"Either you keep your head down or you go down with help." Gamers on... Steam are some of the most helpful...
Counter-Strike: Source can be a mixed bag, where if you get the right server, all of the best party treats in the world are yours. If you choose the wrong server, you are left with unbeatable custom skins, annoying sound bits, and lets not forget our annoying ventrillo abusers. Fortunately, the Valve way of life is all about customization, where ever you may choose it. Counter-Strike started in the mid nineties as a Half-Life Death Match modification, and soon grew into an underground multiplayer sensation. Later bought and marketed by Valve, the mainstream showcase for the new Source engine was given to the original Counter-Strike development team. What first seemed a daunting task grew into a collection of remade-better and re-mastered classic Counter-Strike maps, now featuring an all-better "buy" system, graphics, interface, connectivity, sound, and physics. Patches later, CS:S is virtually bug-free.
The graphics are near perfect and frame rates rate for many in the hundreds, even running the highest possible graphical quality. If you are not sure of your setup, feel free to tinker with the easy-to-use default setting, which though is customized to meet your computer's needs, is usually below your real capabilities. The sound is miraculous, and when paired with Creative's EAX 5.0 HD "MacroFX" and "ElevationFilter" options, is even more. Though Source games do not utilize EAX, the Creative X-Fi sound is layered over. If you either do not use headphones or do not own an X-Fi sound card, ignore the following. A recommended setup to avoid many headaches is 5.1 in-game, headphones in-panel. Make sure to un-sync with the control panel, otherwise your CMSS-3D will not work the down-converting magic.
In conclusion, keep your head down! I realize this has been shouted over the ears of many Marines, armchair soldiers, and Call of Duty nuts for years, but never before have I pursued life as such in Counter-Strike: Source. Make one move in the wrong direction and the sniper down the hall will thank you for moving in the right direction. Perfect kill. Neck shot. Six rounds. You died in the first two. The other four? As you dropped. Wait. No. As your ex-body dropped. Once dead, one must wait until the next round to play again. There are no free spawns. Guns are not free. Nothing is free. What money you have can be increased by saving hostages, successfully bombing a target building, killing SWAT, killing terrorists. What money you lack may be supplemented through weapons one finds along the way. A dropped magazine, littered grenade, forgotten pistol. You become Rambo in a concrete jungle. Be the pistol. Be the bullet. Don't be the dead guy. Have fun!