Counter-Strike, commonly abbreviated to CS, or CS:S for
Counter-Strike: Source, is a team-based, tatical first-person shooter
game which originated with a total conversion mod created by Minh gooseman Le and Jess Cliffe, of Valve Software's first-person shooter, Half-Life. The game has been expanded into a series since its original release, which currently includes
Counter-Strike: Zero and Counter-Strike: SourceCounter-Strike puts a team of counter-terrorists against a team of terrosrists in rounds of competition won by completing an objective or eliminating the opposing force. The latest incarnation of the game, Counter-Strike: Source, is based on the Source Egine developed for Half-Life 2. Signs of Counter-Strike's wide influence can be found in mods for games such as Quake III Arena Unreal Tournament, and other standalone shooters such as Global Operations, Americas Army, Call of Dutty and many more.As of May 2006, Counter-Strike is still the most widely played online first-person shooter in the world. In 2002 there were over 30,000 populated Counter-Strike servers on the Internet (second place was with about 9,800). In 2004,Unreal Tournament Game Spy statistics showed over 85,000
players simultaneously playing Counter-Strike at any point in time, and in 2006, Steam regularly shows over 200,000 players for Counter-Strike (this includes Counter-Strike: Source, Counter-Strike: Condition Zero and Counter-Strike). According to statistics gathered by Valve's content-delivery platform, Steam, these players collectively contribute to over 6.177 billion minutes of playing time each month, as in Febuary 5th, 2007 solidifying its position as the most popular online first-person shooter in history. Counter-Strike was originally played online through the WON gaming service, which was shut down in 2004, forcing players to switch to Steam (to which a section of players responded by creating their own WON network, dubbed WON2).