Counter-Strike: Source - Valve
An update to Counter-Strike: Source has been released. The update will be applied automatically when you restart Counter-Strike: Source. The major changes include:

  • Fixed a client crash on exit (after connecting to a server using sv_pure)
  • Added sv_namechange_cooldown_seconds, to throttle clients from changing their name too rapidly. (Defaults to 20 seconds)
  • Added sv_netspike_on_reliable_snapshot_overflow to selectively enable the automatic dumping of netspike file if a client drops due to "reliable snapshot overflow" (defaults to 0, which disables the debugging)
  • Added check to prevent player names from containing color codes
  • setinfo console command will now reject attempts to set / change convars with any unusual characters
  • Marked mem_force_flush as a cheat to prevent client exploits
  • Fixed %n console crash in the client
  • Updated client rate value to default to 30000 to improve network performance for most players
    • Rate was previously set by Steam’s Internet connection speed setting
  • Updated client rate value to be stored in the config.cfg file
  • Fixed a Linux dedicated server crash on exit
Counter-Strike
Counter-Strike Global Offensive - confused soldier in suburbia


Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is out in just six hours, giving us the chance to jump into a buffed and polished rendition of a classic, which is nice. A beta patch arrived yesterday adding a zombie model that will be used in the Zombie mod, which will be playable with CS:GO later today. It also added a weapons course, which provides basic training in CS:GO's guns and gadgets.

The patch also cleans up the UI a bit and fixes a few bugs. Check out the patch notes and the cinematic trailer Valve released at Gamescom last week below.


Gameplay:

• Added the Weapons Course to the game.

UI:
• Voice notification can now show more players talking.
• Updated the freeze panel to no longer show the heath for your killer in competitive mode.
• Added an option in the menu to disable the game instructor messages.
• Update to the player info panel to no longer show achievement alerts.
• Update to the leaderboard screen to default to “Friends” filter.
• Added the “Total Games Played” leaderboard category.
• Updated the Play With Friends screen:
-- Made the chat window bigger so text is no longer cut off.
-- Adjusted the size of dimming when the focus changes between friends list and lobby list. It used to obscure the friends list and a little of the chat. Now it only obscures the friends list.

Bug Fixes:
• Updated the radio command panel so that the radio panel doesn't end up at the top of the screen during a mode that doesn't have a money panel.
• Set Classic Casual deadtalk to 0 to encourage fair play.
• Fixed the freeze panel dynamic positioning that would allow it to go too high.
• Fixed a missing text string displayed when player is not connected to Steam in leaderboards.
• Fixed a bug where the Mag7 could be bought by Ts via console commands.
• Fixed a bug where adding favorite server was not functional in the Community Server UI.
• Fixed a bug in the Play With Friends lobby where using left and right on keyboard or gamepad made the screen unresponsive.
• Fixed a bug in the Play With Friends lobby where typing in the Chat window would cause player names to flicker in the friends list.
• Fix for voice/chat/radio messages. Better unified the handling of voice and chat messages.
-- Chat messages now correctly use sv_allchat (instead of sv_alltalk), which should be more consistent with other source games.
-- Team-only communications now are not affected by sv_allchat/sv_alltalk, which means that private communications to one's team stay private, regardless of game mode.
-- Team-only communication is also not overridden by sv_full_alltalk, which allows teams to privately communicate strategy during warmup time and intermission.
-- Radio commands are considered team-only, so these should still be usable for tactics during games with sv_alltalk enabled (e.g. casual).
-- Spectators no longer hear team-only communications, except when sv_spec_hear is mode 2 (hear/see comms of the spectated teams).

Audio:
• Increased the audible range of the c4 plant and disarm sounds.
• Fixed audio randomly chirping/screeching on certain levels.

Matchmaking:
• Tuned lobby distance computations when performing matchmaking.
• Exposed a convar ("mm_csgo_community_search_players_min") for community quick match to look for community servers having at least specified number of human players already playing.

Community:
• Shipped zombie model to support the Zombie Mod
Counter-Strike: Source - contact@rockpapershotgun.com (Alec Meer)

that's a very small backpack. How can he fit a Thermos in that?

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. (more…)

Counter-Strike
counter strike


On the eve of Valve hitting go on Counter-Strike: GO, I thought it'd be useful to revisit why the once-mod continues to have its hooks in so many of us. Just like true love or a really outstanding taco, explaining what makes Counter-Strike good can be inexplicably tough to put into words. Go on, try. "It's, uh...tense? The guns feel nice. ...Teamwork?" Told you.

Read on for some notes on why I think Counter-Strike continues to be a classic. We'll have a CS:GO review up later this week.
SHORT ROUNDS


Prompts the player to iterate on tactics; creates context for winning streaks, losing streaks, ties, coming from behind to win.
Death is a time-out to reflect on the next round, creates oscillation between tension (being judged/spectated by teammates) and relief (watching/judging your teammates).


WEAPONS THAT "HAVE A MIND OF THEIR OWN"


Takes skill, time to understand + control weapon behavior.
High-fidelity hitboxes—where you aim matters fundamentally.
But alternately, firing recklessly (spraying) can produce lucky kills.
Uncertainty is fun (“Who’s going to win this shootout?”).



EXCELLENT MAP DESIGN


Fixed spawns; easy to orient yourself (complexity rarely goes beyond two or three routes), nameable landmarks (“double doors,” “bridge,” “back office,” “near spawn,” “at B”).
Constructive asymmetry; when sides swap, they also typically swap tactics sets/roles (cs_assault: Ts are well-protected defenders, CTs are sieging).
Map design carefully tuned to account for player movement speed—equidistant chokepoints. CTs + Ts arrive at chokepoints if they both leave the spawn area with knives out. (e.g.: On cs_office as CT, if I’m going to snipe, I have to sprint to the outdoor hallway to get eyes on main hall in order to give myself an opportunity to catch Ts moving from their spawn to garage).
CS' levels generally have a totally pristine appearance: they generally don't bear any evidence of combat until the round actually begins. This "blank slate" not only creates opportunities for the environment to convey valuable tactical information about what's happened (bullet holes, cracked windows, opened doors, broken grates, turned-over filing cabinets), but damaging the world itself can be inherently fun.



PURCHASING SYSTEM


Players can buy weapons and equipment at the start of a round. This is a system that suits competitive play and builds a metagame throughout a match, and it makes the decision to not spend/be conservative a cost/benefit decision (typical second round choice: save up and hope to loot a rifle from a dead player, or spend now and be better-armed).


MEANINGFUL COUNTER-TACTICS


In most situations, snipers can be countered by smoke/flash grenade, flanking, synchronized teamwork, or planting the bomb.
In some situations, rushing can be countered with good positioning, waiting and listening, and/or long-range weapons.



CULTURE

Dead players form an instantaneous graveyard chat room/peanut gallery/sideline. This shared social space with opponents creates an opportunity for rivalries or other relationships to form between players (clan recruitment, heckling, complimenting).
Weapons have reputations or even stigmas; knifing or pistoling someone wielding an AWP might be seen as a David/Goliath scenario.
Zany maps (de_rats, Mario Kart), sprays, and server mods that offset the seriousness, create opportunities for pranking.
Day of Defeat: Source - Valve
Updates to Team Fortress 2, Day of Defeat: Source and Half-Life 2: Deathmatch have been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The major changes include:


Source Engine Changes (TF2, DoD:S, HL2:DM)
  • Fixed a bug where rejected players could leave a "ghost" player that takes up a slot on the server browser

Team Fortress 2
  • Fixed tf_mm_strict to work as documented
Day of Defeat: Source - Valve
Updates to Team Fortress 2, Day of Defeat: Source and Half-Life 2: Deathmatch have been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The major changes include:


Source Engine Changes (TF2, DoD:S, HL2:DM)
  • Updated client rate value to default to 30000 to improve network performance for most players
    • Rate was previously set by Steam’s Internet connection speed setting
  • Updated client rate value to be stored in the config.cfg file

Team Fortress 2
  • Fixed a crash caused by a string table overflow
  • Fixed a client crash related to the freeze panel
  • Fixed a client crash related to ragdolls
  • Fixed a client crash related to the Mann vs. Machine upgrade panel
  • Fixed a client crash related to Mann vs. Machine stats
  • Fixed a crash related to server plug-ins spawning a Mann vs. Machine Tank before the game is ready
  • Updated the dedicated server to exit when attempting to start a Mann vs. Machine map with less than 32 maxplayers
  • Fixed mp_timelimit causing Mann vs. Machine mode to not reset properly when the defenders lose
  • Fixed the Mann vs. Machine wave loss/victory dialog buttons not being clickable sometimes
  • Fixed the Mann vs. Machine victory dialog getting stuck on the screen
  • Fixed the Mann vs. Machine wave summary dialog showing up at the beginning of the first wave
  • Fixed seeing incorrect upgrades in the Mann vs. Machine upgrade panel
  • Updated upgrade icons to remove numbers
  • Fixed Sentry Busters picking disposable buildings as valid targets
  • Fixed an instance of the Sentry Buster sound looping endlessly
  • Updated the backpack image for Archimedes to fix an alpha channel problem
  • Updated the colors for The Battery Bandolier
  • Fixed the disconnect reason not being localized properly for Mann vs. Machine mode
  • Fixed player glow colors not based on player health in some community mods outside of Mann vs. Machine mode
  • Removed console spew related to missing movement warnings
  • Updated the matchmaking ConVar tf_mm_strict
    • A value of 2 will hide the server from the server browser but will still allow direct connections
  • Updated Mvm_Mannworks
    • Adjusted clipping on left side drop down where bots may become stuck
    • Fixed lighting seam near base
    • Fixed vphysics prop error in console
    • Minor clipping pass on areas players may become hung up on
Day of Defeat: Source - Valve
Updates to Team Fortress 2, Day of Defeat: Source and Half-Life 2: Deathmatch have been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The major changes include:


Day of Defeat: Source and Half-Life 2: Deathmatch
  • Brought in line with shared engine changes

Team Fortress 2
  • Added Mann vs. Machine
  • Added Archimedes
  • Added The Soldier's Stogie
  • Added The Robro 3000
  • Updated The Helmet Without a Home to be paintable
  • Fixed some clipping issues with The Salty Dog
  • Removed player penetration from The Pomson 6000 and boosted the damage to compensate
Counter-Strike
CSGOSoundF
Sound spatialization algorithms are not something the average gamer thinks about. It's a Carmackian phrase; I can already see your eyes beginning to gloss over from reading it. Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, however, is making a big deal about its intention to provide unparalleled control in sound by opening up more audio tweaking options than the standard, "How loud is the yelling compared to the shooting and the music?" They've even provided colorful charts and graphs to explain what this means.



You may be looking at that and still be asking, "But what does it mean?" The devs explain in their blog post that previous CS titles used a single surround sound preset, optimized for 5.1 speakers, and mixed it down to fit less snazzy audio set-ups. CS:GO, on the other hand, will have optimized presets for everything from stereo headphones all the way up to those big surround speaker rigs. Plus, you'll get settings to tweak things like virtual speaker placement (if you wanted to, say, have your "left" channel sound closer to true left instead of the default front-left.)



CS:GO is currently pre-purchasable on Steam for $13.49 on Steam. This post details the pre-order plans and the huge patch going live on the 14th.
Counter-Strike: Source - Valve
Save 66% on the *Counter-Strike franchise and Counter-Strike: Complete Pack during this week's Midweek Madness!
*Counter-Strike: Complete Pack contains Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Pre-Purchase!

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Counter-Strike
Counter-Strike Global Offensive 1


The appearance of a little silver plaque on the front page of the Counter-Strike site indicates that we'll be able to pre-order CS:GO later today ahead of its release in a couple of weeks August 21. It'll cost just $15, too, which is a good price for a modernisation of the classic shooter, which will come with extra game modes, new weapons, more maps and shinier graphics. If you're looking to buy early, keep an eye on the Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Steam page.
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