In March 2025, we informed you about a fan remake of Counter-Strike 1.6 in the Source Engine, CS:Legacy. However, it appears that this fan remake is now running into some legal trouble with Valve.
For those who did not know, CS:Legacy is built from the ground up with 100% custom code and game assets. The game will be using Valve’s official 2013 Source Engine SDK codebase, with its own major rewrites to the renderer, shaders and various systems.
Midnight Madness wants to bring back everything people loved about the original game. It will keep the classic CS style but will also add better graphics, and smoother gameplay. Players can also expect new tech to make it feel more modern.
The devs said they got a message from someone at Valve. That person warned them that using the name and content from Counter-Strike might not be allowed anymore unless they get a special license. If this is true, it could stop them from releasing CS:Legacy as a free remake of CS 1.6. So now, Midnight Madness has two choices: cancel the game, or change it so it doesn’t use anything from Counter-Strike.
Midnight Madness reached out to Valve’s legal team to make sure they get a clear, official stance on this specific matter. They also made sure to tell Valve that they were are ready to make any changes, adaptations or restrictions to their project that they see fit. So far, Valve has not responded to that email.
The good news is that Valve has allowed fan-made remakes before. One of the most famous is Black Mesa, a remake of Half-Life. But Half-Life is a single-player game. Counter-Strike, on the other hand, is an online game that still makes Valve a lot of money. So, a fan remake of CS 1.6 might be something Valve wants to stop.
We’ll be monitoring this story and we’ll be sure to share an update as soon as we get one. Until then, you can read Midnight Madness’s full statement about these legal issues.
Below, you can find the debut trailer for CS:Legacy. As you will see, it looks pretty great. So, that might be another reason why Valve would want to shut it down. And if that’s the plan, I hope Midnight Madness will remove all references to CS so that it can release it as a new standalone game.
Stay tuned for more!
— CS:Legacy (@CSLegacyGame) July 2, 2025
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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