Counter-Strike Online has 8 new weapons and a bunch of new game modes, and is completely free to play. Game modes in Counter-Strike Online include Team Death Match, Deathmatch, Zombie Mode, Challenge Mode, VIP Mode and of course Normal Mode (Plant the bomb / Defuse the bomb). Counter-Strike Online plays almost EXACTLY like the popular Steam version, except with a bunch of new featuresĬounter-Strike Online is exactly like Counter-Strike, except with a new interface (outside of games), new weapons and new game modes. I thought I’d never see the day that an official version of Counter Strike would launch that’s free to play, but I was wrong.
That all changed when Steam launched – as Steam required users to have a valid unique serial code for Counter-Strike before being able to play. I remember before the Steam service launched, anyone could play Counter-Strike for free, as the game never checked the validity of your Counter-Strike CD Key, and you and a dozen friends could share the same bogus key and it wouldn’t matter.
In fact, I remember when Steam originally launched and players had to log in through steam to play multiplayer Counter-Strike. I’ve personally played the original Counter-Strike game on Valve’s steam service on and off for over 7 years. The lag issues unfortunately make the game nearly unplayable from the U.S. From my experience, pings of around 200-300 are normal when playing from within the United States. In an FPS game, low latency is extremely important – so those outside of South East Asia will have difficulty finding games without lag. This means that the servers for Counter-Strike Online are located in Malaysia and Singapore, which means even though anyone in the world can play on these servers, there are serious latency issues for those outside of South-East Asia. IAHGames runs the game in Malaysia and Singapore in English, without any IP restrictions. Nexon runs the game in South Korea, while Gamania runs the game in China. Even with the addition of a bunch of new features and tweaks, Counter-Strike Online, in its core, plays almost exactly like the enormously popular original Counter-Strike game.Īs mentioned earlier, Counter-Strike Online was designed for gamers in Asia, and is thus hosted in Asia. Nexon basically took Counter-Strike and re-developed it specifically for Asian gamers by making it free to play, changing the interface and adding numerous RPG elements. The game is a remake of the enormously popular Counter-Strike for the Asian gaming audience. Counter-Strike Online, called CSO for short, is a 3D MMOFPS.