Did you start playing CS:GO before or after Operation Hydra, back in 2017? Your knowledge
of Dust depends on this! For if you started playing after 2017, you’ll
only have played the 5th and most recent version of Dust2! …and you may never even have seen
the first Dust! Which is just crazy to think about. Did you know that Dust 1 used to be
the game’s most popular map? The stories for many of Counter-Strike’s
original maps have been lost. But not so with the Dusts. Their maker, Dave Johnston, hosts
his own little blog where he covers their development in great detail.
Rather surprisingly, Dust’s development starts with Team Fortress 2.
It was 1999. Dave was 16, and had just finished his exams. He loved Team Fortress, and the
first images of Team Fortress 2 were leaked. It… looks different to the Team Fortress
2 we know today. Because this version of Team Fortress 2 was effectively cancelled.
But those early images of the game stuck with him. These, in particular.
He moved to playing Counter-Strike, where he made a map called cs_tire- a hostage map
that made it into the 3rd beta for the game. Back then, the game suffered from a lack of
mappers. So perhaps because of this, one of the makers of Counter-Strike, Jess Cliffe,
contacted Dave and asked if he wanted to make a map for the fourth beta.
He chose to make Dust! Still inspired by Team Fortress 2, he went to his texture artist,
Chris ‘Macman’ Ashton, and asked if he could make a load of textures inspired from
early Team Fortress 2 pictures. A texture pack was made, which he called ‘dest’.
Which was short for ‘Destiny’. Dave seems to enjoy shortened names. Dust is short already,
and his other map, Cobblestone, was shortened to ‘Cbble’- and the map file is still
called that to this day. If you want to know more about Dust’s development
you should check his blog out- he talks about it in detail. I’ll link to it in the description.
It’s worth remembering that Counter-Strike only had a hostage gamemode until beta 4.
So it wasn’t until Dust was released that the game even had bomb defusal- which was
what Dust was! Because of this, map development back then was less advanced than it is today.
Dust was made one area at a time, with very little planning. At one point, underpass led
to a huge underground chamber, but it wasn’t fun or sunny, so it was quickly removed. He
ended with T spawn, which was the area he was most happy with, perhaps because by then
he had mastered this map’s theme. You can see in these comparison shots how
much it was inspired by the Team Fortress 2 map.
Dust only has 2 routes that the terrorists can choose from. They can either push through
the underpass, or through the tunnel in the centre. He understood the importance of this
section and took the time to get the timings right, and used crates to block lines of sight
and to improve the map’s optimisation. He wanted to give CT’s a slight advantage here.
He then chose spawn positions and bomb plant spots using a combination of guesswork and
logic. He chose these bombsites, with bombsite B being in the underpass. It must have been
difficult to make a defuse map when the gamemode didn’t even exist, so he instead placed
the bombsites as though they were flags that needed to be captured- since Capture the Flag
was at least a gamemode that existed at the time!
Playtesting was hosted in a different timezone, so Dave didn’t even get to play his own
creation. But Jess Cliffe did and suggested bombsite B was moved to CT spawn.
This was done, and the map was included in Beta 4, making it joint oldest defuse map
ever made, together with Nuke and Prodigy. And it was only then that Dave got to play
his own map! Dust quickly became one of Counter-Strike’s
most popular maps, and servers hosting it 24/7 soon began showing up. This map remained
a community favourite for many years. Since terrorists only had 2 routes, you knew
where they were going to come from and had plenty of time to prepare! You could even
stand here, which would let you guard both entrances at once.
Perhaps a better spot though was to snipe from here, into underpass. Terrorists approaching
this route didn’t stand a chance! Dave tried to weaken this sniper-spot by cracking the
wall CTs hid behind to give them less cover. But it only made the spot MORE overpowered,
so he quickly returned it to how it was before. Later on, he felt the map was becoming T-sided,
so moved CT spawns forward, but this made it too easy for them to guard the tunnel,
so this change was quickly reverted as well. A few of the changes he made remained, like
the custom skybox, the tweaks to lighting and this change to the cover at bombsite B.
He learned more about his map post-release than he did while making it! He had several
planned changes for underpass, but never made them. He does sometimes wonder how it would
have been different had he made those planned changes to its layout. But the map was popular
as it was, becoming the most played FPS-map in the world, and while it wasn’t the best
for competitive play, it was a favourite for newer players.
And they wanted more. So Dave eventually got to work on Dust2… which for now he called
Dust 3. He didn’t want it to be seen as a direct sequel. How could it ever be as popular
as the first map? Oh, if only he knew.
Again, you can check out Dust2’s development in detail on his blog. I’ll just summarise
here. By now, the defuse gamemode had been out for
a while, and the expected standard for maps was higher. So unusually for him, instead
of jumping straight in and making the map, he sketched it on paper first. He said the
sequel was important- it deserved careful, considered, detailed and thorough planning;
a long and arduous process that would eventually span literally minutes!
He tried to keep what worked with the first Dust. The sunny theme. The warm colours! The
iconic arches and doors. The underpass. He added new elements too, like a rock wall,
and spiral staircase. He wanted for there to be room for both close-quarter combat AND
snipers on this map. And, on top of all this, he wanted the map to be simple. EZ.
Within a few days, he had made it. And unlike his previous Cbble, everything ended up being
the right size first time! While Dust1 borrowed from Team Fortress 2,
Dust2 borrowed from Dust1! You can see similarities between bombsite
A, and this terrorist route to underpass from Dust1. And how about terrorist route to B,
which looks quite a bit like CT spawn from Dust1.
Dust2 went through some interesting stages! The spawn points used to be entirely different,
with the terrorists starting near where bombsite A is today.
The bottom of middle had this mined out corner, here. This is where it would have been today.
And- you won’t believe this- there was a bombsite at the top of middle, situated in
a cavern. This is where it would have been on the latest Dust2.
Dave said that -thanks to GameHelper- this alpha version of the map was released under
the name ‘de_dusttoo’. I couldn’t spot many differences between this and the beta
version, apart from the spawn points… and of course the cavern at the top of middle,
which was bigger and darker than I had first expected.
Bombsite B started off being quite a bit simpler and flatter than the one we know now.
Before release, Jess Cliffe looked at it and suggested new spawn and bomb locations and
also said to call it Dust2, because calling it dust 3 was silly.
It appears that these were the right calls, because Dust2 quickly became even more popular
than Dust had been. It was fun for new players AND in competitive play. After early battles
with Aztec, eventually became Counter-Strike’s most popular map, and has remained that way,
arguably, ever since! I really have skipped many interesting details
about these maps, do check out Dave’s site. It’s great to see that he’s still posting
there, having made one about 3D printing just 2 months ago.
An often forgotten part of Counter-Strike’s history is Condition Zero- an ill-fated sequel
released in 2004. It never became that popular, but did ship with some prettier versions of
both Dust maps, which you can see here. In some ways I think the Condition Zero maps
look better than the Source ones. But you see for yourself.
For also released in 2004 was Counter-Strike Source, and the Source versions of Dust 1
and 2. Other than the visuals, the other major difference was to the physics. Barrels and
other debris within these levels could be shot, moved about, used to cover the bomb
and to interfere with player movement. This was a particular favourite of mine on Dust2.
The maps did get small bug fixes. The skybox on Dust2 used to be open at long A, so players
could boost each other using grenades up and over the top of the map. At one point, players
could hide inside the rocks. I’ve covered Dust and Dust2. But there WAS
kind of a third Dust map, as well. Dave was contacted by PCGamer UK in 2005 and asked
to write some articles about mapping for them. He used this as an opportunity to create his
first map for Source. Here it is: de_dust_pcg. It exists, it works, it’s got some interesting
features, though it was never intended to be a true sequel to Dust2 or anything like
that. It’s definitely worth checking out though.
A few years ago, with his help, I ported this across to CS:GO so it’s playable on the
workshop if you’d like to try it.
In 2005, Valve released the Lost Coast- this was a one-off bonus level from somewhere along
the Half Life 2 coastal segment, but with improved lighting using HDR, which simulates
how your eye adapts to bright and dark environments. In 2006, Dust received the HDR treatment,
making everything overly bright and glowy. This is showing it on a newer version of Source,
so it may have looked a bit different to this- but I remember the effect looking extremely
strong! It slowed my PC to a crawl and made it more difficult to see people in most situations.
But it looked nice. Counter-Strike still uses HDR, but the effect has been made far less
obvious than it was with this map. Remember- this was a new and exciting technology at
the time! They wanted to show it off. I believe Dust was the 3rd map to receive HDR, following
Nuke and Militia. Again, it’s worth noting that this was a
different era. There wasn’t matchmaking. There wasn’t twitch streaming, and there
weren’t tournaments anywhere near the scale of the ones today. I don’t think people
were as competitive. Back then, most people played Counter-Strike casually. For fun! Standards
were lower, and most people didn’t care about map balance as much as they did about
having a good time and messing about. I enjoyed playing Dust with HDR, even though my PC couldn’t
handle it too well and it negatively impacted my aiming. But HDR was new and exciting, and
I still have fond memories of it. But it shows how much has changed- if they introduced HDR
like this today I think most people would complain.
We associate the Leet Krew terrorist models with Dust2. But Counter-Strike Source didn’t
ship with the Leet Krew skin. They came later, in 2006. And unlike Global Offensive, where
each map has a set player skin, with older Counter-Strikes you could choose any skin
you liked on any map!
Meanwhile, back in 1.6, strange things were happening. Valve were putting billboards on
the walls of maps such as Dust2, containing adverts for real products! These remained
in the game until 2013, when it received an update that removed them again. Just an odd
footnote in Counter-Strike’s history, and one of the questionable experiments that Valve
dabbled with along the way. And then, 4 years later in 2010, Counter-Strike
Source received the Orange Box treatment. The game was moved to a newer version of Source,
was given a new UI, achievements and generally changed how the game felt to play. And Dust2
also got HDR. And then, in 2012, Global Offensive was released,
and the Dusts received yet another facelift. The map wasn’t so bright or colourful, but
was more realistic looking, and a helloloalalot more detailed.
And Dust1 got a change to its layout! Its underpass had always been difficult for terrorists.
It was widened to give them a path that was hidden from CT snipers. And a stairway was
built into the side, coming out above the underpass! This opened up all kinds of options
for terrorists, helping them to gain a foothold on this half of the map, as well as offering
them another angle into tunnel. CT’s weren’t forgotten about either, with a bridge being
added across the underpass just here. This gives them a faster route into tunnel- but
can also be used by terrorists. Bombsite B was moved for a third time- in
CS:GO it was placed closer to middle, which means it takes less time for terrorists to
reach it and reduces the number of camping spots they must pass to get there.
CS:GO didn’t just get Dust and Dust2, but also SE editions for both, which simplified
a lot of the details, removed the wires, dusty clouds and so on. These were intended for
competitive play, but I think what happened is that Valve decided it was too much work
to keep both map versions updated, so instead dropped the se series and focused on making
the main version of the map more competitive viable. After all, doesn’t everyone deserve
good visibility? I have already covered Dust2’s many changes
spanning 2012 to 2015 in another video, which you can watch if you like. I’ll just summarise
here by saying that it went through all sorts of small bug fixes and updates in this time.
The big things to know are that in 2014, Shortdust was released, featuring a cut-down version
of Dust 1 for use in demolition, and sporting a single bombsite set inside the mid tunnel.
This involved terrorists starting in underpass and having to plant in the main palace. Funnily
enough, this featured a new route which was almost exactly the same as one of the changes
that Dave had considered, but never carried out, in the original Counter-Strike.
And then everything changed in 2017. Since Dust2’s release back in 2001, it had been
one of- if not THE most popular map for Counter-Strike. It was certainly my favourite! But perhaps
it was too popular. Maybe it was stopping other maps from being played, and had been
watched so many times that people were growing tired of seeing it.
So Valve moved it to its own category, away from everything else. It could still be played
competitively, but could no longer be voted for in deathmatch or casual gamemodes. From
2017 onwards, you either played Dust2 endlessly, or jumped into a mappool containing other
maps. And then, in October 2017, it received a facelift,
sporting new textures and theme. It was a great moment, and introduced the version of
the map that we know to this day! There have been bug fixes and stuff for this one as well,
but I won’t be covering them here. Then, a month after the new Dust2, Dust1 was
removed from the game, without even so much as a patchnote! It was when Operation Hydra
ended. The mappools were reshuffled, many community-made maps were removed… along
with Vertigo, Aztec, Militia and Dust1. Since then, Militia and Vertigo have returned.
Vertigo’s had an almost complete overhaul, while Militia’s… been made dark and snowy.
So far, Aztec and Dust 1 haven’t returned to the game. Perhaps they will in the future.
But for now, other than Dust2, only shortdust remains! I can imagine that newer players
will have loaded this up and thought ‘this isn’t dust’, what with its one bombsite
in the middle and lots of clutter blocking entrances up everywhere. But now you know!
It’s a reminder of where the Dust series came from, and the only trace of the first
map that’s left after 20 years of updates the game has had.
Let’s hope shortdust is in the game as a tribute to the past- and not just because
Valve has forgotten to remove it just yet. As always, thanks to Dave Johnston for providing
such a well-documented and detailed account of the past- it makes videos such as this
one possible.