Valorant
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Radiant Valorant streamer Solista banned for cheating on live stream
Fariha Bhatti
Ranking up in Valorant is no easy feat. Renowned Valorant streamer Solista dodged the straight path and used cheats to rank up, but he was caught on livestream. Riot’s Vanguard system to filter out cheaters has been winning the hearts of Valorant players. Vanguard has actively plucked out hackers marring ranked games, some of them getting banned on live broadcasts. However, Solista’s ban has left players who avidly watched his …
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Use these Cypher one-way lineups to rain kills on Split
Fariha Bhatti
Cypher’s tripwire is the perfect antidote to deal with aggressive enemies on Split. His unique cages are just as effective, new lineups demonstrate. Valorant has specifically levied blocking sights on controllers, but a few other agents are also gifted with unique smokes. Cypher is essentially a Sentinel, but his hollow cage shrouds entries and rackets when an enemy comes in contact with the milky grey ring. While his smokes are …
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TenZ says Valorant ranked games are bad for streaming
Fariha Bhatti
Streamer and Valorant pro player Tyson “TenZ” Ngo has revealed a reason why he’s not a huge fan of ranked games in Valorant. Earlier, tons of Valorant professional players have discussed how ranked games can be frustrating due to queue time, rank disparity, lobby restrictions, and random teammates in solo queues. TenZ cosigned this notion and has called out the developer to introduce a 10-man hub like Counter-Strike: Global Offensive’s …
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New Silvanus skin bundle adds unique looks for Vandal, Phantom
Fariha Bhatti
Prepare your wallets! New Valorant skins are dropping soon. Riot Games has actively been delivering rip-roaring skins for Valorant weapons, but this new addition is in a league of its own. The serene yet spooky skin bundle has a novel theme that was earlier spotted in Winter Wunderland, released in Christmas holiday patch. The new skin bundle dubbed “Silvanus” will likely arrive before the upcoming map Breeze, currently being teased …
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TenZ on loan to Sentinels through Valorant Challengers Finals
Nina Forneloza
Tyson “TenZ” Ngo is officially on loan to Sentinels thorugh the end of Challengers Finals, if the team makes it that far, for the Valorant Challengers Stage 2 tournament. TenZ is subbing in for Jay “sinatraa” Won, who is currently under investigation after accusations of sexual assault were brought about by his ex-girlfriend. The accusations came just before the start of Masters Stage 1, which meant that Sentinels needed a …
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Raze’s ultimate can help you trick enemies in post-plant situations
Fariha Bhatti
Raze is not just your aggressive duelist, shooting rockets to cause chaos. The agent can be valuable in post-plant situations with this little trick. Fake tapping the Spike is one of the most common tactics to bag rounds on the defender’s side. In Valorant, the trick becomes easier as you can always half defuse the bomb, punish the attacker for peaking and go back to defusing. However, the clear tap …
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New lineup shows that Sova can still dominate on Split
Fariha Bhatti
Sova is a jack of all trades, but his abilities aren’t especially well-suited to Valorant’s smaller maps. Some new lineups prove that the initiator can still be viable on Split, at the very least. Sova is one the hardest agents to master in Valorant, but his pick rate remains sky-high despite the learning curve. The initiator has become the top pick of both casual Valorant players and professionals on almost …
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Leaked Valorant patch 2.07 shows major Astra and Raze changes
Fariha Bhatti
The upcoming Valorant patch will tweak Viper, Astra, and Raze, according to a leak that released Patch 2.07 days ahead of the scheduled date. Riot Games has just delivered a crucial patch that fixed up Viper and Yoru, bringing the two agents back into the game meta. Players weren’t expecting another update so soon, but a data miner has leaked the entirety of patch 2.07, and it reveals crucial tweaks …
Crouching in Valorant is a terrible idea and here’s why
M Alzamora
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Players crouch into their sprays all the time but this tactic has a tendency to send players back to the scoreboard. The best time to break a bad habit is right now, so here’s why crouching in Valorant’s duels is killing your KD, even if you’re Global Elite. When players first start out, the massive accuracy bonus they get from crouching is too hard to pass up. Both Valorant and …
Valorant’s Night Market returns, teases mysterious “Breeze”
M Alzamora
News
Valorant players got a double dose of good news yesterday with the surprise return of the Night.Market and a tease that hinted towards the release of the game’s sixth map. News began to spread on April 7 that the Night.Market, Valorant’s randomized store, would be back for another limited run. But once it went live it was clear that April’s Market had more in store for players than skins. When …
The Night. Market’s cheap skins are coming back to Valorant
Fariha Bhatti
News
Valorant’s Night. Market has returned with epic in-game cosmetics available at some very low prices. After its reveal in December, the discount store has once again returned to Riot’s tactical shooter. The cosmetic retail shop slashes down the rates of the most luxurious skins for players who’d rather not buy the more expensive bundles in the game. Night. Market is back. Here’s your chance! You never know what will be …
Valorant devs discuss plans for agent ban system
Fariha Bhatti
News
An agent ban system is not coming to Valorant anytime soon, a developer has revealed. Since the game’s release in 2020, Valorant players have anticipated the addition of a ban feature similar to that of League of Legends. The game was initially released with only 10 characters, but now the roster keeps expanding with new patches. The addition of 15th agent Astra had some fans thinking that a ban feature …
Use these Viper Snake Bite lineups to protect the Spike on Bind
Fariha Bhatti
News
The newly buffed Viper is already making hits in high elo Valorant lobbies. These new retake lineups prove that she’s more viable than ever. Smokers become crucial in a map like Bind, where various entries into bomb points call for a substantial blockage. Brimstone stores three big sky smokes in his kit, making him an ideal pick for Bind. While Viper has only one smoke, her toxic screen allows her …
Reports suggest G2 Esports is reviewing its Valorant roster
Fariha Bhatti
News
Several reports have revealed that G2 Esports is gearing up to make significant changes to its Valorant roster. According to the reports, the organization is actively looking for a new in-game leader and is considering benching Aleksander “zeek” Zygmunt after a disappointing run at the Valorant Champions Tour. The team entered Valorant battlegrounds when the pro scene was still in its embryonic stages. Thanks to the roster loaded up with …
New Viper buffs let her dominate Ascent in solo queue
Fariha Bhatti
News
If you’re struggling on Ascent’s attack side, Viper’s your best bet to turn the game around. The poisonous agent was always one of the most self-sufficient controllers, thanks to her damage-focused kit. Brimstone also carries a molotov, but Viper’s wall gives her an edge over other controllers. The extended screen paired with her toxic smoke allows Viper to break open any site. Ascent can be a tricky map to play …
Leak reveals salaries of Valorant stars nitr0, sinatraa
Olivia Richman
News
Even though Valorant is a relatively new esport, some of its top players are still raking in big dough. This explains why big names in Overwatch, Apex Legends, and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive don’t feel it’s too much of a risk to switch over to Valorant in the infancy of its esports scene. The girlfriend Sentinels’ Tyson “TenZ” Ngo’s girlfriend, Kyedae Shymko, seemingly leaked the salaries of two of Valorant’s biggest …
Game-breaking bug lets Yoru plant the spike while invincible
Fariha Bhatti
News
Yoru has turned Valorant players’ dreams of safely planting the Spike into a confusing reality. Riot Games may have incorporated modern gameplay elements and futuristic character designs into Valorant, but the classic bomb defusal theme is still at the center of it all. Attackers must plant the Spike before time runs down, and defenders are tasked with defusing it before the Spike explodes. Despite tons of agent abilities, entering a …
shroud isn’t happy about the aim and recoil in Valorant
M Alzamora
News
Twitch streamer Michael “shroud” Grzesiek let Valorant have a piece of his mind after he nissed what looked like two easy kills while playing his daily dose of Riot Games’ first-person shooter. Twitch fans know that if there’s one thing shroud is known for, it’s hitting some pretty nice flicks on enemy players. But after shroud missed two kills on the Kingdom assassin Reyna, he let loose his frustration with …
This Sova arrow lineup wipes out enemies on Ascent
Fariha Bhatti
News
Sova does wonders on every map, but he’s particularly deadly on Ascent. If you’re opening bomb point B on Ascent, you’ll likely need a controller on your team. The B site entrance is exposed from Defender’s lobby and market angles that can be blocked by smokes. However, the stair is a common angle for enemies to scout B site from. This is one of the trickiest areas to clear for …
TenZ on Sentinels’ roster for Challengers 2, but is he staying?
Nina Forneloza
News
Sentinels has won its first match of Challengers Series 2, and Tyson “TenZ” Ngo is still on the active roster. Many fans are now wondering if TenZ is going to stay with the team, and how the connected investigation into suspended player Jay “sinatraa” Won is going. TenZ is currently on loan from Cloud9 to fill in for Sinatraa, who is under investigation after being accused of sexual assault. Fans …
Riot Games has long looked to expand its footprint beyond the success of popular MOBA League of Legends, and one of its biggest successes to date in this regard is the tactical shooter, Valorant. Blending traditional first-person shooter elements with unique and flashy hero abilities, Valorant seeks to combine the best attributes of tactical shooters and hero shooters into one cohesive experience.
Based on player feedback, the game has largely succeeded in accomplishing those aims. It’s not an easy balance, and it’s one that is arguably still tenuous, but Riot Games seems to be doing as good a job of it as most fans have hoped for.
What type of game is Valorant?
Valorant is a first-person shooter that represents a unique blend of the tactical shooter and hero shooter subgenres. There are some games that represent similar gameplay elements, but not many that offer the exact experience that Valorant puts forward to players.
The tactical shooter genre is often considered to have been defined by the release of the original Counter-Strike, a multiplayer mod for famed single-player PC title Half-Life that later became a standalone game of its own. While most multiplayer FPS games to that point emphasized prolonged battles between opposing players zipping around the game at high speeds, Counter-Strike slowed things down significantly and made players much more susceptible to each other’s firepower, requiring players to take a more tactical approach to play.
That slower and more tactical approach, combined with the lightning-quick nature of action when it does occur, proved reliably popular. That popularity can still be seen today with the ongoing success enjoyed by the Counter-Strike franchise, and it’s this gameplay type that represents the core of Valorant. It’s no accident that former Counter-Strike developers were drafted by Riot Games to help create Valorant during the game’s formative stages.
What differentiates Valorant from CS and other tactical shooters it that each of the game’s characters, called agents, wield a number of unique abilities. Some are typical for tactical shooters, like flashbangs and smokes, while others are wildly different, such as an ability that transports two players to an isolated dueling arena for its duration.
These agent abilities are more reminiscent of hero shooters, a subgenre that arguably got its start with the Team Fortress games but has best been popularized by Blizzard title Overwatch. The abilities, combind with the tactical considerations that are at the core of Valorant, separate it from most any other FPS experience available for play.
How does Valorant esports work?
Like many other popular competitive shooters, Valorant does have a thriving esports scene. That scene is differentiated by the way it’s run and controlled by developer and publisher Riot Games. Riot uses a model based on the success of its League of Legends esports scene, which sees the globe’s competitive players and team’s separated by region. These regions play out their own competitions in their sections of the world before coming together at regular intervals for international tournaments featuring the best teams from each individual region.
While League of Legends once boasted a variety of regions and regional types, Riot sought to simplify that model when setting up esports for Valorant. The game has only a handful of major regions, and these regions are held as largely equitable, each sending their best teams to international events leading up to the year-end VALORANT Champions event.
