Counter-Strike
Counter-Strike
Winners League Season 2 playoff brackets are now revealed
Steven Rondina
The Winners League Season 2 playoffs are officially upon us. The group stage has wrapped up and with that, the list of teams advancing to the playoffs has been set. The top four teams from each group have qualified for the playoffs, lining up 16 squads to compete in both the North American and European regions. The playoffs bracket for North America is as follows: The North American region will …
Counter-Strike
Na`Vi reportedly set to bring in Boombl4 to replace veteran Edward
Fariha Bhatti
The Natus Vincere CS:GO team looks set to make a roster change as HLTV reports that Kirill “Boombl4” Mikhailov will join the team, replacing Ioann “Edward” Sukhariev. Talks between Na`Vi and Winstrike Team are reportedly at an advanced stage, with a deal expected to be confirmed in the coming days. Boombl4 is best known as the star player and in-game leader of Winstrike Team, formerly known as Quantum Bellator Fire. …
Counter-Strike
Racist incident sees CS:GO pro Sindi given ban from FACEIT
Steven Rondina
An ugly incident involving racism and slut-shaming has hit the pro Counter-Strike: Global Offensive community. During a game on FACEIT involving several pro players, ACES Esports player Tatyana “Sindi” Gracheva unloaded a number of racial epithets at Noel “melonhead” Raki. The language came during an ugly argument involving multiple players in the game. An exchange between Monolith Gaming’s Artem “malik” Arkhipov, Winstrike Team’s David “n0rb3r7” Danielyan, and former Epsilon Esports …
Counter-Strike
Team Vitality cruise through CS_Summit 4, take the chicken trophy
Steven Rondina
Team Vitality are the champions of CS_Summit 4. The French squad looked excellent throughout the house party-style tournament, crushing the group stage and making a strong run through the playoffs to hoist the trophy. The final victory for Vitality came at the expense of the favorites to win the tournament, Team Liquid. Vitality entered the grand finals coming off a dramatic win over ENCE Esports, and the team seemed to …
Counter-Strike
Cache map update nearing completion according to creator FMPONE
Steven Rondina
The reboot of popular Counter-Strike: Global Offensive map Cache is nearing completion. Map designer FMPONE released an update on his progress in redesigning the stage. Judging from his post, there are just a few areas left that need to be overhauled before it can be rolled out in full. According to FMPONE’s post, the only areas left to tweak are the T-side pathways towards the bombsites including A main, squeaky …
Counter-Strike
Gambit Esports dissolving CS:GO team, puts players up for trade
Steven Rondina
Gambit Esports is performing a hard reboot on its Counter-Strike: Global Offensive division. The former major winning organization has outlined its plans to withdraw from CS:GO for the immediate future. Gambit is planning to transfer its remaining players and put together a new team at some point later in 2019. “Over the past two months we’ve been conducting a series of negotiations, however, a suitable combination of players hasn’t formed …
Counter-Strike
Valve bows to CS:GO pros and tweaks Vertigo, changes Danger Zone
Steven Rondina
Valve has heard the complaints of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive’s pro players and has changed things accordingly. Following resoundingly negative reactions to the latest iteration of Vertigo, the CS:GO development team has rolled out a patch that provides some major changes to the new map. The tweaks are entirely made around the A bombsite, which has become a source of frustration among the pro community. The overhaul introduces a number of …
Counter-Strike
Spanish organization cuts CS:GO team after match fixing scandal
Steven Rondina
One of Spain’s top Counter-Strike: Global Offensive teams is no more. According to a statement on the organization’s website, Team Queso has officially dropped its CS:GO roster. The cause of the move is alleged intentional match throwing by the squad at the Liga de Videojuegos Profesional Superliga 2019 in a game opposite Tenerife Titans. “After analysing the evidence and concluding the investigation into the Superliga Orange CS:GO match that pitted …
Complexity Gaming reveals new high tech headquarters in Texas
Olivia Richman
Counter-Strike
Complexity Gaming’s vision for the “esports 3.0” era has manifested in the opening of its new headquarters right next to the Dallas Cowboys World Headquarters. The GameStop Performance Center is an 11,000-square-foot building constructed on 90 acres of land, where the organization’s various esports teams will practice similarly to their football counterparts, all owned by the same man: president Jerry Jones. “We see the opening of our new headquarters as …
New Mousesports roster takes top prize at DreamHack Open Tours
Steven Rondina
Counter-Strike
Mousesports is once again starting to look the part of one of Europe’s best Counter-Strike: Global Offensive teams. The squad took first place at DreamHack Open Tours 2019, besting Valiance to take the top prize. It is a key victory for the rapidly developing team, and one that hints that big things might be on the horizon. The first game of the grand finals was a competitive one. Though Train …
Vertigo gets bashed by multiple CS:GO pros during ECS Season 7
Steven Rondina
Counter-Strike
The professional Counter-Strike: Global Offensive community does not like Vertigo one bit. MiBR’s Fernando “fer” Alvarenga took to Twitter earlier this week and publicly blasted the map. That kicked off a tidal wave of venting from top CS:GO players. “Btw this Vertigo map is worse than shit. It’s so ugly to watch and even more stupid to play,” fer said. Team Vitality’s Dan “apEX” Madesclaire agreed. “Retake A this round. …
Bulgarian player spyleadeR returns to CS:GO with new Mortal Kombat
Olivia Richman
Counter-Strike
After a five-month absence from competitive Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Emiliyan “spyleadeR” Dimitrov has returned under Mortal Kombat. “After being a free agent for a long time, I am finally back in the pro scene,” spyleadeR told HLTV.org. The MK lineup will also feature Nikolay “niki1” Pantaleev and Nikola “NK4Y” Radushev, who were removed from Bpro earlier in the week. Upon hearing of the duo’s release from their former organization, spyleadeR …
Denis ditches Sprout, joins BIG as former star Nex heads to bench
Steven Rondina
Counter-Strike
The German Counter-Strike: Global Offensive scene has received a new shakeup. Denis “denis” Howell is splitting off from Sprout after an 18-month run with the team to join fellow German organization BIG. The news was confirmed by all parties on Twitter. “Today it’s time to say goodbye to Denis, who has been part of Sprout from day one,” Sprout announced on Twitter. “But our ways part from now on even …
Complexity Gaming announce MillerCoors as newest sponsor
Olivia Richman
Counter-Strike
Complexity Gaming has announced a new strategic partnership with MillerCoors. Thanks to the new partnership with MillerCoors, the brewing company known for its alcoholic beverage brands, Miller Lite will now be the exclusive alcoholic beverage of Complexity Gaming. The esport organization’s chief revenue officer, Daniel Herz, said they couldn’t be more excited to welcome MillerCoors to the Complexity family. He stated that both the esports organization and the beverage giant …
CS:GO update brings big changes for esports fans and in-game economy
Steven Rondina
Counter-Strike
The Counter-Strike: Global Offensive development team has been hard at work in recent weeks. The latest CS:GO patch has dropped, bringing a host of new features, balance changes, and map updates. It’s an incredibly hefty patch that offers something of interest to any sort of fan of the game. The biggest change for esports fans is a greater integration of professional events into the game client. A list of upcoming …
S1mple chews out racist teammate during a live Twitch stream
Steven Rondina
Counter-Strike
Counter-Strike: Global Offensive has a racism problem, and at least one pro player isn’t standing for it. During a recent Twitch stream, Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev ripped into a teammate for an inappropriate in-game handle. The pub game interaction was clipped and immortalized: While playing a pub game on Vertigo, S1mple was paired with a teammate whose handle was “Kill All N—-rs” with a small misspelling to get around Steam’s filters. …
Swag swaggers and Vegi comes up big for Virtus.pro in Winners League
Steven Rondina
Counter-Strike
The playoffs to Winners League are just over the horizon and that has teams bringing their best. Squads have made the push to lock up a top-four finish in their respective groups, and teams on the outside are looking to make a late run to sneak their way in. That has made for some fierce competition among those teams teetering on the edge. This week also saw many of the …
FaZe Clan adds former Virtus.pro legend Neo to team, replacing AdreN
Steven Rondina
Counter-Strike
FaZe Clan has made some serious changes to its Counter-Strike: Global Offensive roster. The team announced on Twitter that it has added former Virtus.pro captain Filip “NEO” Kubski to the lineup. He will take over in-game leadership duties effective immediately. “Today we welcome Neo who begins his role as a substitute effective immediately,” the team said. “We’re proud to have such a legend join our roster. Neo will be representing …
ENCE break the Astralis Nuke streak, win BLAST Pro Series Madrid
Steven Rondina
Counter-Strike
ENCE Esports exacted a bit of revenge on Astralis at BLAST Pro Series Madrid. In a rematch of the grand finals of the 2019 Katowice Major, the Finnish team took a convincing 2-0 win over the presumptive best team in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive to take first place at the event. This came immediately after another win for ENCE over Astralis in the group stage. The series opened on Nuke with …
OG, NiP eliminated from Disneyland Major with heads held high
Steven Rondina
Counter-Strike
Two more Dota 2 teams were robbed of a fairy tale ending at the MDL Disneyland Paris Major. OG and Ninjas in Pyjamas have been booted from the tournament. They share a fifth-place finish and leave with $60,000 and 900 Dota Pro Circuit points. European rival Team Liquid got the better of OG in their series in the lower bracket. The first two games were incredibly tight, with OG and …
Counter-Strike has long been among the biggest titles in esports and competitive gaming, even going back to esports’ deepest roots from decades past. What’s more, the game continues going strong today, with developer and publisher Valve releasing the latest iteration of the franchise in 2023. The newest version, Counter-Strike 2, has not been without its issues. But its popularity continues the enduring prominence of the Counter-Strike series, signaling that the venerated franchise is likely here to stay for many years yet to come.
But how did the franchise come be to so prominent in the esports space, and role does CS2 have to play in the industry moving forward?
Counter-Strike has roots in the beginnings of esports
Counter-Strike was unquestionably one of the biggest drivers of what we would today consider to be early professional esports movement. It was far from alone, and it wasn’t the most advanced. That likely was StarCraft: Brood War, a real-time strategy game from famed developer Blizzard that caught on in South Korea and led to a professional scene in the country well ahead of any examples of esports industry elsewhere in the world.
But outside of Korea, Counter-Strike quickly became the driving force behind competitive gaming and esports. First released in 1999 as a modification for popular first-person shooter Half-Life, the game was easy to pick up and play for many gamers. Half-Life was borderline ubiquitous software for gamers with a PC, and adding a mod to it was as simple as downloading and applying said mod. So it was that Counter-Strike began to catch fire and spread across the world.
As it spread, so too did its competitive play. Early competitions often centered around online play, most prominently including the Cyberathlete Amateur League (CAL) in North America and the Clanbase Eurocup in Europe. But live, in-person tournaments, similar to those enjoyed by StarCraft players and fans in Korea, were also rising in prominence.
Within just a few years, there were a number of major annual tournaments being held for the original version of Counter-Strike. Notable international tournament organizers included the Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL) in the United States, the Electronic Sports World Cup (ESWC) in France, and the World Cyber Games (WCG) in Korea. This was in addition to many other regional tournaments through which teams could test their mettle and battle over smaller prizes.
But even at bigger tournaments, prizes weren’t what they are today, and in general there was far less money available to professional Counter-Strike players than there is in today’s thriving esports industry which sees many players and teams playing at the full-time pro level. That’s a far cry from a time when perhaps a small handful of players were able to make a true living through playing CS alone, and even them, it was often a modest one.
Counter-Strike 2 at the fore of a bigger esports scene than ever before
Counter-Strike 2 was released to a far different esports space than that which the original Counter-Strike occupied. But what exactly is it that has changed the scene so much, besides the accrual of years?
Esports betting is at the top of the list. The sports betting industry is growing and expanding around the world each and every year, and esports has absolutely been a part of that. As esports betting continues to grow and thrive, it brings its benefits to the games that are being bet on. And Counter-Strike 2 is at the top of that list.
These benefits have arrived through a myriad of means. Fan interest in tournaments has gone up and become more consistent with betting markets available for each and every game played, which further incentivizes tournament organizers and their sponsoring partners. But those partners are also now more likely to work with the pro teams and players themselves. Betting operators are among the most common and most generous sponsors in the pro CS2 space, showing how esports betting’s rise has contributed to Counter-Strike’s continued prominence in esports and competitive gaming as a whole.
