CS:GO is one of the best competitive shooting games in the history of video games. We all grew up playing this saga in a rundown cyber café in our neighborhood. From 1.6 to now, Valve has been very quiet. Until now.
“Counter-Strike is at its best when teams compete on equal footing and skill is the only limit to their success,” said Valve in their blog.
“In recent years, we have seen professional Counter-Strike move away from that ideal. The ecosystem has gradually become less open, with access to the highest levels of competition increasingly restricted by business relationships,” they explain.
The publisher, who usually stays out of disputes, has introduced numerous changes in the CS:GO professional circuit to make it an “open esports.”
Among them, tournament organizers will no longer be allowed to have “exclusive business relationships or other conflicts of interest with teams participating in their events,” and prize pools will be made public. Invitations to tournaments will be determined through Valve’s new ranking system or open qualifiers.
Valve aims to implement all these requirements by 2025 due to existing long-term agreements. While they acknowledge there might be some setbacks along the way, they are “committed to the long-term health of Counter-Strike as a sport” and will do whatever it takes to ensure its future.
These changes come at the same time as the news that the Competitive Premier mode of Counter-Strike 2 will undergo feature revisions starting from the second season.
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