Counter Strike: Global Offensive is a game that has been around for eight years, and is still standing strong. Ever since its release back in 2012, the first person shooter has dominated the competitive scene among the plethora of other games in its genre.
Screenshot from Valorant's released gameplay footage
However, ever since Riot's announcement of their upcoming 'Project A', doubts were beginning to rise about the future of this competitive shooter; and with Riot releasing the first details of its game on Sunday night, the doubts have started changing to beliefs.
'Valorant' - This is what Riot decided to name the game that might just be, the killer of CS:GO. It is clear from the gameplay footage that Valorant is a sort of hybrid of CS:GO and overwatch, or that of DoTA and Fortnite. The game allows players to choose from several unique characters with special abilities, some fight in the front lines, some can heal their teammates and some fight with grenades or airstrikes.
The concept of the game on its own is really unique and can certainly give CS:GO a run for its money. But Riot went a step further and hit the Valve title at places where it'd hurt the most: Anti-Cheat and 128 tick servers.
Riot Games have promised to focus on anti cheat from the very beginning of its release, something that CS:GO severely lacks at, while also ensuring the availability of 128 tick servers across the game along with a mere 35 ms of latency in major cities of the world.
And there's even more! Riot promised that the game, in spite of having stunning graphics, will be able to deliver a minimum 30 fps even on decade old PCs, and 60 to 144 FPS on most modern gaming PCs.
Screenshot from Valorant's released gameplay footage
With all these amazing features that Valorant brings to the table, it seems almost inevitable that it's going to take over CS as the next big title in the world of competitive shooters, which leads us to the question, 'Is it possible to save CS:GO?'. The answer to this question depends on Valve's next move.
Valve has to step up their game. Now I can't deny that Valve is showing CS:GO a lot of love recently, I'd be preaching to the choir otherwise. Ever since the game went free-to-play with its danger zone update last year, It's receiving a significant number of updates including several new cases, weapon fixes and multiple QoL changes. With The Shattered Web update, Valve showed that this game is in for a long run; Lots of new stuff were introduced to the game and the community reciprocated in kind by repeatedly setting all time peak concurrent player records which were unprecedented in the history of the game.
But is it enough?
Unfortunately, it's probably not. Valve still has to make some drastic changes if they want to make their playerbase stick to the game. A great start would be improving the anti cheat of their game, which is infamous for not being able to catch a good number of blatant cheaters who play a big part in ruining the game. The next move by Valve will surely be the deciding factor for the future of this game.
Another huge decider of the fate of the game will be the community itself. After two decades of ruling the competitive scene, the Counter Strike series has defined an entire era of esports. It has changed how people look at esports and gaming in general. Will the fans ever be able to quit the game that defined their childhood? The game that they spent countless hours grinding and perfecting? The game that was an escape from reality for almost every gamer at some point?
Only time will tell...
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