CZ has arrived!

[Doorman]

Email from those nice people at steam telling me that CS-CZ is ready to play! After an uneventful download and verification process I was playing it within 3-4 minutes of the email. Interesting; but I still ask myself why? AI is OK. Maps are pretty, Dust has been 'dusted down' and nice new tiles layed. We'll see I guess.

[albert]

Tried it too, it lagged in Smoke on a local server game. I need to get my bindings sorted. :unsure:

[ChimpBoy]

Quite good fun actually for about £20

Took an absolute age though to update last night - over an hour on broadband

Graphics and models weren't as good as I'd hoped for but it's certainly an improvement.

Have only played the off-line missions so far which were quite good fun on normal skill-level

Only a very few live servers though, and they were pretty full

[Dr Sadako]

Originally posted by ChimpBoy@Mar 24 2004, 10:33 AM
Have only played the off-line missions so far which were quite good fun on normal skill-level
 

Too bad that it is the same on the other skill levels. The only difference is the amount of enemies you have to kill. Playing CS against bots is nothing I like. I was hoping of a more FPS like MOH or Max Payne with levels and a storyline. Recycling the cs maps and then releasing it is not a new game. It is a ripoff.

[ChimpBoy]

Originally posted by Sadako+Mar 24 2004, 09:52 AM-->

[smilodon]

I've been running this dogs dinner of a game for a while now and it really is as bad as I feared Valve would make it.

The single player game isn't a game at all. Anyone able to run Podbot with the uprated scripts is going to get a better single player game than CZ can offer. In fact I'm amazed that people who were being paid a salary actually managed to make worse bots than people who did it for fun and for free.

The graphics are only a real improvement if you have never heard of  the likes of Djiesse or Spastic Child. My hint would be save your money and install the CSRU.

There's a better version of every CZ map somewhere out there and again they cost nothing. And CZ has even ruined several top CS maps. If it aint broke don't fix it Valve.

So there's average Bots, average graphics and no discernable single player game at all.

If anyone else wants to throw away £20 could I suggest they chuck it in the direction of a reputable charity and not Valve  

[Doorman]

Cracking bit of marketing though eh? I feel as though I've paid $35 for something I already had! Especially after copying over all my collected models and sprites etc.
Not to worry, I was one of those that were born every minute. :dribble:  :lmfao:

[smite]

My Copy of CZ has just been posted by Play.com.
At least i will get a box to show for it you guys dont have that . Here's me wishing i didn't bother now that everyone isn't impressed with it.

[Dr Sadako]

Originally posted by smite@Mar 24 2004, 10:40 PM
My Copy of CZ has just been posted by Play.com.
At least i will get a box to show for it you guys dont have that . Here's me wishing i didn't bother now that everyone isn't impressed with it.

You might still need it smite as Steam doesn't seem to be interested in supporting CS anymore. CS:CZ is their new milkcow now and all update efforts will be put into that one. Looks like CS1.6 will be phased out as 1.5 was.

[smite]

Originally posted by Sadako+Mar 24 2004, 10:12 PM-->

[smilodon]

Sadly I fear it will get worse.

As Sadako says CZ will soon become the only seriously supported game from Valve.

As CS:CZ takes over from CS 1.6 as the standard format for CS, the support for CS 1.6 will drop away, much like it is doing for Linux Server Software.

A new subscription 'premium' account will be offered by Valve. The cost will be something around £10 a month. They will offer lots of sweeteners to encourage players to upgrade their accounts to 'Premium'.  For example when HL2 is released it will only work as a multiplayer game through Steam. Access to these new HL2 mods, of which a new version of CS running on the HL2 engine will be a major offering, will only be made to paid up Steam accounts. The free Steam games will look less and less attractive.

Eventually all CS:CZ accounts will become paid for accounts and Valve will then withdraw support and finally access to the old free CS 1.6 mods.  And finally non paid up Steam accounts will have no games available to them and will become obsolete.

Likewise the server software for the new Valve games running on the HL2 engine will be charged for. At the moment Cyber Cafes have to pay Valve $10 a month for every PC they run that has a copy of CS installed. Soon a similar pricing structure will be put in place for servers. Then dMw will have to pay a monthly fee to Valve for each of the three servers we run.

Finally as with WON support they will switch off Steam access to the CS 1.6 client and server software and the old game will be unplayable across the Internet.

At last every account and every game offered through the Steam network will be charged for.

As this happens many players will desert CS for BF or Halo or Soldner etc. The question is how long will The dMw support CS? Will we collectively migrate to a new game or will the community fragment into those who will pay Valve for the priviledge of playing CS and those (like me) who would rather dig their eyeballs out with a spoon.

Sad days ahead people.....sad days
 

[Gh0st Face Killah]

Although the won support has been withdrawn currently you can still play cs1.5 on the net so i get the feeling as valve tighten their grip we may see people reverting back to that.

[ChimpBoy]

The big man doth speaketh the truth methinks.  Not sure about the monthly subscription, but I can certainly see plenty of one off payments a la CZ for major new mods (CS HL2 being a prime example).

That said I had good fun with Oldy and Albert last night on the dmw CZ server with a bunch of bots, and it means the server can never truly idle as you can just join a game and lets bots play with you till others join in.  I don't agree with Smilodon about bot intelligence - I thought they were pretty good (at level 2 of 3), certainly better than podbot, and their calls were fantastic and help you pinpoint the enemy straight away.  PodBot I find to be incredibly patchy in terms of quality.

Plus I do like the way the bots call me "Sir"    (even when I was bottom of the scoreboard )

[Doorman]

Originally posted by ChimpBoy@Mar 25 2004, 09:43 AM
1:The big man doth speaketh the truth methinks.

2: I don't agree with Smilodon about bot intelligence - I thought they were pretty good (at level 2 of 3), certainly better than podbot, and their calls were fantastic and help you pinpoint the enemy straight away.

3:Plus I do like the way the bots call me "Sir"    (even when I was bottom of the scoreboard )

1:Probably
2:Mmm, I played on the Fastline I think it is, and two of the silly sods got caught in a loop where one was chanting "I'm gonna plant the bomb" and the other, Chet was his name, (should have been kicked IMO) kept on "I've got your back" The rest of the Ts and CTs sat around scratching their arses till the time ran out! AI? I don't think so.
3: Arrogant bunch aren't we? I thought they were calling me 'Sir' and 'Commander' too. I guess we hear what we want to hear!  :whistle:

[Zok]

I’m sorry I can stand it no longer.

A couple of years ago (about) an announcement was made that there was going to be a new version of counter strike (CZ), woohoo I thought, I’ll definitely get that when it’s released.

In the meantime I continued playing Counterstrike essentially a free mod that was released for Halflife, due to my enthusiasm for CS and the need to get other players involved I purchased a second copy of HL to run on my second machine, (I now own legally 2 copies of half life, 1 copy of CS that came with another copy of HL and 1 copy of Blue Shift which came with yet another copy of HL) the revenue for the purchase of these games goes to Valve. So for the pleasure of playing a free mod I have lined the pockets of Valve in purchasing the game engine to run it, this is all okay and acceptable, I wasn’t coerced and had full control of my senses.

During the years I have been playing CS (beta 6 I think) constant improvements have been made by the original team in gameplay and visuals, while thousands of contributions have also been made from all over the world in the form of maps, models, add-on programs etc. all in the spirit of sharing rather than profit. Then along came Steam, just another improvement beta version, “could the CS community try this version out, see what they think, give feedback all in the spirit of sharing”. A couple of improvements later and there seems to be a viable version of CS on the beta Steam platform with playable bots, LAN gaming and the promise of no lengthy downloads in the future due to constant updating, and easy connectivity.

Then came Steam the official release, well what a f**k up, no bots, no (offline) LAN support, and as for easy connectivity phut! The thing is we all agreed, we all said what a bunch of w**kers Valve are for doing this, why are they trying to ruin our enjoyment, there was even talk about dumping Steam and going back to 1.5 as a protest. Just check the forums guys, there isn’t a week go by when at least one complaint about connecting to Steam doesn’t appear. And what have we done about it, we’ve gone and bought CZ, what does this tell Valve, “well done chaps were gonna give you same more money cuz your giving us what we want”.

Well I’m sorry but I won’t be giving Valve anything at all for what is essentially a game I already own, I will continue to play CS 1.6, as far a Valve dumping support for the “free” versions then I hope that much of the community feels the way I do and we may return to the spirit of what was originally intended when CS was first released all those many moons ago.