Free Counter-Strike 1.6 server hosting

Counter-Strike 1.6 still has active communities, and a server of your own is the easiest way to play with friends on your maps and your rules. Torchlite installs the official HLDS dedicated server from Steam with the cstrike game, starting on de_dust2.

Plans

Both are free. Starting or renewing the server shows a short ad break in the panel, 2 ads on Lite and 3 on Turbo. Counter-Strike 1.6 is very light, so Lite is enough for almost any server. The renewal guide explains the Renew timer.

Before you start

• Counter-Strike 1.6 on Steam for every player.
• Optional, your own maps and plugins.

No key or extra account is needed.

How to start

1. On Create your server, choose a plan, then Counter-Strike 1.6.
2. Confirm your email with the code we send. The server downloads the game files from Steam, then starts by itself.
3. Log in at game.torchlite.host with the same email and password. The Network page shows the IP and the port.
4. In Counter-Strike, open the console and type connect IP:port, or add the server to your favourites.

Settings

The Startup page holds the map the server starts on. Change it there and restart.

Everything else is in cstrike/server.cfg, which you open in Files or over SFTP:

• hostname "My server" sets the name in the server list.
• sv_password "secret" keeps the server private. Leave it empty for a public server.
• rcon_password "a long password" lets you run admin commands from the game console with rcon.
• mp_timelimit and mp_roundtime set the match and round length.

Changes in server.cfg apply after a map change or a restart.

Maps and plugins

Upload extra maps as .bsp files to cstrike/maps, and add them to cstrike/mapcycle.txt to put them in the rotation. Players download a custom map from the server when they join.

Metamod and AMX Mod X are not installed by default. To add them, upload them to cstrike/addons and point cstrike/liblist.gam at Metamod, as their install guides describe for Linux servers. Use the Linux versions.

Common problems

The server says the map was not found. The map on Startup must be a .bsp file in cstrike/maps, written without the extension.

Settings do not change. Restart the server or change the map after editing server.cfg.

It stopped on its own. The renewal timer ran out. Press Start and the server loads the start map again.