AFAIK, de_dust (and de_dust2) were hastily thrown together by a young amateur (not in a bad way) map maker, not a professional and carefully designed + user tested level.
So maybe what we need more of, are designers and developers throwing shit together with less analytics behind their choices? It does seem like the more data-driven a decision is, the safer but also more "boring" it becomes.
Yes: there are no "average gamers". Everybody gets something different out of games, and the beauty of early HL1 online play is that there was something for everyone. Severs that were AWP-only playing sniper-focused maps; servers where AWPs were banned. Servers that only ever played de_dust; servers that only played crazy user-made maps. Team Fortress Classic and Counterstrike and HL1 Deathmatch and Science & Industry and so many more variants that I've forgotten playing. And what one player wants to play changes with their mood and the phases of the moon. As long as there were at least 9 other people interested in what you felt like messing around with in that instant, you could do it.
If you make a game based on average metrics, you get a single, average experience. If you make a game for the average player, you make a game for nobody. (Although you do seem to make a lot of money ...)
AFAIK, de_dust (and de_dust2) were hastily thrown together by a young amateur (not in a bad way) map maker, not a professional and carefully designed + user tested level.
So maybe what we need more of, are designers and developers throwing shit together with less analytics behind their choices? It does seem like the more data-driven a decision is, the safer but also more "boring" it becomes.