Counter-Strike: Condition Zero

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Counter-Strike: Condition Zero introduces new game technologies including highly-detailed locations; atmospheric enhancements, such as snow and rain; and more dynamic special effects -- taking the #1 online action game into new territory. Also, play your favorite classic CS maps, now visually upgraded.

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Counter-Strike: Condition Zero is a co-production by Valve and Turtle Rock Studios. In the collaborative spirit of CS, Valve and Turtle Rock have tapped the creative talents of mapmakers and technology designers in the CS community. And several of the tools and technologies created in the making of CS:CZ will be released to the MOD community after launch.

Counter-Strike: Condition Zero will have five teams per side, and each team will have four different heads. So for all your math wiz's out there, that's over 160 combinations of units. What's cool here is that Gearbox has added a bunch of new uniforms that reflect the environments in which they're fighting in. "So when your mission is in a cold setting, your units will all wear artic gear. We also have desert and jungle camouflage as well," says Pitchford. "Every character type gets a different outfit dependant on where the mission is taking place."

One thing we here at GameSpy want to make clear. Almost every aspect of the single-player experience -- the new weapons, models, and maps -- will be available in multiplayer games. Don't think all this cool stuff is just for the single-player experience. Pitchford states, "The complete version of Condition Zero is a full retail product. A free patch will be released, however, that will make online Counter-Strike fully compatible with Condition Zero's online components."

The Artwork

"We've increased the amount of polys per model," explains Matthew VanDolen (a.k.a. Doo Doo Brown, artist and modeler at Gearbox), "Before the models were 750 polygons each. The ones in Condition Zero are 1,250 polygons. It's a 75% increase in the amount of polys per character." So how did it look? Check out our exclusive screenshots of the models. In game they look incredible. Remember how much better Quake III Arena looked when compared to Quake II? It's that drastic of a change. You can see little nuances in the faces, not available in CS before. "We're also going to have full lip-synching," continues VanDolen, "You can see here the CT's mouth is moving. So when they say, "Fire in the hole!" you'll be able to see it. Just another thing to make CS more realistic." The textures on the uniforms are also first rate. We could see every wrinkle, crease and fold -- it left us speechless.

In addition to new models, Counter-Strike: Condition Zero will also incorporate new weapons. "As far as weapons go, we pretty much started over with the following assumptions," explains Pitchford. First, balance. The balance of CS is very important. We didn't want to introduce anything that disrupts the solidity of the game design as it stands. Second, realism in context. We wanted to introduce weapons to be plausible in the context for which they were intended. Third, fantasy. A lot of the CS weapons allow us to safely simulate the kinds of things we see in movies or hear about from war stories. We've added some guns that we've always wanted to see in action and have had a lot of fun using in the safe, simulated environment of CS. And lastly, strategy. Without radically altering existing CS paradigms, we wanted to add weapons that allowed for new tactics and new solutions to old tactical situations in the game. Using these basic objectives, we came up with a huge list of potentials. The list was tweaked, some tests were done, and some debates occurred and eventually we concluded with a very nice and solid collection of new weapons. Most of them are pretty exciting and all of them "fit."

Weapons and Toys

So what are the new weapons? "We've added some new weapons for both the CTs and Ts," explains Stephan Palmer, game/level designer at Gearbox, "The CTs have a new rifle called the FAMAS. The FAMAS is more so to counteract the Terrorist AK. Incidentally, the FAMAS is used by the French GIGN." "On a side note," says Brian Martel, "the FAMAS was also the gun that was in Metal Gear Solid." A new weapon for the Terrorists is the Galeil. "It's the Israelis official rifle," explains Palmer, "It's similar to the AK-47 but it's a little heavier, so the recoil is not as bad so you're more accurate with it."


CZ Preview: What to expect   July 3, 2002
Chris Peters (Austin, Texas)
70 out of 90 found this review helpful

BASICS:
This is a PREview, not a REview: Condition Zero was just announced to be released this fall. (I am 80% certain they'll finish it by then, too). CZ is an sequel to the hit internet game, Counter-Strike, which has been the #1 team-based shooter on the web for over 3 years. 70,000 fans cannot be wrong - Counter-Strike is the funnest, most addictive game you can play right now. Trust us. Check out reviews for Counter-strike if you don't believe me.

NEW MAPS, WEAPONS, & CHARACTERS:
New maps are themed from 6 new "Hot-spots", namely: North & South America, the Middle-East, northern Russia, Asia, and "urban" Europe. Each hot-spot has several maps to play on, and each map has 12 objectives to complete in order to unlock new weapons and characters. As the developers actually travels to these various locations for research, the maps look very realistic and authentic. Each map has 12 objectives to complete in the single player game, thus unlocking new weapons, maps and characters. You will outfit your team pre-mission, a la Rainbow Six, and as you unlock new soldiers you'll find each has unique skills, specialties, and personalities (ie, AI routines). I've heard there are over 160 characters in the game so far, so lots to unlock and play with.

New teams include the Russian Spetznatz for the Counter-terrorists, and extremist militia group for the terrorists. New weapons in CZ include: Machete, Galil, Famas, M60, Law Rocket, Molotov Cocktail, Machete, Riot Shield, tear-gas grenade and coresponding gas mask. The Riot Shield will add some very interesting strategy to old favorites like Dust and Militia; the Molotov cocktail also introduces fire to Counter-Strike, and sounds like the perfect terrorist weapon.

AI BOTS!
The greatest addition CZ brings are new AI bots. Finally, people without high-speed internet connections can enjoy the game. Basically, the developers, Gearbox, are working on a complex team-driven AI that mimics real players: your AI teammates will choose appropriate weapons, work in teams, cover choke points, and even do crazy stuff like jump irrationally in corners or do other weird things that people sometimes do. The bots actually learn your tactics and adjust accordingly. Some beta-testers for Gearbox have already reported that they have a hard time telling the computer-controlled characters apart from real players. The best part is that all the AI is script-able, meaning you can go in and adjust the AI to behave exactly how you want it to. I can't wait.

THE HUGE COMMUNITY ISN'T GOING AWAY:
One thing about CZ which might sound like a rip-off but is actually great - the multiplayer updates will be available for free online, including the new maps and weapons. That means that the 70,000+ current players can play with the new CZ players right when the game comes out. There won't be a division between "haves" and "have-nots". Of course, those people who download the free updates will miss out on much of CZ's coolest features, like the single player bots and new graphics.

NEW GRAPHICS:
The game still uses the ancient Quake 2 engine (5 years old!) but Gearbox has somehow managed to make CZ look good. The game supports high-res textures, 32-bit color, and trilinear filtering. There are also new, high-geometry character models and weapons. This doesn't make CZ look as good as Doom 3, but it still stands up pretty well for today's standards. And this graphical update is only available to people who buy CZ, not those who just download the free updates.


A Sweet follow up to the original Counter Strike   June 5, 2004
David B. Young (Olney, Maryland United States)
8 out of 8 found this review helpful

Counter Strike CZ, is the sequel to one of the best games of all time: Half Life: Counter Strike. For those of you who play cs, the game has not changed much from cs 1.6. There are no new weapons, only new weapon skins and new player skins. The graphics are much better than original cs, and the traditional cs maps[ dust, aztec, inferno, militia, etc] have been slightly tweaked. This usually means another box or crate added here or there, or a slightly longer hallway in places, not enough to change the layout of the level, but enough to confuse you for that precious moment while that terrorist hits you with his ak47.

Players of the original Counter Strike will have no problem picking up Condition Zero, and after a few weeks of play will never want to go back to the old counter strike. The question remains: Should you buy Condition Zero? The answer is simple if you don't have the original: HELL YES. And even if you have the original Amazon is selling cz for only $20 bucks, you can't lose much on that. In addition to the kick ass multiplayer you also get a brand new single player campaign, as well as the ability to play against bots in the multiplayer levels[ id save this for when your really bored]. I the missions to be fairly easy even on the hardest setting, but some of the missions are fun, and new players many like to play this after they get owned from playing online for the first time.

Note that when you buy cz the cd key you receive also allows you to play the original counter strike against your cheap friends who haven't bought the new version yet. It seems that the counter strike community is slowly making the change to condition zero. As of today [6-5-04] there are about 4x as many playing the original counter strike as there are playing Condition zero- 45,000 playing cs to 10,000 playing cz. (No I did not pull that number out of my ass, you can see for your self on steams website, http://www.steampowered.com/status/game_stats.html ) If I remember correctly that number used to be more like 10 people playing cs to 1 person playing cz a few months ago. By the time you read this Condition Zero may have overtaken the original counter strike in terms of player usage.

I give this game five stars because it is wicked fun to play, and it never seems to get boring. Counter Strike: Condition Zero does require skill and some patience at times. The game is round based- meaning after you die you must wait for everyone on your team to finish off the other team. If your looking for instant respawns and mass killing, you should play halo, or unreal tournament.


Will it really be released on December 30, 2003?   December 19, 2003
G. Middleton (CIA bunker, United States)
9 out of 10 found this review helpful

On 12/30/03, I think Amazon.com will update their expected release date. The new expected release date will be 3/17/04. They just left it 12/30/03 so everybody will pre-order. This game has already been made. The delay is a marketing strategy the producers are using to make this game the most anticipated game in history so they can increase sales and profit. Condition Zero is already complete, and they can't tweak the multi-player engine anymore than they already have. If you notice, the strategy guide was made months ago and already released by Prima. They wouldn't release a strategy guide for an incoplete game. I've been waiting on this game since 1/01/02. I've been waiting that long to blast newbies with new weapons. And you think you're pissed. I don't care if this game sucks I just want to see it released.


dont be fooled   November 11, 2005
6 out of 6 found this review helpful

ok this game is amazingly fun and i could talk about how good it is for hours but dont spend 29.99 on it when u can buy counter strike anthology for 20.00 and it comes with counter strike 1 and counter strike condition zero for 10 dollars less so if your smart you will take my advice and save 10 dollars and get two great games