"Counterstrike with Realism!"

I'm glad to say that this is the first time that I've seen a first person shooter with more realism in it than non-realism. 1.6 was great, but now, with this new addition of CS:S, gamers can now unite and for once agree that we have been blessed with gaming bliss... that is, CS:S.

Graphics: (10/10)
Ok, from what I've seen, the graphics have greatly improved, we are now seeing better textures, more realism within those textures... the characters move as they idle, you can see them breathe through the clothing, and CS has been blessed with a slew of outside materials that have added to the gameplay. For example, we are now seeing many barrels which allow players to not only hide behind, but sling at opposing players with realistic physics that can be further appreciated in map phys_phun.

Sound: (9/10)
There's not much more I can say about the sound. I have noticed that there are differences in the sound from what is being shot at, rather than where it is being shot from. This adds to the realism and that's why I believe that sound has been improved, although not much. Then again, there was nothing wrong with the sound before, it was simply improved.

Gameplay: (10/10)
Folks, it doesn't get any better than CS:S. Although the bomb detonating and hostage rescuing has been brought back to CS:S for another go, they've somewhat improved the detail of those processes. For example, with the bomb, it now looks MORE like a bomb, and the bomb has letters and asterisks to mimic a real bomb. Furthermore, the bomb now moves all the materials that aren't bolted to the ground, all around the map - it's quite a sight. The hostage factor has somewhat been modified, as the bodies of the hostages are much crisper seem a lot realer. The only drawback to this is that all the terrorists are around 7 feet tall, and look too gallant to be hostages - this may scare the terrorists a bit.

Online Play: (9/10)
Although this game is only an online game, I still have to give this a 9/10, this being the reason that people with slower connections speeds will be dominated by those with the higher connection speeds.

Overall Rating (9/10)
This is a MUST buy, the only reason I'm not giving this game a 10 is because I'm reserving that 10 for Half-Life 2... Whenever it shall come.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 11/01/04