CS:GO is now free for anyone to play, and there’s a battleroyale gamemode. And there’s
a new weapons case which I’ll cover some other time.
I’m going to say this is the biggest update that CS:GO has ever received, putting it in
direct competition with Fortnite. That’s not to say it IS fortnite. The Battleroyale
map for CS:GO is incredibly small and the action, frantic. I don’t think anybody has
had the time to experience it properly yet, but here’s what to expect.
If you solo-queue you’ll be placed on the island with 15 other players. If you choose
to play with friends there will be 18 in total… because that number nicely divides by 2 and
3. For warmup, you get parachuted into the map
with a pistol. Anybody killed immediately respawns. Once everyone has joined, the real
game begins and you choose where on the map you want to start from. This is an interesting
way of doing things: if you pick quickly you can choose from anywhere, but if you wait
until last, you won’t have so many spots to choose from but will have a better idea
of where everybody else is, so can choose how busy your landing spot is.
CS:GO’s budget has really gone up because you’re then all deployed from separate helicopters.
You have a bit of control over where you land, but the swinging mechanic is fiddly and will
take some time to master. You can let go of the rope a bit early for lols.
Expect a lot of falling damage. I regularly lost health from jumping from first floor
windows or from doing drops that, in other games, probably wouldn’t have punished you
for. You start with fists, some medic kits and
your tablet and can use your buy button to spend cash you’ve collected around the map
on weapons, items and advantages. Also, your starting health is 120, as opposed
to the usual 100. A headshot with most weapons deals around 100, so I’m guessing a bit
extra was needed to make engagements take longer than one crisp clean lock.
Getting punched results in CRAZY amounts of screen-shake. Insane levels! This may be to
encourage players to rush enemies armed with weapons, since a punch is enough to throw
their aim off completely. Everything seems geared towards offense, rather than the usual
Battle Royale strat of hiding in a corner until everybody else is dead.
If this sounds like a lot to take in- you’re not alone! This isn’t Counter-Strike as
we know it. And I found my knowledge of the game counted for little when ammo was so scarce
and the map so open. You don’t feel safe anywhere.
There are automatic turrets that shoot you, there are drones flying about everywhere delivering
supplies that have been bought by other players- these will seriously give away a player’s
position, and it takes so long to open and to pick up items you’ll be incredibly exposed
and vulnerable while doing so. You have to pick up bullets one at a time!
Oh and the C4 explodes with the same force as in normal gameplay. You have been warned.
And, on top of all this, there are missile strikes, deployed from an oilrig or something
off-shore and announced by a man with a HILARIOUS accent! The damage from the ‘DANGER ZONE’
is low, but the sound, brutal and the concept a bit disturbing. This ‘dangerzone’ gradually
consumes the map in a style you’re probably used to by now from Battleroyale games.
Your map is very useful, but takes up most of the screen when on show. It represents
where players are with yellow hexagons. This will show you ROUGHLY where on the map people
are. And your map won’t work in the underground regions, making you feel even more vulnerable.
The games I’ve had haven’t lasted longer than a couple of minutes. I think we’re
all a bit new to it at the moment and it will take time for proper strategies to develop,
but it’s exciting stuff. And it’s not a clone of Fortnite, either:
it may be battle royale but it’s got a distinctively Counter-Strike-y twist to it. And I’m not
just talking the gunplay here. The pacing feels different from other games and I like
how it encourages you to move around, offering financial incentives and risky missions. I
haven’t felt inclined to camp as you HAVE to collect money and items to stand a chance
in the end-game, especially with ammunition so limited. The learning curve is steep and
I suspect will take a long time to master. Don’t expect time for a toilet break.
There have been hints to this gamemode for YEARS. Weapon_fists and breachcharge were
discovered within Counter-Strike’s files AGES ago. No doubt the popularity of the genre
has spurred this update on, but I hope it continues to offer a different flavour of
battleroyale to other entries on the market. And let’s not forget the other change, which
may be even bigger news than a new gamemode: Counter-Strike is now free. Completely free.
Expect a wave of new players and renewed fears of cheating epidemics. But Global Offensive
is an established game, with many cheat-prevention measures in place. And there’s still prime
and trust factor to distance honest and older players from the cheaters. I think Valve are
about as ready to make the game free as they can be.
And those of you who had the game before this point will have a shiny new Loyalty Badge,
and will have been upgraded to Prime Status if you hadn’t been already. I’m not sure
how I feel about this, but I guess we can see it as Valve having confidence in their
Trust Factor scheme. For new players who wish to have access to Prime, you still have to
pay for it. It costs the same as CS:GO did before it went free, and will let you play
with other paying players who have more to lose if they get caught cheating!
Battle Royale is the cool thing right now and I can understand the need to include it
in Counter-Strike. But for me, classic competitive will always be the heart of the Counter-Strike
experience and will remain popular long after the Battle Royale craze has died down. If
you don’t care about this new game mode then you should be able to ignore it and to
continue playing the game as normal. Or at least, you would if the update hadn’t
broken the game for players using AMD and Intel graphics cards, who are reporting regular
crashes following the update. This is a SERIOUS issue that apparently extends well beyond
the battleroyale gamemode. I’m hoping a solution is found as soon as possible as this
is GAME BREAKING. This update is exciting for everybody within
the community. CS:CO maker ZooL has been busy checking out the new items and scripts, of
which there have been many. He pointed out to me that fire grenades no longer explode
in the air, allowing for cool next gen strats like THIS. Valve, please fix. And Bez the
Bot Whisperer says that bots CAN spawn and choose their starting spots, but they have
no way to navigate the map right now so just stand there, looking intimidatingly at anybody
nearby. So yeah, massive update, and now the game’s
free you have no excuse not to boot it up and to give it a go for yourselves. On this
day, Counter-Strike has transformed into something new. I will be very interested to know how
this update, and indeed this very video, ages with time.