Counter-Strike Online for Asia
New version.
Valve has told everyone it will be making a new version of Counter-Strike for the Asian market.
It will be completely online, and pushed out across Japan, Taiwan, China and South Korea by Nexon - a publisher most well known for MMORPG MapleStory.
"By combining their proven development abilities and leadership position in Asia with Counter-Strike's award-winning core gameplay, we have the recipe for customising an online phenomenon for each of the Asian markets," said Gabe Newell, head honcho at Valve.
Counter-Strike is a tactical first-person shooter that was first released in 1999, then revamped to launch alongside Half-Life 2 in 2004.
You play as either a good-guy or a terrorist, and co-ordinate fancy attacks with groups of your friends. It's immensely popular for its realism (or at least its severity), and is estimated to generate around five billion minutes of play-time a month. Cor. If I was clever I would tell you how many people that meant were playing it.
It isn't yet clear what Valve will be doing to Counter-Strike Online to make it different, but we wouldn't expect it will be too far from the version we've been playing for a while.
We shall keep you posted.
