"A great spin on an old classic"

Counter Strike Source Review
By Steven Splint (AKA Tyrael Odium)

For use on the GameFaqs Web Page

I remember that i had never even heard of Counter Strike until one of my friends started talking about it back in high school. I was sitting in front of him, and he was talking to my other friend about a game that they had played the day before. I asked them what game they were talking about, and they told me Counter Strike. They started telling me about how the game was played, how you had to try to be quiet so that you could hear your enemies, and how you had to try to work as a team to achieve your goal. This was back when 1.5 was the version that was being played, Counter Strike has come a long way since then, it has now become Source.

Graphics - 9/10

The graphics on this game have been given a major upgrade from the 1.6 graphics that most of the players are used to. For starters, all of the levels are now done with such detail, you are able to see rust spots on some of the vehicles that are in the various levels, the glass and water effects all look incredible, you can even see the numbers that you press on the brick of C4 in the bombing levels. All of the decals are now done flawlessly, bullet holes now vary in size and shape depending on how far away you were when you shot, and your custom sprays finally look big now that they are allowed to be larger than 100 pixels by 50 pixels. The other players have also been upgraded a lot, there are now many more points of articulation in the skins, the rag doll effects are much more realistic in this game (epically when your in mid jump and somebody gets a head shot off on you). On top of those upgrades, the players just look fantastic, they are no longer "Pointy", like they were when the game was running off of the Half-Life Engine, all of the players look smooth and well rounded with realistic body and facial features. Your character's arms finally look healthy, with no more bulging veins and the little cut offs when you try to reload a larger weapon. Now there is a small problem for me, I am judging the graphics off of my laptop with a "Mobile Radion 9000", because I am unable to get a high speed connection at home, and if I were to go on this game with my tower(which is equipped with a Radion "9600") I would have a ping of approximately 4000, so i use my HP Pavilion ZV5320CA when I'm at friends houses (who have high speed internet) and i still think that this game looks incredible on just moderate settings.

Controls - 10/10

Since this is a PC game, there should be no objective with the controls, because you are able to set them to whatever you want, and you have nearly no limit to the type of controls that you want, but even the default controls are very easy to use, many players will be able to just pick up and play from the get go, because many first person shooters use these exact controls for their games. In fact I would probably be able to name 5 right now (Halo, UT04, Half-Life 2, Star Wars Battlefront, Battle Field 1942, Yup I could do it). Although there is no story mode to get new players accustomed to the controls or the game type, and when you try to go to an all noob server, it is packed with advanced players with clan tags looking for easy frags, it can be tough for a new player.

Sound - 10/10

As expected the sound for this game is incredible, and since it is a large part of the gameplay it should be really good. If you have good enough headsets or good enough speakers you will be able to hear from which direction enemies are coming from, how far away they are, and if you are a good enough player, you may even be able to get off a couple hits without even looking at them. On top of the sound just being incredible, there are so many different types of sounds, Counter Strike 1.6 also had this, but there are a lot of new objects in this game, and all of them have their own unique sounds, and depending on how you interact with them, they make different sounds. The radio messages are done very well in this game, and you should be able to use them to communicate very fast to your team mates (because none of us want to stop to type "HELP" when you are in the middle of a dog fight). The only problem that I have with the sound is the voice chat, and I also feel that it is unfair to give this game crap for that because the problem is normally just the persons microphone.

Gameplay - 10/10

The gameplay is what made Counter Strike famous in the first place, and valve did everything correct with making a sequel, they went over the game and analyzed it very carefully. They fixed everything that was wrong with the game and left all of the good stuff alone. All of the classic gameplay is still there, but some of the levels have been taken out, such as Train (hopefully those maps will be put back in with an update). The next update that steam plans on releasing will add AI BOTS to people who don't have a good internet connection so that they can still get the same experience as the players online. A lot of little bugs have been fixed with the game, nothing too major (because there was not a lot wrong with it to begin with). Most notably is the little glitch where you could be shot through a thin wall, if you were too close to it, and your enemy was too close to it. But not too much was changed with the gameplay, because all that the developers wanted to do was beef up the graphics so that the players could get some eye candy as they tried to pull off sick headshots. My only REAL beef with this game is that if you try to play this game on a dialup connection, you quite simply can't so; people in my situation are unable to enjoy this game.

Total - 9/10

The best way to describe this game is by saying that it is just like "Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes". These people took a game that was already nearly perfect, and they were somehow able to improve it. In a nut shell this game has incredible graphics, great controls, and legendary gameplay. The only way that I can ever see this game being improved is if it will be able to be played on a dialup connection without lag, and that is nearly impossible for what this game tries to do. I hope that this review has been helpful to you, in whatever way possible.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 01/18/05