Steam has decided to start finally phasing out CS 1.6 in an effort to encourage users to evolve into playing newer games. The claim “server maintenance, support tickets and other staff related costs” do not make up for the extremely minimal income the game generates through new sales.

Personally, I’m shocked… the Counter-Strike 1.6 community is still huge and booming, many tournaments and leagues are still insanely popular. They have a few good excuses to move users into playing newer games, but to me it just seems like an underhanded “cash grab” to force players to buy more games.

CS1.6 is scheduled to be removed from Steam sometime this summer… perhaps to make room for upcoming titles like “Counter-Strike Source: Online” a pay-to-play service (similar to a WoW subscription)?

What do you think?

Read the official Press Release from Steam.

Edit: This was an April fools day post, relax.