Frag Heads or Terror-Force after all?
In the beginning, it was by no means certain that the project would end up being called Counter-Strike. As can be seen from the official Valve book “Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar”, in which the developers look back on the chaos of the early modding days, there were several wild alternatives.
How would you have liked to spend your evenings on Dust2 in Frag Heads, Counter-Terror or Strike Force ? Also Terrorist Wars was seriously on the list.
In the end, Le and Cliffe luckily agreed on the name we all know today. But where did it actually come from?
The answer was provided by Minh Le himself years later: In response to a fan’s question on X (then still on Twitter) in 2017, he directly confirmed that a Canadian action series of the same name called Counterstrike from the early 90s served as inspiration.
unknown fact: Counterstrike was named after a Canadian TV show I used to watch.. pic.twitter.com/XfCrn7Z00B
— Minh Le (@GoosemanCS) February 1, 2017
From ICQ chat to a worldwide phenomenon
What happened after that day in March 1999 has long since become legend: Gooseman programmed and created maps and models, while Cliffe took care of the sounds, website and PR. The first playable beta was released just a few months later in June 1999.
The mod hit like a bomb, Valve took notice, eventually bought the rights to the brand and hired the two creative minds without further ado. Over the years, the small mod for in-between games became what is probably the biggest e-sports shooter in the world. Both Cliff and Le no longer work at Valve today.
Would you have had a look at Frag Heads back then or are you glad that the two of them ultimately opted for Counter-Strike? Do you perhaps even have your own nostalgic memories of ICQ, the iconic “uh-oh” sound and the first beta days? Or did you perhaps prefer playing Team Fortress Classic, the other big Half-Life mod, back then? Let us know in the comments!
