GoldSrc Game Problem: CSTRIKE CHAT appears instead of in-game chat messages

There are several possible fixes for this, lets try the easy ones first.

1. In your game console (~ typically) enter spec_menu 0
2. If that doesn't help, then go to the keyboard tab in your game options menu and reset your keyboard settings back to default. You'll have to reconfigure any custom settings you may have had.
3. Next possibility is to locate this file and delete it, Steam will re-create a good version of it: \counter-strike\cstrike\resources\cstrike_English.txt
4. The last possibility is that you installed a skinpack like "fusion skinpack" that might have a compatibility problem with the current version of Steam and Counter-Strike.

You will need to remove the custom content that you installed in order to fix this problem.

You can easily check to see if this is the case by exiting from Steam and then renaming your Counter-Strike folder:

C:\Program Files\Steam\SteamApps\<account>\counter-strike\cstrike

rename the counter-strike folder to this:

C:\Program Files\Steam\SteamApps\<account>\~counter-strike\cstrike

When you start up Steam and then click on Counter-Strike in the games menu, Steam will quickly create a default installation. Then you can go to the server and see if you still have the same problem.

If you still have the problem then you probably have a bad cache GCF file and you'll need to re-download the content.

To delete the local content, go to the game that is causing you problems, so: Steam > Games > then right-click on "Counter-Strike" (for example) and select properties.

There in that properties panel is the "delete local content" button.

You'll have to re-download the Game content but your problem should be resolved.