Valve Brings Counter-Strike: Source to Linux, Half-Life 2 Likely to Be Next

A couple of weeks ago, Valve brought over its first GoldSrc-based games to Linux: Half-Life and Counter-Strike 1.6. With the rapid release of those games happening one after another, it hinted at the fact that the company might be accelerating its roll-out of its entire collection. That meant just one thing: other Source-based games were en route, including Half-Life 2 and Counter-Strike: Source. Well, we have the latter one so far, with hopes that the former will trickle out soon.

I had problems with the original Counter-Strike under Linux, where I couldn’t connect to basically any server I tried to. Fortunately, that issue doesn’t exist with the Source game. Testing with the help of a couple of rounds in cs_office, I was left impressed overall, but did experience the occasional hiccup – one that resulted in a death. I am not sure if this is a system problem or something Valve needs to iron out.

For some reason, the chat fonts as seen in the above shot look a little strange when over-top of a light surface. On a dark surface, they look just as they do on the Windows version of the game. While Valve doesn’t consider this Source version of the game to be a beta like the original, it very much is. Expect patches in the future.

In related news, the long-awaited Steam for Linux release of Psychonauts has also arrived. The developer states that while the Linux version is for the most part fine, the Mac version has a lot of work to be done. Again, patches are definitely in this game’s future.