shroud returns to CSGO, quits again after just one round

Michael “shroud” Grzesiek returned to Counter-Strike: Global Offensive just to immediately decide he’s once again done with the classic FPS. 

The former CSGO pro was playing on Dust 2 with former roommate and fellow former CSGO pro Justin “just9n” Ortiz, when he died almost immediately. That left shroud to watch his teammates play against the final remaining Counter-Terrorist. Since it was two-on-one situation, it was looking like shroud’s remaining teammates had a pretty good chance of taking the round. But then shroud and his teammates noticed something very wrong happening. 

The game was hit with a major lag spike across all players on the server. just9n started screaming almost immediately, saying that it felt “fucking terrible.” 

“Dude, are you kidding?” Just9n exclaimed. “What the fuck is this game?”

Shroud was chuckling but was very clearly frustrated as well. He said that his team was “done” at that point. He then immediately left the game, removing the view of his desktop from his Twitch stream. 

“You thought Siege was bad? Get a load of this game called Counter-Strike,” shroud joked. 

The major lag was caused by griefers who attempted to crash the server with a DDoS attack. shroud has been openly frustrated with CSGO in recent years due to matchmaking and hacking problems, which was partly responsible for his extended stay in rival tactical shooter Valorant. Though shroud has discussed returning to CSGO both to play as a streamer and co-stream esports events, his occasional returns to the game have consistently ended with reminders of why he left in the first place. It seems unlikely that shroud will return to streaming CSGO any time soon. 

What is a DDoS attack in CSGO?

DDoS stands for “direct denial of service.” This is a form of cyber-attack where the player attempts to make a certain, targeted network unavailable by disrupting the server. A server is targeted by a network of internet-connected machines, with each bot sending requests to the target’s IP address. This causes the server or network to become overwhelmed, slowing it down to a prohibitive degree or crashing it entirely.

In Counter-Strike, this is done fairly easily by bombarding spectating tool GOTV. It can cause massive lag spikes to the game, making it impossible to play. This is particularly troublesome for streamers like shroud, who can easily be targeted by griefers. 

Are DDoS attacks illegal?

DDoS attacks are illegal. Unauthorized DDoS attacks can earn offenders up to 10 years in prison and fines of up to $500,000, according to the Federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.