Counter-Strike 1.0 released 23 years ago today

On November 9th 2000, as the United States was grappling with a hotly contested presidential election that would decide the nation's ideology in the new millennium, a small game named Counter-Strike emerged from its beta shell to a full release.

Valve software had recently entered a partnership with the Counter-Strike mod team to officially release the game under the Valve banner. Fans of the Half-Life mod were excited to see what Valve support could do for their favorite tactical first-person shooter mod. Over the past few months, Valve and co. worked to iterate over many beta cycles, adding weapons, maps, and game modes.

When the beta was first announced, the audience for Counter-Strike was quite small, but as the beta progressed and the game continued to be iterated upon and improved, CS quickly grew, even surpassing the player count of the original Half-Life. When Counter-Strike was nearing the end of the beta and approaching a full release, the player count had over tripled. The story since then, as people say, is history. Through continuous updates, continued iteration, and a diligent audience and development team, over the next 23 years, Counter-Strike became the game we all know and love.