By Alec Meer on August 21st, 2012 at 1:00 pm.
Lamentation at the ongoing lack of a new Half-Life there might well be, but Valve sure are launching a lot of games round about now. Dota 2 is quietly infecting the brains of a small army of people with a new type of language, Team Fortress 2 has just turned into a strange, voucher-based co-op game, and Fart Cops of course continues its unassailable dominance of the game charts in China. Then there’s Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, which moves from long-running beta to A Thing That You Can Pay For And Play today, specifically in about five hours from now. It’s pretty cheap, too – £10.79/$13.50 at the moment. Who’s playing/will be playing? I admit, I’m tempted. It’s been long years since I used to ineptly stagger around CS 1.6′s Dust in the PC Format office, but I have a certain affection for the game’s quiet viciousness. The time very much seems right for its latest rebirth.
I’ve given the beta only the quickest of spins, and was relieved to see that it hadn’t put much in the way of funny business in the way of the game proper. Arms Race Mode, wherein you’re rewarded with a new weapon for each successful kill, made a lot more sense in practice than on paper, and did a good job of offering short-term personal goals rather than purely the traditional There’s No I In Team mentality.
Anyway, I am absolutely blathering here. The news is that CSGO is out in mere hours, and that the launch patch notes say they’re adding quasi-official support for the zombie mod. Like CSS before it, CSGO will be a quiet giant, you mark my rather obvious words.
21/08/2012 at 13:08 Totally heterosexual says:
AHA
I SAW THE TITLE BEFORE YOU CHANGED IT
21/08/2012 at 13:17 BoZo says:
Could you enthrall us with your tale for us mere mortals who haven’t bound mwheelup/down to F5?
21/08/2012 at 13:19 Totally heterosexual says:
CS:GO is GO
THAT WAS TOTALLY WORTH 3.5 HOURS.
21/08/2012 at 13:27 Revolving Ocelot says:
The link in the top bar is still “csgo-is-go”. Bask in it’s radiance!
22/08/2012 at 03:37 midwaslll says:
I bought the game, and it opened up beta access immediately.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40zfXQqX_Zc
22/08/2012 at 08:38 dmyers says:
Ah yes, an article title might change, but a permalink will always remain permanently linked.
21/08/2012 at 13:15 RDG says:
I’ve played a bit and I must say I enjoyed it even though I got my head kicked in every single match. The only problem with the new game modes is that it’s 5v5 and as a bad player (moi) you have nowhere to hide your terrible skills. The smaller maps also make for shorter matches, which is nice if you, like me, die whenever anyone fires a bullet.
I’m sticking to classic modes now and I sometimes manage to fire my gun, it’s quite nice.
21/08/2012 at 13:21 emorium says:
i am a pretty lousy player as well and i agree, it’s way more fun to play in matches with more players where you don’t feel the entire team is giving you the stink-eye for dying to that AWP. too bad the find game option doesn’t let you choose how many players you want in your game. right now its a 50-50 shot you get 10v10 or 5v5.
21/08/2012 at 14:36 Irony says:
Just use the server browser. It lists both the number of players currently in a game, and the maximum number the server will hold.
21/08/2012 at 13:21 sd4f says:
I’ve been playing it, and in a way enjoying it more than sauce, but it has its problems, i think i’m getting used to the new movement and way the weapons shoot, but i’m having lots of trouble with hit rego (the models get covered in blood, yet don’t get any hits, or one hit) that happened a lot less in css than csgo is. Also, it’s quite buggy at the moment, after about two map changes, the game crashes to desktop for me. There’s also been times when something weird happens in team selection and i can’t do anything except disconnect through the console.
So in short, i’m surprised they’re releasing it, because as it is, it needs a fair bit of work yet.
21/08/2012 at 15:44 CelticPixel says:
I enjoy CS, but I’m also a fairly poor player. I’ve got my hopes pinned on their promises of match-making players of similar skill levels, so perhaps I’ll see you soon on the ‘Still a noob after 15 years of gaming’ server!
21/08/2012 at 17:57 HexagonalBolts says:
Could someone provide more info on this? Matchmaking based on skill levels is EXACTLY what counterstrike needs, almost all the matches seem to have one guy with 12 kills and everyone else with 1 to 3 kills.
21/08/2012 at 19:02 Jimmy says:
I got pro skillz, n0sc0p3 xtrem scrub damage, k/d off da railz, n00bz outtamyway
21/08/2012 at 16:16 Wreckdum says:
Not paying $13.50 for a game I already own with some new textures. This should’ve been free DLC for CS:S.
21/08/2012 at 16:46 emorium says:
it’s quite a difference actually, granted you need to have played the previous games extensively to notice it. and honestly it’s about the price of a CoD map pack. i don’t see how anyone who proclaims to be a CS fan considers it a bad deal.
21/08/2012 at 16:55 Lemming says:
You stay in your ivory tower of self-entitlement and play CS:S then.
21/08/2012 at 13:18 MadTinkerer says:
Zombie mode in CS:GO. This is a totally free thing, so I don’t mind it but it still bugs me a little bit because L4D. I mean: really.
21/08/2012 at 13:38 Torn says:
Any info or gameplay of the ‘official’ CS:GO Zombie Mod? I can’t seem to find any solid media on the internets about it.
Maybe because noone’s played it yet?
21/08/2012 at 15:06 Aldehyde says:
If it’s anything like the zombie mode in the old Counter Strikes then it will just be a bunch of bots running towards you on all the usual maps but they have no weapons and don’t really take damage except for shots to the head.
The maps are usually set in a darker light as well.
Well, that is one zombie mod. The other is where one guy starts as a zombie against all the other players and when he kills someone that player respawns as a zombie. Last man standing wins.
21/08/2012 at 13:19 Revolving Ocelot says:
Blah, I’ve never played any CS game. The skill level just seems too high for me (BUNNY HOP AROUND EVERY CORNER WITH PERFECT NOSCOPE HEADSHOTS OR YOU LOSE JAJAJAHUEHUE). I’ve got CS: Source in my Steam library since it came with my copy of Half-Life 2, but I’ve never installed it.
21/08/2012 at 13:23 Yosharian says:
This
21/08/2012 at 13:28 SuperDuperStormTrooper says:
Is
21/08/2012 at 13:28 SuperDuperStormTrooper says:
Patrick
21/08/2012 at 14:08 Sic says:
Swayze!
21/08/2012 at 15:30 Crumpled Stiltskin says:
Roadhouse!
21/08/2012 at 13:42 fallingmagpie says:
SPARTA!
21/08/2012 at 14:31 Subject 706 says:
SPAARTAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!
21/08/2012 at 16:07 Shodex says:
FREEEEEEEEEDOOM!!!
21/08/2012 at 16:11 Tiax says:
Patrick Sparta ?
21/08/2012 at 16:42 ScubaMonster says:
“but I’ve never installed it.”
This is a problem I’ve seen, people will say that the barrier for entry is too high, people will blast you for sucking, etc. so they don’t even try it. I’m hardly the best FPS player around, but CS:S was fun and I actually got kills. Was I the best? Certainly not, but I had fun anyway. I don’t recall anybody bitching at me, and the level of bitching wasn’t any different than any other internet game.
CS:S gets this rep for being a game you can’t even hope to play because of experts, you’ll get screamed at, whatever else, but I found that not to be the case at all. For every server you might run across that will have asses, there are plenty of others that don’t. I honestly didn’t find it any worse than any other FPS game out there.
21/08/2012 at 17:01 Lemming says:
I agree. I’m not great at FPs, just average, and I’ve never been bitched at in CS:S. Not even TF2, actually but the barrier for entry for TF2 is WAAAAAAAY higher than CS:S.
21/08/2012 at 17:35 Spakkenkhrist says:
Yes, I’m far from the best player but was encouraged to try it with by a mate, and sometimes I was even getting a reasonable number of kills. Also I found I was better after a couple of drinks, so in short get pissed then try it.
21/08/2012 at 13:21 Xari says:
I’m enjoying this more than CS:S, all I really played in that game were the various wacky mods like Zombie Escape and never got into the classic game much unlike CS 1.6 which had me absorbed for years. CS: GO has been evoking a lot of that original 1.6 addiction in me.
21/08/2012 at 13:41 rakbanan says:
Yeah, no, I’m tired of Valve not taking Counter-Strike seriously as a competitive game, or even as a series. They outsource it to some random developer based on proximity to their offices and previous relationships instead of experience, and it shows.
The best thing I can say about CS: GO is that it’s better than the complete and utter blunder that CS: Source was at release, and that game turned into something half-decent eventually. I’m not holding my breath though, I’m putting my money on CSPromod.
21/08/2012 at 14:17 Magnusm1 says:
…What?
21/08/2012 at 15:03 Asuron says:
Yet they’ve been in frequent contact with CS professional players and making changes based on what they and the community wants?
Are you one of those CS 1.6 players I hear about who do nothing but bitch about how perfect 1.6 is and how everything else is bad because you say so? I mean from what I’m hearing, CS: GO fixes alot of problems that people have with Source and makes it emulate 1.6 much more, while at the same time introducing new features.
But I doubt that’s good enough for you
21/08/2012 at 16:00 rakbanan says:
They’ve shown with their community interactions (Q&A etc.) that they have no competitive insight or experience. The devs only listen to who they want to listen to, implementing half-assed solutions to the absolute biggest concerns, while ignoring the rest. Throughout the development, multiple pros have claimed that they’re not being listened to, and raised concerns about CS:GO’s future.
We don’t want an exact copy of 1.6. We’re not afraid of not being good at other games, like some people always say when 1.6 is brought up. If you’re good at Counter-Strike, you’re good at Counter-Strike, and experimenting with movement tricks and nade spots is a joy I haven’t felt since I first started out competitively. New can be fun. What we want is simply a highly skilled competitive game. CS: Source was a step down, CS:GO is two.
You’re right, it’s not good enough for me, and I’m not alone.
21/08/2012 at 16:45 ScubaMonster says:
“Throughout the development, multiple pros have claimed that they’re not being listened to, and raised concerns about CS:GO’s future.”
Same goes for any online game ever made. Browse any forum and you have a storm of bitching, unwarranted or not. I prefer to play and find out for myself.
21/08/2012 at 17:08 rakbanan says:
I’m talking about actual professional players. Players who travel the world and compete at these games.
21/08/2012 at 17:32 Spakkenkhrist says:
That will be a small percentage of the people that play this then.
21/08/2012 at 18:12 rakbanan says:
Please read and understand the discussion before posting nonsense.
21/08/2012 at 20:15 Aldehyde says:
The fact that pro players aren’t being listened to isn’t interesting. What have they been complaining about that hasn’t been responded to? That’s what would be interesting. If it’s just bitching because it’s not 1.6 then it IS pointless bitching.
So, please, what have they been complaining about?
21/08/2012 at 13:43 applecado says:
Just pre-bought it. I’m ‘altrezia’ on steam if anyone wants a very bad player in their friends list.
21/08/2012 at 13:53 Balm says:
Good to hear.
Not interested though – somehow any CS-game just dosn’t feel right outside of internet-cafe or a LAN-party.
Am I the only one who is a bit disapointed that CS:GO is being sold, instead of being distributed by Hats-To-Play model?
21/08/2012 at 14:06 Mr. Mister says:
What?
22/08/2012 at 02:10 soul4sale says:
That would be a Team Fortress 2 reference.
21/08/2012 at 14:04 Ernesto says:
Ok. Now where can I get Fart Cops? Cause that one sounds way more fun :D
21/08/2012 at 14:16 pupsikaso says:
Um… are there dedicated servers?
21/08/2012 at 14:38 Irony says:
Yes. On the main menu there is an option to “Browse Community Servers.”
21/08/2012 at 14:29 derbefrier says:
this game is fun for everyone except those who just want an exact copy of 1.6 and they seem really pissed off thats its not, but whatever some people seem to take CS waaaayyyy to seriously. I plan on getting this after I get bored of Darksouls and GW2
21/08/2012 at 15:54 Jamison Dance says:
I played about five minutes of CS:S, and discovered that I was just a giant headshot waiting to happen.
I played CS:GO and was pleasantly surprised to find that the skill level is much lower, so I can actually sortof compete with people sometimes. More new players make the game much more friendly, simply because not everyone is a walking death-machine. If you are scared off by CS:S or 1.6 and how good everyone is, CS:GO is much more friendly.
21/08/2012 at 19:38 OpT1mUs says:
Skill level is “much lower” because you were playing beta. Loads of us never got into the beta, and have been playing CS since 1998.
21/08/2012 at 23:26 Jamison Dance says:
I didn’t “get in” to the beta. I bought the game, and it opened up beta access immediately. If you buy the game, you too can play it right now.
21/08/2012 at 16:00 Devenger says:
Really enjoying this (got late access to the ‘beta’ by pre-ordering). Arms Race is a slick, well-incorporated way of learning how the weapons handle, and Classic Competitive is as compelling as ever (not that I’m any good at it, but it feels so wonderful to actually achieve something in such a high-stakes environment). Having ‘low-tier’ weapon kills grant triple the kill reward is an interesting twist; I wonder whether it will change the nature of ‘eco’ rounds, since winning a round with a few SMG kills can immediately leap you into significant wealth.
My favourite thing so far: the different factions (diferent CT squads, different terrorist groups, etc.) have different voices. From the terrorists in the new cs_office saying at the start of the round something like “We still think this is a good idea, right?”, to the cs_italy terrorists having an amusing ‘Cheer’ voice command, I’m actually quite excited to play all the different sides just to hear the things they say (and an be commanded to say).
21/08/2012 at 16:09 Shodex says:
I’m upset that they removed the original voice overs. These ones are like.. quality.. ew.
21/08/2012 at 17:04 valz says:
I’m playing it. It’s great. I’m very happy with the beta.
21/08/2012 at 19:33 kuuuu says:
http://redir.is/aSm
21/08/2012 at 23:23 Tom Walker says:
Shut up, spambot. Nobody likes you.