Counter-Strike: Counter-Strike

Counter-Strike

Developer(s)	Chobot Inc.
Publisher(s)	Vivendi Universal (PC) Microsoft Game Studios (Xbox)
Designer(s)	Minh "Gooseman" Le Jess Cliffe
Engine	GoldSrc (Half-Life)
Version	1.6 (September 15, 2003)
Platform(s)	Windows
Release date(s)	June 12, 1999 (1999-06-12) (Mod) November 8, 2000 (Retail) March 25, 2004 (Xbox)
Genre(s)	First-person shooter
Mode(s)	Multiplayer
Rating(s)	ESRB: Mature ELSPA: 15+ OFLC: MA15+
Media/distribution	CD-ROM, digital download
System requirements Windows Windows 2000 or later 500 MHz Intel or AMD Processor (800 Mhz recommended) 96 MB of RAM (128 MB recommended) 16 MB graphics card (32 MB+ recommended) Sound card with speakers or headphones Internet Connection for online play Input - Keyboard & mouse

Counter-Strike (also known as Half-Life: Counter-Strike, Counter-Strike 1.6, or simply CS) is a tactical first-person shooter video game developed by Valve Corporation which originated from a Half-Life modification by Minh "Gooseman" Le and Jess "Cliffe" Cliffe.

The game has been expanded into a series since its original release, which currently includes Counter-Strike: Condition Zero, Counter-Strike: Source, Counter-Strike: Anthology and Counter-Strike on Xbox.

Counter-Strike pits a team of counter-terrorists against a team of terrorists in a series of rounds. Each round is won by either completing the mission objective or eliminating the opposing force.

The game is currently the most played Half-Life modification in terms of players, according to GameSpy.

Gameplay

Counter-Strike is a first-person shooter in which players join either the terrorist or counter-terrorist team (or become a spectator). Each team attempts to complete their mission objective and/or eliminate the opposing team. Each round starts with the two teams spawning simultaneously.

A player can choose to play as one of eight different default character models (four for each side, although Counter-Strike: Condition Zero added two extra models, bringing the total to ten). Players are generally given a few seconds before the round begins (known as "freeze time") to prepare and buy equipment, during which they cannot attack or walk/move (a player can still take damage, having the player drop from a certain height during freeze time was the only way a map designer could control the players starting "HP"). They can return to the buy area within a set amount of time to buy more equipment (some custom maps included neutral "buy zones" that could be used by both teams). Once the round has ended, surviving players retain their equipment for use in the next round; players who were killed begin the next round with the basic default starting equipment.

Standard monetary bonuses are awarded for winning a round, losing a round, killing an enemy, being the first to instruct a hostage to follow, rescuing a hostage or planting (Terrorist)/defusing (Counter terrorist) the bomb.

The scoreboard displays team scores in addition to statistics for each player: name, kills, deaths, and ping (in milliseconds). The scoreboard also indicates whether a player is dead, carrying the bomb (on bomb maps), or is the VIP (on assassination maps), although information on players on the opposing team is hidden from a player until his/her death, as this information can be important.

Killed players become "spectators" for the duration of the round; they cannot change their names until they spawn (come alive) again, text chat cannot be sent to or received from live players; and voice chat can only be received from live players and not sent to them (unless the cvar sv_alltalk is set to 1). Spectators are generally able to watch the rest of the round from multiple selectable views, although some servers disable some of these views to prevent dead players from relaying information about living players to their teammates through alternative media (most notably voice in the case of Internet cafes and Voice over IP programs such as TeamSpeak or Ventrilo). This form of cheating is known as "ghosting".

Though Counter-Strike is itself a mod, it has developed its own community of script writers and mod creators. Some mods add bots, while others remove features of the game, and others create different modes of play. Some of the mods give server administrators more flexible and efficient control over his or her server.

"Admin plugins", as they are mostly referred as, have become very popular (see Metamod, AMX Mod and AMX Mod X). There are some mods which affect gameplay heavily, such as Gun Game, where players start with a basic pistol and must score kills to receive better weapons, and Zombie Mod, where one team consists of zombies and must "spread the infection" by killing the other team (using only the knife).

There are also the Superhero and Warcraft III mods which mix the first-person gameplay of Counter-Strike with an experience system, allowing a player to become more powerful as they continue to play. The game is also highly customizable on the player's end, allowing the user to install or even create their own custom skins, HUDs, sprites, and sound effects, given the proper tools.

When Counter-Strike was published by Sierra Entertainment/Vivendi Universal Games, it was bundled with Team Fortress Classic, Opposing Force multiplayer, and the Wanted, Redemption and Firearms mods."

On 24 March 1999^{[verification needed]} Planet Half-Life opened its Counter-Strike section. Within two weeks, the site had received 10,000 hits. On June 19, 1999, the first public beta of Counter-Strike was released, followed by numerous further "beta" releases. On April 12, 2000, Valve announced that the Counter-Strike developers and Valve had teamed up.

The non-beta release dates of Counter-Strike are as follows:

Counter-Strike received favorable reviews, and after the first release of the game, it sold over 4 million copies.