Counter-Strike and Game Engine Update by Fean0r at 19:22:02
Posted on steampowered.com by Greg Coomer
Quote:
"A Counter-Strike update and a game engine update were originally scheduled for tonight, but have been postponed until tomorrow morning. Here's a list of the changes included in the update.
COUNTER-STRIKE:
Fixed bug where shield would be invisible if a player picked the shield up immediately after throwing a grenade.
The round timer is now disabled when the bomb is planted.
The winning defensive team now gets the same amount of money whether they win by round timeout or not ($3250 instead of $2000)
Players on the offensive team who survive the round due to a round timeout no longer receive money the next round.
The Terrorists get an additional $800 per player if they plant the bomb but lose the round.
Fixed exploit where when a player died they could sometimes join the other team during the same round.
ENGINE:
Fixed custom decals not being downloaded from the server correctly.
Fixed custom decals drawing incorrectly for the host of a listen server after another player joins.
Fixed vgui textures being corrupted after going over a number of level changes.
Fixed problem where player would be sometimes be forced to look straight up after task switching in and out of game in fullscreen d3d mode.
Fixed problem in sound system where it wouldn�t properly be shutdown at the end of a .wav file.
Fixed banner picture not working correctly in HLTV.
VGUI:
Changed the way that Asian fonts are displayed in game for compatibility on more platforms.
Optimized VGUI to use less system resources when running on the desktop.
GAMEUI:
Fixed error message that was cut off when a player was disconnected from a game server.
SERVER BROWSER:
Fixed Opposing Force not showing up in the server browser game filter."
Looks like a good update for a change 
Action League - Season 2 by Fean0r at 11:41:29
The league is well underway and after a slow start everythings seems to be running quite well.
For up to date results and information check out http://www.actionleague.co.uk
Why not drop by the forums and say hello
Counter-Strike and ethics by Fean0r at 00:00:51
I read this and thought some people might find it interesting -
Introduction:
This article is basically an overview of Counter-Strike and the "ethics" a player should strive for to help create a fun and challenging gaming environment. Each section of this article will cover a different aspect of CS ethics, from cheating to chatting.
Part I: Cheating
I think it's safe to say that the overwhelming majority of Counter-Strike players do not cheat. I also think it's safe to say that that same majority believes cheating to be wrong and will not condone it. I for one believe that any kind of cheating, no matter how it's used, is wrong and goes totally against the way CS was made to be played. Even though I and thousands of other CS players believe cheating to be wrong, there is no way to totally prevent all types of cheating. After all (and this may sound strange), each player has the right to cheat. They purchased their version of Half-Life and they downloaded their copy of CS. It is up to the server administrators to decide how to deal with cheaters, not the game developers.
The anti-cheat movement in CS has done some very good things in the fight against cheating, but it has also created a lot of paranoid CS players who will accuse someone of cheating at the drop of a hat, so to speak. Nothing makes me angrier than doing really good on a map and having people accuse me of cheating, especially when I know I'm not. I'm sure many of you have had similar experiences. The point is that in its efforts to create a fair, cheat-free environment for legitimate CS players, the anti-cheat movement has also created "witch hunters," who are so passionate against cheating that they are blind from the fact that some very talented CS players actually do exist. The reality of the situation is that cheating is a very simple thing to spot. Simply by watching someone through spectator mode will dispel most accusations. I have seen many players literally following an enemy's movements through walls, who I know don't cheat. It appears that they are using a wallhack, but the truth is that they are listening to the footsteps of the enemy.
So…next time you are about to accuse someone of cheating, please take a second look.
Part II: Customization
There are some CS players (myself included) who would like nothing better than to see everyone use the default skins, models, sprites, sounds, etc. to create a perfectly level playing field. However, skins (most of them) aren't a form of cheating and usually don't present any kind of advantage. Of course there are those bright blue and bright red skins for each team, but those would be considered by most people to be cheats. Remember, the very reason that Counter-Strike was able to exist is because Valve made Half-Life such an easily customizable game. Should we really take that away from the fans? Even though I would like to see everyone play with a 100% default version of Counter-Strike, I must also acknowledge that most players' customizations of CS are in no way giving them an advantage.
Sounds are another popularly customized aspect of CS. As with any customization, this usually will never give the player any kind of advantage over a player using the default sounds. However, (as always) there are some people who will change the silenced guns' sound to be as if it had no silencer at all. That, in my opinion, is cheating, because it gives that player an unfair advantage over the majority of other CS players. However, the popular use for custom sounds is no different than applying custom skins to your game.
There are so many ways to customize CS that I can't possibly go through them all and still keep this article at a reasonable length. Just remember, most people who customize the various aspects of CS do so in a non-cheating way. However, there are always those few people who choose to do so in a way that they know will be very advantageous to them. Those people I consider to be cheating.
As always, though, the player who does this has every right to do so. It is, again, up to the server administrators what the consequence of misuse of customization will be, not the game developers.
Part III: Chatting
I have connected to so many servers which have notices of basically what you should and shouldn't say in that server, which I encourage. Having these notices will set a tone of mature chatting in your server. As far as ethics go though, there is no real way to say that one way of chatting is any more ethical than another. However offensively a player may chat, they have the right to do so, but at their own risk. That player risks being dealt with by the server administrator. So the next time you are in a server and some "camper" or "AWP whore" is beginning to make you angry, make sure you don't let your emotions get you kicked or banned from the server. Basically, watch what you say.
Part IV: Gameplay
The reason that CS has become such a madly popular MOD for Half-Life is based almost entirely on its gameplay. Each different map type for CS has a different style of gameplay. For example, we all know that on cs_ maps the CTs are supposed to rescue the hostages and the Ts are supposed to prevent that from happening, and that on de_ maps the Ts are supposed to bomb the bomb sites and the CTs are supposed to prevent this from happening. Of course we can't expect the brand new CS players to fully understand how each map type should be played properly. What angers me, though, is seeing veteran CS players doing nothing more than thinking about themselves and how many frags they can rack up. Too many times have I heard "the bomb has been planted" and see my only living teammate run and camp somewhere until it explodes. Too many times have I seen my only living teammate run and camp somewhere while the CTs rescue all the hostages. And no matter how much this angers all of us, again, these players have the right to play the game how they want to. But again, they run the risk of consequence by the server administrators. Most server administrators won't tolerate repeated behavior like that, and chances are that player will be kicked or banned for it. There are of course millions of other aspects of gameplay that so many players just decide to ignore, but it's time to end this article. In conclusion, you can play the game however you want, but remember: you do so at your own risk, because chances are a server administrator is probably watching you.
64-bit Counter-Strike Linux Server by Fean0r at 18:12:02
Good news for server admins. Valve will be supporting AMD's upcoming 64 bit Opteron. Here's the PR:
VALVE ANNOUNCES SUPPORT FOR UPCOMING AMD OPTERON(tm) PROCESSOR
64-bit Counter-Strike Linux Server Provides Performance Gain for World's #1
Online Action Game
San Jose, Calif. - March 6, 2003 - Valve, L.L.C., creators of Counter-Strike and Half-Life, today announced immediate availability of a 64-bit version of the Counter-Strike dedicated server using the upcoming AMD OpteronTM processor. Counter-Strike has the largest service footprint of any game on the Internet, with 35,000 servers generating over 4.5 billion player minutes per month.
"These server operators are extremely sophisticated, and were some of the earliest adopters of Linux," said Gabe Newell, Valve managing director. "We expect them to be leading-edge adopters of the AMD64 platform. AMD's approach to 64-bit computing looked great on paper, and it's nice to see that with real processors and development tools that it fulfills that promise. Every PC developer should be looking to get their server code and development tools running in 64-bits right away."
In a straight port of code highly optimized for x86-32, Counter-Strike dedicated server tests with both 32- and 64-bit versions revealed a 30% clock-for-clock gain, and is expected to show further performance gains in future upgrades.
"Valve Counter-Strike servers with 64-bit computing can offer customers a better overall gaming experience, and AMD processors will enable this performance boost," said Barry Crume, director of server segment product marketing, Computational Products Group, AMD. "With 64-bit dedicated servers using AMD Opteron processors, Valve will offer online gamers increased reliability, improved stability and greater throughput."
New VAC Tech by Dogz at 14:27:18
Valve have decided to take a new approach to stopping scummy cheaters using versions of wallhack. Instead of updating the Valve Anti-Cheat (VAC) to disable wallhack completely it makes it unusable. Any player playing with wallhack will still be able to see through walls and boxes but alas they wont be able to see actual player models. See below (before & after):
 
Expect the update in roughly a weeks time.
Blueyonder counter-Strike league. by Reaper at 12:22:07
Blueyonder are just about to start season 2 of their Counter-Strike league. It's run over 7 weeks, with teams of 5 players.
If you interested in entering then oil up your P90's and get yourselves over to Blueyonder.
Counterstrike Trains British Troops? by Dogz at 14:34:14
Aparently the British Army have stated using a modified version of Halflife, just like counter-strike, to train its troops. The screenshots dont actually look that bad! Hows about we get a general release????
Read more about it here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_2054000/2054437.stm
CS 1.5 first impressions by Reaper at 11:14:20
Well what can I say? Not a lot of differnce at the front-end for the average CS player to worry about, threaten to leave over etc etc. It seems that for this release Valve have concentrated in upping the steaks for the cheaters. and about time too, IMHO! It now logs, kicks and bans any cheats detected on a server, so you have been warned. There has been mention that this is also logged at a central place, but is yet to be confirmed.
You may find, as I have, that actions bound to the F1 & F2 keys no longer work. This is because they are now reserved for the new Tracker and Viewdemo command. So what are they?
The Tracker is very similar to pingtool and Gamespy where you can check which server your CS buddies are playing on and launch games. I have not had the chance to use this yet so am unable to offer any opinion yet.
The viewdemo command is part of the new demo player. It's not clear if this is a test version or a release. This allows you view and record demos within the game.
If you find you will never use these tools you can get your 'F' keys back by going into your cstrike/cl_dlls directory and renaming the GameUI.dll file to something else.
Also, for those of you with good eye sight you can now run Half-Life at 1600x1200.
Finally there is a new map de_piranesi. So look forward to playing that one
On a note about CS1.6, it looks like this update will be soley distributed via the Steam method, which has been beta tested by Broadband users only as it pushes the files to you when CS is launched. It has now been streamlined to just push the required files to you and not everything, making it possible to 56kr's to use this method. We shall see just how smooth this process is when 1.6 is release late summer.
Enjoy
HL 1.1.1.0/CS 1.5 updates by Reaper at 12:37:23
Looks like Valve are almost ready to release new updates for Halflife and Counter-Strike, moving them up to 1.1.1.0 and 1.5 respectively. They are currently in final development and latest news is that their release is due for the third or fourth week in June. Both updates will include the second phase of the anti-cheat software, the Ricochet Mod.
There is also a new map for us to get our teeth into called de_piranesi, more details about this map can be found here
So watch out for more moaning on CS forums everywhere and threats of people leaving CS 
Condition Zero at E3 by Dogz at 13:51:48
The information about this game is becoming a tangled mess but if you happen to be at E3 this year check out Condition Zero at the nvidia booth in the west hall.
Condition Zero is looking to be a mid august release.
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