cs:s orange box beta

[Psy]

Multicore in the OB engine is shit. Honestly, the L4D(2) engine runs about a million times better.

[cashed]

I don't see the game getting visually better. Most of the port updates are gimmick stats and the achievement additions+
I really cant see them plugging away and fixing all these bug reports.

[Dives]

I don't see the game getting visually better. Most of the port updates are gimmick stats and the achievement additions+
I really cant see them plugging away and fixing all these bug reports.

I've noticed the particle effects seem to blend together better, such as the dusty air in dust2.
Maybe its just me but it seems like the lightmaps look slightly better as well.

Edit: Ok I have some comparison screens. First image is old, second image is new.



It looks like the dust sprites blend better into each other but worse when intersecting brushes.



The floating dust motes in the air appear brighter and the lighting seems more even.



You can see the improved lightmap smoothness on the building with the dome.

[YokaI]

Just to clarify, Valve is not the ones who have technically been developing this update for Counter Strike : Source, instead it is under the hands of a subsidiary development studio aka "Hidden Path Studios". This collaboration is very similar to that with Turtle Rock Studios, which was eventually taken in by valve and they are the major developers behind the L4D series.

It's a bit shameful that valve isn't really updating much besides a few achievements, death cams, and other statistical information. I think it's a bit of a bigger disgrace that it isn't really valve behind this update, but what should I have expected? The major developers who made the original CS and CS:S have up and gone long ago now.

It won't be surprising to see some more maps in the future, seeing as Valve has hired this studio probably to work on this game in particular (because Valve REALLY has their hands tied with current projects), it would also be expected that they'll get them to update DOD:S and possibly even TF2 in the future with new content.

Outsourcing their material to another studio seems a bit redundant, when valve could just hire more developers and it would probably be easier for them in the long run that way. It also seems very counter-intuitive when they seem to be spouting the "everyone needs to continually update their games with no price tag" when they themselves are getting other studios to actually put work into their own unfinished titles. (Regardless of what you say, CS:S is an unfinished game.)

Is it nice to see CS:S updates? Well yes, though it gets rid of one of my major arguments I always use against valve's updating policy. (Damn you Valve!!! ) I would like to see them do more to the actual games balance, however, seeing as the weapon damage output / other weapon attributes have not even been touched since the games initial release in... what, 2004? I would like to see them mess with some of the various damage outputs similarly to the way they did TF2s damage, in which range is also a deciding factor for how much damage is dealt. It would also be cool to see some more changes to various attributes such as walking speed / rate of fire / reload time / etc etc. There's just far too many guns in CS which have either been ignored because of their crappyness (UMP, Five-Seven, etc) or because they just aren't different enough to validate using over the other weapon options.

Valve should also really be trying to appeal to the Esports community once again, it's one of their largest dying communities that, since they've hit fame for their single player experiences, they've been ignoring for quite some time now. I don't think valve has ever truely appealed to the Esports community, and they expected the players to make their games competitive. While it is true that players are the ones who have to make the game a true e-sport, once it becomes a popular idea the producers need to get behind said devotion for the games they make by holding tournaments, sponsoring tournaments, making small / required balance changes, changing the game to make each tournament have some new surprises, interesting turnabouts and keep players thinking strategically rather than thinking formulaically

30 fps is a common frame rate for some games(Halo2), it's the bare playable minimum though. You don't need 9001fps for your game to run smoothly, you only need 30-60.

Also, a good mid-range card, is a 5770. Very good for it's price.

While this is true, the point of having insanely high FPS is to avoid hiccups in the gameplay experience. If you are running your game @ roughly 30 FPS, the problem lies with that FPS dropping during specific instances. If you have your game running at 130 FPS, a 15 fps drop will not even be noticeable to the player. However, if you're running at 30 or even 40 fps, a similar drop in FPS can cause stutter which, in a fps game, you DO NOT WANT indeed.

Regardless, you should have a computer that is able to run CS:S, the game is so old now! Honestly, you could go to Frys and buy a 100 dollar graphics card and it will be more than enough to run CS:S on any settings at this point.

[Major Banter]

Holy shit I actually read that entire post Yokai.

And it wasn't boring.

Surprised face.

[SotaPoika]

I like CS Source the way it is at the moment. It has it's bunnyhoppers and other bit annoying stuff, but I guess it's that something that belongs there. I kind of like mastering the few tricks here and there to gain a very small advantage. Well, maybe it's just me..

OF course, I'd like to see the Counter-Strike 2 (it was called something else, but I don't remember it now. It was made by the same dude).

[nub]

Holy shit I actually read that entire post Yokai.

And it wasn't boring.

Surprised face.

No offense to Yokai but LOL

OF course, I'd like to see the Counter-Strike 2 (it was called something else, but I don't remember it now. It was made by the same dude).

It's called Tactical Intervention, and you could consider it "CS2," but it's really not going to be a direct followup or anything. There's supposedly going to be a lot of innovation with hostages acting more life-like, such as panicking and being used as shields and whatnot. I also heard it's going to be a free mod. So far it looks mediocre, but the media that was released is pretty early stuff I guess, so hopefully it gets uber polished before it's finished.

[Sathor]

Basically, CS2 or whatever can't change the concept in general, or it isn't CS anymore. It is Modern Warfare then or whatever you like. It was the same for the Need for Speed series. I ignored especially every title without normal cars on normal streets. There are lots of other standard racing games out there.
Means, CS only stays CS if not much is changed. There can be improvements made, like much better AI for hostages, better weapon balance, perhaps even such things like magazine reload instead of bullet reload. But the basic concept must be kept, so it doesnt just have the same name tag for advertisement.

[nub]

The core aspects of CS are buyzones, knife and grenades as separate weapons (trust me it makes a big difference), hostage rescue, and bomb plant/defuse. If those are retained then I think it would still be CS regardless of how the weapons are done. I'd love a CS with realistic, accurately-portrayed weapons...and more of them at that.

Things that would ruin CS are probably vehicles, noob tubes (under-barrel grenade launchers) or any explosives other than grenades, kill streak rewards like in MW2, and a cover system like in Rainbow 6 Vegas.

[BaRRaKID]

I think valve is taking this in the wrong direction. I believe that the biggest reason cs and cs: s are such big games is the competitive gamers community that supports them. Valve could really make cs the best game in that area (it's probably the most popular now, but not necessarily the best), but they seem to be too afraid of making the changes needed to get there. Things like improving the spectator experience (HLTV and Source TV are a nice start, but are far from great), add more player and team statistics, create a tournament mode, strip everything that is not important (like weapons that are not used for example), create better maps, improve player movement, etc, etc, are easy to do, and they don't affect the overall playing experience for the regular players, but greatly improve it for the people that play it as a sport.

[MayheM]

Nub I agree with you on what would ruin CS. The levels are too small to have vehicles and should never have them. I do think it would be interesting however to have upgrades you can buy. Like a laser sight for a gun and stuff like that. But to add to your list of things that would ruin the game. Med kits, ammo dumping, and re-spawning. The point of the game is to win the round. Bringing in the other elements from other games would change the dynamic. That is not to say you could not have a stage progression within the game. Like win the round and progress to the next area. Those who die would then spawn in the new area.

There are a lot of things that could make a sequel to CS:S really great. They just need to be sure to remember the original game and what it is.

[Saxon]

I'd love a CS with realistic, accurately-portrayed weapons...and more of them at that.

I'd love to see that too. Sadly when I suggested such a thing on the Steam forums I was met with a barrage of flaming (eg "omg they need to make the guns more like CS1.6, these guns take up too much of the screen" etc)

CS would be so much more fun if Valve added more options for players, I really don't get why the CS community are so against any change whatsoever