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Every round in Counter-Strike, many lives are lost to determine
whether or not a few random boxes get blown up. Why blow up these crates, and not the identical
ones right next to where the terrorists spawn? Sometimes, a good bomb target raises more
questions than answers: why are loads of weapon crates stacked in a pile at bombsite A?
I acknowledge that it’s a great target to blow up- so why have a statue on bombsite B as an
equally valid alternative? And if you’re happy blowing a statue up instead of a weapons cache
then why not go for this easily reachable statue of a child choking a fish instead?
We need answers. And that’s what map descriptions should be for.
Until then, we’re left guessing why terrorists insist on attacking the most difficult to reach
corners of the map over and over again- and even when they’re successful they fail,
since their target doesn’t even seem to get damaged by the explosion!
To remedy this glaring error, a few things have been attempted over the years.
Counter-Strike Source maps often had scripted events which were triggered by the bomb blast,
like to have the crates break, to have fires ignite or for toxic gas to spill out into the air
to show everybody that the attack was successful. CS:GO doesn’t bother with this so much. You might
think this is because nobody’s around to see the aftermath, but as a rather paranoid terrorist,
and a rather late CT, I am. And I’d appreciate some destruction as my
body is hurled through the air by the blast. And the map’s stories have become increasingly
hidden, too- they used to be proudly displayed when the map had loaded in. But these days,
they’re all but hidden from view, with the loading screen text reduced
to dull map parameters that nobody reads, and community credits posted below if we’re lucky.
But the stories behind the maps still exist, hidden inside CS:GO’s
map folder in the form of txt files. So let’s investigate which mappers
have bothered to think up exciting backstories for their maps, shall we.
We’ll start with how NOT to do it. Inferno is a classic example of a dull backstory.
CT’s must prevent Terrorists from destroying either bomb target, while the terrorist carrying
the C4 must destroy one of the bomb targets. Oh, and there are 2 bomb sites in
this mission. Great. Really, Valve? Is that
it? Is that the best you can do? Is this a tutorial or something? It seems to serve no
other purpose than to credit the map’s maker. Dust2’s tries a bit harder by detailing that
these are ‘chemical weapon crates’. But it’s still not inspiring, is it.
Let’s take a look at Nuke’s. A silent alarm has been tripped by the guard shack at the MAC
nuclear power plant. The terrorists want to attack the site because security is low
and because the decommissioned site still contains the spent fuel rods.
That’s more like it! There’s just one small problem with this-
the powerplant’s name is no longer MAC. It’s been changed since then.
Twice. This description has simply been copy+pasted from the Counter-Strike Source version
of the map- an era when people cared more about the backstories, apparently! To give them credit,
the new version does show a crashed truck that has ploughed through the protective fences.
So we do know how they entered the level; a detail that is often missing from maps which
start terrorists in a dead end, having just come to from collective amnesia or something.
But the older version had a dead guy in the guard shack, which I think tells a much stronger story,
even if the illusion is broken by every terrorist starting the game with 0 kills.
I digress. Let’s look at the other maps and see if any of them have cool backstories.
The current community-made maps featured in the game contain just a list of names
in their map descriptions to serve as map credits, so there’s nothing to see there.
This might be a requirement that Valve imposes on them, since going to the mapper’s workshop page
often reveals a little bit more about their creation. But still not a lot.
I want to point out this abrupt ending, right here. I’ve suffered the same bug before- you
can type a beautiful, long description about your map, but all it takes is one update to
your workshop submission for it to wipe anything beyond the first few lines if you’re not careful.
It’s been a long time since I bothered typing up a long description on the workshop because of this,
but since it’s still happening with newer maps it’s apparently
a bug that still isn’t fixed. Valve pls f- If you ever wanted to know the backstory to Cache,
here it is: Cache is a defusal map set around Chernobyl. The Terrorists want to destroy the
evidence of a massive weapons cache in the shadow of Chernobyl. Well, I guess it explains the name
of the map at least. Anubis has… nothing.
Engage is a bomb defusal map set in a German car factory. k
Apollo is set in a Space Centre Museum. Yeah I figured.
Mirage doesn’t even have one. I hunted down the map’s submission on gamebanana and it’s
revealed that the plot of this map is that ‘The Terrorist carrying the C4 must destroy
one of the explosive crate areas.’ Amazing. In this day and age, the story behind the
map isn’t a priority. So let’s travel back in time to Counter-Strike Source,
which seems to be an era when mappers appeared to have more imagination. Or at least still bothered
to bundle the original stories to the maps. Check out Assault’s: The Marr Freight Company
has fallen victim to a band of Terrorists hell bent on using their operation to launder money.
The Harper Appliance Company is unwittingly shipping out more than they bargained for.
THAT’S how a map’s story should be written! It’s exciting and cheesy, while still remaining short
and concise. And the map plays into this, too, with the correct company’s name on the warehouse,
crates stacked with money and even a washing machine filled with bank notes to aid in
‘laundering’ money and making a CLEAN getaway. In the new one, the warehouse is now owned by
Parker rather than Marr, and the money has been replaced with lots and lots
of weapons. So it’s not the same story any more, but it’s still okay I guess.
Moving on, there’s even a story that spans several maps. Cobble’s explains that this is
Lord William’s country farmhouse, then Chateau’s story follows on from that, explaining that the
terrorists had successfully blown up cbble and that Lord William’s in the process of rebuilding
his Summer chateau. The redecoration of which is something the terrorists seem keen to prevent.
I’m a little bit disappointed that Piranesi isn’t another Lord William-themed map- missed out on a
trick there- but it does at least come with its own backstory about the castle being opened to
the public as a museum, while terrorists need to prevent that by destroying one of its two main
attractions. A lot better than generic crates… though no good reason for their motives is given.
Even Port gets its own backstory, about it being an economically-significant shipping target.
See? It doesn’t have to be elaborate. Just something to give context to
this life-and-death situation. Because who wants to die over a generic crate dispute.
Even some of the hostage maps in Source get some love. There’s something I like about Militia’s,
like how it explains the hostages have been gone for a week, and in the terrorists’ briefing it
gives nothing more than a visual description of the CT vehicle convoy that’s coming for them.
Compound’s description is particularly awesome, bothering to explain who the hostages are and
why they’re worth kidnapping. Though I wouldn’t trust these guys to traverse a corridor, let
alone work on America’s secret weapons program. So that was Counter-Strike Source. Let’s go all
the way back to the start, with 1.6. Some, like Dust2’s description, are the exact same as they
are today. Just a shame it’s such a generic story isn’t it. Others, like Inferno’s, are better in
1.6. Apparently there are some critical ‘gas pipelines’ beneath this quaint little village.
There’s not a lot of evidence of this over on bombsite B, but opposite A where graveyard is
today are several MASSIVE pipes! So how about that. Inferno actually has a story.
And while it wasn’t told in Counter-Strike Source, when you’re near T spawn, in the distance is
a large factory. Perhaps this is a tribute to the map’s original story! I’ve had a few
people come to me over the years, unnerved by the mysterious sound that you can hear HERE. So this
might answer that question- it’s gas being pumped. There’s one lovely little touch to the stories in
1.6, and that’s for the mapper to leave their email here somewhere should anybody want to
contact them about the map. I’m not sure what sort of messages they’re expecting to get. But
remember, this was an age when you submitted stuff to the internet without knowing where it would end
up. Attaching your email to your creation serves kind of like a digital message in a bottle.
Militia’s story in 1.6 is a bit different, claiming that it’s set in ‘Cliffe’s Compound’,
with Cliffe clearly being a reference to one of the makers of Counter-Strike.
Vertigo is apparently set on ‘Rizzleton tower’, though if that is a reference to anything then
it’s an inside-joke for its mappers, since no real structure exists with that name. Although I do
like the extra advice it gives players. Useful. But the best 2 stories must be for the maps no
longer featured in the game. This is de_survivor’s.
And here’s oilrig’s. Remember, this was for the VIP gamemode,
where one person on a team would be given a pistol and told to reach the end without dying.
In conclusion, the problem with Counter-Strike’s stories is consistency.
Valve bothers telling stories for some of the missions, like the special coop strike ones…
which then makes it even more confusing when they simply don’t bother for the rest.
Sometimes it looks like they’re teasing at some kind of massive back-story, but then it goes
nowhere. They mention Overpass’s mission in the initial blog post for the map way back in 2013,
then totally forget about it from then on. They include map descriptions in the map folder, but
then don’t show them in-game. It’s a mess. Looking back through the game’s past, there are flashes of
creativity here and there, which sooner or later get snuffed out when people forget to port it to a
newer map version or whatever. And that’s a shame. So here’s what I propose to Valve:
you should care about the map stories again. Take the time to give each map in the game a decent
backstory, because it’ll only take a few minutes to do and it will have so much meme potential.
The feature to display them on the loading screen is already contained within the game- just like
the feature COMMUNITYMAPCREDITS is used to initiate a series of usernames, typing RULESHERE
will force the loading screen to display the story behind the map. With just a simple adjustment,
we can display the exciting backstories behind the missions again, instead of that generic rules
text that nobody bothers reading any way. And the stories don’t have to end here;
CS:GO has already laid the foundations for better stories than its predecessors.
For a while, everybody on the same team had the same skin type, which helped explain where the
mission was taking place, and who was involved. The SAS models on Inferno. The Leet Krew on Dust.
The anarchists on Office. The custom models they introduced a few years ago has detracted from
this somewhat, but the thought was there. Even CS:GO’s trailer helped set the scene
by telling one possible story of a round played on Nuke. And this got me thinking.
Team Fortress 2 did a great job of introducing its characters in the form of short,
humerous videos. Why not do the same sort of thing to Counter-Strike, but for its maps? I know
they’re not people. But they have personality, and tell stories that millions of players are able to
relate to. The game has already missed several good chances to do this, but if Mirage gets a
remake, why not ship it with a new trailer for the game, telling stories on the map that people
can relate to? It would be a great way of getting players invested in a new map, and the new custom
skins which will no doubt ship with it. What do you think?