Counter-Strike: Source review

Looks good doesn’t it?

The purchasing bar crawled agonising slowly across the screen. It’s half eleven, I’m tired, and the last thing I want is a technical/monetary problem to impede me from playing Counter-Strike: Source. How hard can it be to take my money? Success! No! The ‘preloading-CS: Source’ bar has come to a halt. Steam, why hast thou forsaken me I cried! Minutes seemed like hours. Oh my god it’s moving! Praise be the geek goddess! More menu screens. Come on. Updating Counter-Strike: Source. Hold together baby. Almost there. Almost there. Ready to play. A single tear rolled down this reporter’s cheek.

This is a clever move by Valve: releasing a next-generation update to the most popular on-line game ever (in the West at least) as an incentive to pre-order Half-Life 2 via Steam. You can see it now, Gabe Newell, Doug Lombardi et al. rubbing their hands together as a figure on a giant LED screen representing their bank balance rockets upwards - whilst the senior management at publisher Vivendi Universal Games gently weep into their lawsuit documents.

Those who have played the Counter-Strike: Source beta will know its charms. The problem with the beta was there was only one map. And the problem with that map was it was Dust. Dust is a poorly balanced map of limited scope, not best suited to the more dynamic gunfights or tactical movement some of the better maps allow for. Whilst the graphical prowess of the new source engine was obvious, it was harder to judge how similar Counter-Strike: Source played in comparison to previous versions. Just how much had the game changed?

Recoil ramifications

Might be time to invest in a new PC…

After previewing the beta we suggested that the aiming had been altered. It does now appear that the recoil has been tuned, not dramatically, but enough to result in less confident aiming for those accustomed to previous versions. This can be initially frustrating for those who have honed their aiming abilities through hundreds of hours of play.

However, as you gradually adjust your aim, Counter-Strike: Source begins to feel more familiar; the maps are faithful to the design of their 1.6 counterparts; the semi-realistic player damage modelling remains untouched; and, save for the odd minor tweak, weapon balancing hasn’t changed all that much. Movement is also more or less the same, meaning that this version has lost none of the pace and that gives Counter-Strike its arcade edge.

Do you want Source with that?

Some of the maps are lot darker – muzzle flash can help reveal enemy positions though.

The most notable changes are a bi-product of the graphical/physics improvements the Source engine brings to Counter Strike. Again, there is nothing that will affect the fundamental dynamics of the game, but they do make a good awareness of the environment more important.

Shadows are a good example. Source, unlike the original Half-Life engine, uses dynamic lighting that casts real-time shadows. This means that more observant players might be able to tell if their opponents are coming around a corner because a shadow gives away their approach. Equally, the rubble that litters certain areas of the map can provide audio cues to enemy movement, such as a mis-step sending a glass bottle rolling nosily along a stony surface or someone knocking into a metal barrel. Perhaps it’s time to fork out for some decent headphones.

There are other, equally subtle, effects to take into consideration. Take the glass on office. One shot will not break a pane, but it will shatter it, obscuring vision through its now frosted surface. But that’s not all. Because the glass breaks in a realistic manner, even though you may have shot out a window, some shards might still jut out from the frame. Catch one as you move through and the breaking noise could give you away.

Little details, but nevertheless important ones: now something as seemingly innocuous as a window or a bottle could potentially decide a round. This only scratches the surface as to what part the environment could play in future Counter-Strike updates; should Valve want to go in that direction.

Classic CS

However, for the time being they’re playing it safe. None of the additions we have talked about should upset purists too much. If Valve had made any drastic alterations to the existing formula they would have risked alienating their huge fan base. The only problem with such a faithful approach is that they now face criticism for not supplying any original content.

Perhaps this problem explains why the game has been released with only two of the more popular competitive maps (Dust2 and Aztec) whilst newer, less played maps such as Chateau and Havana have been given a Source update. I suspect Valve want to drip feed the release of more widely-played competition maps like Inferno, Nuke, Train and public favourites like Militia, Assault and Prodigy; in effect presenting old maps in the form of new content. Given the lack of success they’ve had in introducing new maps in the past you can’t really blame them, but it would have been nice to have seen some surprises included in the launch.

A visual treat

“I thought you were going to wake me up once we got there?”

Still, the maps that have already received the Source treatment are simply sumptuous; full of rich textures, stunning lighting effects and painstaking detail. Just look at the way the water in Aztec refracts light, the gentle current being disturbed as players’ splash through it; or how the Havoc physics allow you to make a fruit salad with bullets in Italy’s market place.

Thanks to details like these, watching gun fights in Counter-Strike: Source is almost as fun as participating in them. Bullets leave pot marks in walls, scenery crumples and breaks and grenades send utterly convincing rag doll bodies cascading through the air. The action that takes place on a Counter-Strike: Source server wouldn’t look out of place in a Hollywood blockbuster. As competitive gaming comes closer to becoming a spectator sport, such spectacular visuals are becoming increasingly important to its acceptance and popularity. Plus it’s nice having something to watch whilst you wait to respawn next round.

The end of something old. The beginning of something new.

Physics working to their full effect.

The main point of criticism that could be levelled towards Counter-Strike: Source is the conservativeness of the conversion - where are all the new features? Whilst this is a valid point, it’s worth bearing in mind that Counter-Strike: Source is the next step in the evolution of a game that has been updated and tweaked for many years. The Half-life engine could only take the game so far. Source has the potential to take it so much further. But not yet. Valve have always introduced changes slowly and cautiously - when you have something as finely honed as Counter-Strike you don’t make dramatic alterations - and they have rightly continued with this policy. Most Counter-Strike players will be happy with the new graphical engine and the environmental effects. The rest will have to wait a bit longer to see significant changes in the formula.

A second point of criticism is that for a ‘full’ release Counter-Strike: Source is missing a lot of content: it comes with a fairly sparse collection of maps and only one player model per side. However, Valve have always been strong in their support of the Counter-Strike community and it’s guaranteed that we will see a constant stream (or should that be steam?) of new free material and content in the coming weeks, months and even years. For now there’s enough to be getting on with.

Ultimately Counter-Strike: Source is not a revolution in online shooting. What it is instead is a technically and graphically stunning port of a game that was already pretty damn good, with the potential to deliver bigger and better things in future. And you can’t complain too much about that.