It has not taken long to be confirmed, just a few hours ago we were talking about a hypothetical Counter-Strike 2, as a result of several related brands that have been recently registered by Valve, and now the company has confirmed it, and also with very good news for current CS:GO players. It still does not have a specific date, but it does have a season (and we won’t have to wait long), a beta that starts earlier than you might think and, although Valve has some surprises in store for its launch, it has also already advanced some of the most recent news. highlights of this new generation of one of the most successful shooters of all time.
How could it be otherwise, Counter-Strike 2 will mean a significant leap in terms of its technical section, which in turn will translate into significant improvements in the game compared to the current version. To this end, CS2 is being built with the Source 2 graphics enginepresented in 2015 to replace the veteran Source, from 2004, and which is the same used by other company titles such as DOTA 2 and Half-Life: Alyx, among others from the company.
Pending more news from Valve, one of the most notable novelties of Counter-Strike 2 is that smoke grenades are now dynamic volumetric objects that interact with the environment and react to lighting, gunshots, and explosions. And what does that mean? Well, they will be context sensitive and, therefore, they can be passed through by bullets, creating holes in the smoke. They will also be affected by other grenades, such as incendiary or stun grenades, altering their shape and duration. Another novelty is the elimination of the tick rate of the servers, that is, the frequency with which the information between the players and the server is updated. Now, the game will use sub-tick updates, which will allow a smoother and more precise communication between the clients and the server, eliminating problems such as lag or peeker’s advantage.
As I said at the beginning, there is very good news for Counter-Strike: Global Offensive players, and the first is that Counter-Strike 2 will include all the maps we already know from CS:GO, although the jump to Source 2 will translate into a huge improvement in the visual section, as you can see in the image below, as well as in the interactive examples published by Valve on the official page of the games. In some cases, in addition, the map improvements will not only be aesthetic.
Another good news for those who come from CS:GO is that Counter-Strike 2 will be a free update for them, who will also keep weapons, skins and other digital assets. In this way, the jump to Counter-Strike 2 will be completely free for them and, in addition, it will not entail the loss of everything they have accumulated in Global Offensive over the years.
Valve has announced that Counter-Strike 2 will be released in summer 2023, although he has not specified an exact date. However, the most impatient players will be able to try the game from today, since a closed beta has been enabled for a limited number of users that will be expanded over time. To access the beta, players will need to have CS:GO installed on their computer and request an invite via the game’s official website.
