While my opponents seemed to slide across the slope with ease, I would hurtle into the abyss every single time. When I would connect, I would see long, sloped ramps to nowhere, curling and twisting through empty space towards an unknown destination.

Of these offerings, the most consistently-populated servers were always devoted to the act of 'surfing,' a fact that boggled my pre-teen mind. When I would search through the list of servers for players of a similar skill level, I would come across a panoply of fan-made mods and maps intended to offer a respite from the endless dual grind of de_dust and cs_office, and I would occasionally take the plunge and sully my dad's hard-drive with these bizarre creations. While there were many factors working against me - my age, my characteristic lack of dexterity, my (for the time) toaster-level PC, and my bargain-bin 200 DPI Dell laser mouse - I never let these disadvantages stop me from padding some lucky player's K/D ratio with my ill-fated MAC-10 rushes. In my younger and more vulnerable years, I spent a lot of time getting shot in the head in Counter-Strike: Source.

Map counter strike source