The declining state of Counter-strike

j0e I agree with you totally, I spent hundreds on running servers pre steam and pre 1.6 had a good community, then they released steam and 1.6 divided the community between 1.5 and 1.6 then forced everyone to 1.6 then divided it again with cs-cz and now done it once more with cs-source.

from a server point of view in 1.5 was full 90% of the day, when we changed to 1.6 it was empty for ever gave up paying for it after 3 months.

Even today there are simply too many servers online, and far too many of them are empty.

inflatable I agree with all you said as well.

 

If you want realism play america's army.

CS is successful because it's fun. Most people get confused on this matter because they are not very... informed.

 

what is fun about being hit in the head by a pistol round that drills everything in its path?

 

I don't know where to write in I played tourney level cs for a few years, and I had been playing it since beta 4.2 IIRC (when the awp wasn't the best sniper, and the colt had a scope) I've gone through all the changes and besides bug and supposed cheat fixes the best version of Cs was somewhere back in the 6 or 7 betas as long as the best versions of some of the maps. In terms of what made CS so good on the pro level was the solid game play, there were no hooky or broken gameplay mechanics that gave one team or person an advantage, all the guns were relatively balanced, and on the tourney level there werne't many exploits or wierd issues, a team with good stratedgy and skills was what it took. Not like BF2 where vehicles are overpowered or theirs balance and gameplay mechanics issues (dolphin diving, jump proning etc). Anyways is this new variable pricing live yet? if not you really can't slam it until you've tried it, How much will the pricing change? I mean it's one thing if the ak goes up to 9K dollars it's another if it goes up 400-1K. I think it will be interesting (although I don't play cs:s regurarly). So you can't say you are always gonna be stuck with a crappy gun or what not, I often found myself stuck at 16,000 after a few rounds and even at 6K that's more than a full loadout for a round unless your stupid. But I digress, basically no other game has topped CS partially do to it's playability on any machine now and partially due to it's superbly solid gameplay (that seems to have been left static, and forgotten). If a game is going to surpass it or be equal it will need to have that core solid gameplay, which boils down to the mechanics and balance rather than all the gimmicks and graphics in the world.

 

Wow, what an incredibly one-sided article. You add a section called "What do the professionals think?" and ask nobody even remotely involved in the game development business. "Professional" cyber-athletes are a joke, their opinion counts for no more than the average gamer. Sponsors don't count for anything because they aren't even the ones playing the game. They are just sponsors, as in they are in it for the commercialism, not to play games, just to make money. How is their opinion valid at all? How is it more valid than that of the average CSS player? You state opinion as it is fact throughout the article, and twist the statistics in your favor, which in the journalism business is a big no-no (but it still seems to happen so often anyways.)

You state that Valve trying to change the maps/gameplay for CS:S is a bad thing, but that is exactly what they would be doing to 1.6 if they never released source. It is called updating, it is an important part of any game, and Valve is actually doing it, and you should be thankful. They are not trying to "reach-out" to the CS 1.6 community by changing the game, they are trying to IMPROVE the game, which in turn will attract newer players to the franchise. I remember when Valve first publically stated they were replacing the radar with a new one, and everybody freaked. Then it finally released and it ended up being a very nice update. Nobody has any faith in the people developing the game, but Valve is a very respectable and intelligent company, it's a shame how people like you can constantly criticize them for every little step they take without just waiting it out and seeing where they are going first. Some of the updates attract negative criticism from the community, but anyone who is a REAL gamer will adapt, it gets boring playing the same game for too long. There have been many times in which I stopped playing CS/CSS for months because I just was tired of never having anything new, I eventually started CSS to see the new radar update and it definitely got me playing again, it may not have been a major update at all, but it got my attention.

I hope you are not a professional journalist, because this article is very much 'faux news,' it is nothing but a singular opinion on the gameplay updates CS:S is having, but you state it as it is statistically going to bring the gaming community down to nothing but dust unless Valve does something to stop it. The entire article strikes me as something I would find from any random angry player on the Steam-Powered forums, and am a bit disgusted that a site such as this would take it as a serious article. Perhaps in the future you should explore both sides of an argument without any bias, and then maybe you won't come off as just another angry newb?

So in short:
your article =

 

After 8-18 months of 1.6, 1.5 died. I dunno when CS:S got released, but its definetly assed 1 year. It shows how good a job Valve did. (Granted, you need to buy CS:S, but still).
and i agree with this 2 communities (Competitive Vs fun play). I can't see in any way how CS:S will completly replace 1.6... unless Valve somehow pulls the plug