch.
Gold isn't everything in life... you need wood, too!
Mattchew
Profile Blog Joined December 2010
United States5684 Posts
August 22 2012 04:10 GMT
#6
and now im playing 1.6
There is always tomorrow nshs.seal.
keioh
Profile Blog Joined May 2010
France1099 Posts
Last Edited: 2012-08-22 05:52:25
August 22 2012 05:51 GMT
#7
Good times~

I too don't know how I bachelor'd while playing this game ; for like 3 years I would play 6-8 hours a day, spending my nights in gather, refining my aim and brain all afternoon, and sometime I would just troll like a boss with some friends on servers. This game was just incredible. I can just remember the first "war' we had on it ; I was so pumped up, so tense, we had planned kablamostic strategies (and not a single one did work, except the good ol' "RUN AND KILL OR DIE TRYING", which is kind of expected when you put only 45 min of actually TRAINING said strategies)... and we got humiliated, but this was too late : I was a CS addict.

But this is also how I got really introduced to ESPORTS, even if I already knew a bit of the korean scene of BW. I remember spending some looooong time before 1.6 trying to watch the best team on HLTV ; it was so hard to get connected that I actually felt like a 1337 h4xx0r when I first succeeded. Remember when SK was pwning every other teams ? They were awesome videos of über skilled kills and actions Iwould watch when I did not feel like playing. I also remember the fun we had with my team in competing in ESL.fr ; we were actually not that bad, but sometime we would just lose rounds, even entire sides because we were laughing so hard we couln't actually watch the screen.

Nostalgia'd, I hate you OP
GIMME ALL THE BELGIAN WAFFLES I CAN GET FOR THIS MONEY !!!!!! BELGIAN WAFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFLEEEEEEEEES
surfinbird1
Profile Joined September 2009
Germany999 Posts
August 22 2012 06:12 GMT
#8
Oh god, soo many hours spent plying this game. Every LAN at least half the time we played Counterstrike from stupid maps like poolday and erdnuss to dust and italy. And the Warcraft3 mod was glorious! As an Orc with endurance aura and grenade damage it was just so much fun. Especially on maps like dust where there were chokepoints which you could reach earlier due to your speed and then drop the grenade on four to five guys, so awesome. I will never forget this game and the countless hours of enjoyment I had with it.
life of lively to live to life of full life thx to shield battery
QuanticHawk
Profile Blog Joined May 2007
United States32046 Posts
August 22 2012 15:35 GMT
#9
I fucking loved militia and office. Militia was just fun. Office, I always went shotty or uzi. Prodigy was fun too.
PROFESSIONAL GAMER - SEND ME OFFERS TO JOIN YOUR TEAM - USA USA USA
TylerThaCreator
Profile Blog Joined May 2011
United States906 Posts
August 22 2012 15:46 GMT
#10
jumping on the undead suicide bomb ulti warcraft 3 mod bandwagon. sooooo much fun
aka SethN
MasterOfPuppets
Profile Blog Joined March 2011
Romania6942 Posts
August 22 2012 16:00 GMT
#11
1.6 was so much fun for me a few years ago. It's still probably the single most popular video game here in Romania, and I'd even go so far as to say that it's pretty hard to find a (male) teenager or young adult who lives in a comfortable urban environment here (so the "too poor to even consider a computer" idea doens't apply) who has never played Counter-Strike.

I've had a great deal of fun with it, both vanilla on pub servers with friends and regulars that I knew, as well as War3 mod, Zombie Plague, GunGame, Paintball mod and such. ^^

Everything about the game but specifically the fact that it can be quite skill-demanding from the players makes Counter-Strike 1.6 one of my top 3 multiplayer shooters of all time alongside the Quake series and Unreal Tournament. Fighting~~
"my shaft scares me too" - strenx 2014
KING CHARLIE :D
Profile Blog Joined March 2012
United States447 Posts
August 22 2012 16:36 GMT
#12
Most memorable moment was clutching 1v4 vs an invite team at lan to win winner's bracket finals. Screamed so loud when I won it. Then we lost to that team in the finals. =[
NO TEAM WILL EVER BE AS GOOD AS TEAM LIQUID!
DRTnOOber
Profile Blog Joined February 2012
New Zealand476 Posts
August 22 2012 20:24 GMT
#13
Awesome comments everyone, I too am feeling the nostalgia.
But I'm off creep... and so I slow down, what are hellions doing here? I don't belong here...
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