condition zero: hands-on
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It's the fun that has been so elusive for the past developers of Condition Zero. Transforming Counter-Strike's hit multiplayer into single-player gold hasn't been an easy task. But a collaborative effort between VALVe Software and Turtle Rock Studios has produced the most promising version of Condition Zero yet.
Turtle Rock Studios
Formed in the blossoming spring of 2002, Turtle Rock Studios is a small programing team based in Irvine, California. The team consists of only four former Westwood/EA Pacific employees. The studio, headed by Mike Booth, had its first major project—the Official Counter-Strike Bot—tested alongside Counter-Strike 1.6's BETA earlier this year. Now, Turtle Rock Studios is prepping the version of Condition Zero that will be released next month.
The start screen features interesting things like "logos" and "text."
Another CZ
After receiving Ritual Entertainment's Condition Zero content earlier this year, VALVe decided to re-do significant parts of the project. Community feedback wasn't too positive about Ritual's work. In my opinion, Ritual's quality of work for Condition Zero wasn't what the community expected from a title with VALVe's name on it.
Although you will still find some of the Ritual missions in the game, the meat of CS: Condition Zero is a new mode programmed by Turtle Rock Studios. Twelve Ritual missions will be in a section of the game called "Deleted Scenes." These missions were the best of the 20 or so that Ritual developed. But the new game mode that will comprise most of Condition Zero is a Tony Hawk Pro Skater-like challenge mode. Everyone besides you will be computer-controlled, so let's introduce the bots first.
Talking Computers
You know that Official Counter-Strike Bot tested in CS 1.6? "That was version one" of the bots, said Mike Booth. "I like to think of this as version one-point-five," Booth said of Condition Zero's enemy AI with a slight grin.
The testing helped considerably, Booth told me. His team took into account plenty of community feedback from places like the Steam forums. One example of feedback having an effect is the recently added ability for bots to knife fight in an intelligent manner. If that doesn't sell you on the game, I don't know what will!
All of your enemies and teammates are CPU bots. Each has a unique name and personality. The personality consists of four attributes: skill, co-op, bravery, and favorite weaponry. So if your teammate has a low co-op level, he might tell you to screw off when you give him an order. Yes, tell you.
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