The Counter-Strike computer game has been winning the hearts of players around the world for decades. On June 19, 2024, the iconic shooter celebrated its 25th birthday. The birthday was not announced, and the game’s developers did not introduce innovative features. However, this does not decrease gamers’ interest in this shooter.
Over the 25 years of its existence, Counter-Strike has undergone several transformations, but it still remains the most important representative of the genre and one of the main eSports disciplines, for which many tournaments with large prizes are held every year. They include several large online leagues and LAN tournaments. The prize funds of the biggest championships range from $500,000 to $2 million. This game is also exciting for bettors. The best esports betting sites always keep track of the major CS events and allow their clients to place successful bids and win substantial amounts as well. Let’s look at the way Counter-Strike became so popular among gamers and bettors.
How did it begin?
The history of Counter-Strike began in the winter of 1999 – when game dev enthusiasts Min “Gooseman” Lee and Jess “Cliffe” Cliff decided to modify the tool for the then-popular video game Half-Life GoldSrc. It was then that the SDK set for creating modifications to Half-Life appeared in free access. Ming Lee was responsible for modeling and programming the upcoming game, and Jess Cliff was responsible for testing, graphics, sound, game design, and promotion.
The counter-terrorist theme in CS was inspired by Min Lee’s interest in guns and the military, as well as games like Rainbow Six and Spec Ops. In March 1999, the developers came up with a name for their shooter – Counter-Strike. On June 19, 1999, the first beta version of the modification was released. This date has started the countdown of the history of the cult shooter. In the autumn of the same year, the first online servers appeared. The game was free, had clear mechanics, and therefore attracted the attention of the first adherents, successfully competing with the commercial and popular at the time Quake and Unreal Tournament. Interestingly, the first beta had four maps: Siege, Prison, Mansion, and Wpndepot. On the attacking side was a special unit that needed to rescue hostages, and the classic bomb mode appeared only six months later, along with three maps for it: Nuke, Dust, and Prodigy.
Reasons why CS 1.6 still remains popular
One of the most popular versions of the game was CS 1.6, released in October 2003. This version has confidently conquered the eSports industry. In general, the period from 2002 to 2007 is called the golden age of Counter-Strike because the shooter gained popularity and beat all competitors in the new e-sports industry, competing on equal terms with Starcraft, Warcraft, and Quake 3.
Although version CS 1.6 is over twenty years old, this game still excites gamers worldwide. Gamers say that it had well-developed mechanics, well-implemented grenades, and chips with shots through walls. Also, 1.6 had much simpler system requirements than its successor, Source. Version 1.6 was considered the best optimized, and it allowed a much wider audience to play.
Global Offensive: A New Era in Counter-Strike
In August 2011, Valve announced a completely new version of the popular shooter Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, based on the usual gameplay, but with much modern graphics and a new engine. In August 2012, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive was released, which marked a new era of CS. The release of CS: GO brought the Counter-Strike gaming community together again.
The emergence of video streaming platforms such as Twitch and UStream also contributed to the popularity of CS: GO. The Global Offensive version returned the shooter to its former popularity and entered the top eSports disciplines.
Is CS2 the best version in the Counter-Strike series?
In the fall of 2023, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive was updated to Counter-Strike 2. The peak online active players in CS2 exceeded 1.5 million in the spring of 2024. With the release of Counter-Strike 2, the shooter received more than 31 million unique players, which is the highest figure for the entire Counter-Strike series. Previously, the record was set in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive – in May 2023, when the game was launched by about 29 million unique users. In the latest version, the developers changed the physics of the game, and now CS2 looks more realistic and immersive.
CS’s eternal popularity
In 2024, Counter-Strike became the absolute leader in the number of tournaments held in the discipline (more than 269 tournaments). Moreover, since 2016, CS has led the ranking of eSports games by the number of active teams (6,394 teams). Counter-Strike eSports discipline generates the largest number of bets in the global eSports segment. That is why this 25th anniversary is not the last one. We will surely meet new anniversaries of this iconic shooter.
