Valve dropped the ball with Counter-Strike

[peteroy]

In 2004 Counter-Strike Source came out with Half-Life 2 source engine, a big visual upgrade from the old Half-Life 1 engine.

Counter-Strike Source was probably the most popular online first person shooter, it had modern weapons and 2 game modes, bomb defuse and hostage rescue.

Since Counter-Strike Source (will call it CSS) came out in 2004 we saw Battlefield 2 and Call of Duty 2 in 2005 which were successful and offered a lot more variety in gameplay compared to CSS, then Call of Duty 4 came out in 2007 and took over CSS as the most popular online FPS game.

Call of Duty 4 Modern Warfare is in my opinion where Counter-Strike should have been in 2007 had Valve not dropped the ball and continued to develop it, yet in 2007 Counter-Strike was still stuck with old maps, old visuals, old sound and only 2 game modes. COD4 had everything CSS has and more.

It is easy to judge Valve in hindsight, that they dropped the ball on what could have continued to be the most successful online FPS game, today Call of Duty has managed to stay number 1 in popularity since 2007.

Now Valve has announced a new game, Counter-Strike Global Offense which will come out in 2012, after looking at the trailer I think that this game will not signal Counter-Strike comeback, Global Offense is using 2004 Source graphic engine, which in 2011 is already dated, also the art level is sub par for todays standards.

Bottom line is, Counter-Strike is not making a comeback with Global Offense in my opinion, it will need to compete with Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 and Battlefield 3, it doesn't stand a chance.

Also posted on my blog

[sexfx]

It doesn't need fancy visuals or new game types; its counter strike enough said. This global offense is a total sell out to cater to consoles, and people like you, where visuals and amount of game types make a game. What counter strike needs, is to fix the bugs people have been complaining about since it was released.

[deathtoall2]

Actually, CS:GO will use the latest version of the source engine, not the 2004 version. CS:S, in fact, no longer runs off the 2004 version of the engine since it was updated to the Orange Box Engine in that big update about a year or two ago. I agree that CS: GO probably won't be as popular as more mainstream franchises like BF and COD, but i will still buy it because its the first new counterstrike game in years.

[kanthos]

What Valve don't get is that releasing a new CS is not the way to get the public they are losing.
The only way to do that is getting the game (1.6 and CS:S) and place new features that all community asks since they were released!
CS 1.6 public just want new graphics! They don't want improvements on the game play.. but Valve does even consider the players opinions and CS:Source guys want improvements on the graphics too and also the bugs fixes..

When Valve open their eyes for the people who really plays the game, then they will go in the correct path.