70 Fun Facts About CS:GO

Which studio co-developed Counter-Strike: Global Offensive with Valve, having begun by porting its predecessor?

The console port of Counter-Strike: Source grew into a full sequel once Valve saw the opportunity.

In which month and year was CS:GO first released for Windows, OS X, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360?

The Linux version did not arrive until September 2014, and cross-platform play between PC and consoles was dropped so the PC version could be updated freely.

How many official game modes did CS:GO have?

They were Competitive, Casual, Deathmatch, Arms Race, Demolition, Wingman, Flying Scoutsman, Retakes and Danger Zone.

A full CS:GO Competitive match is a best-of how many rounds?

Wingman, the two-on-two mode, runs over just sixteen rounds.

CS:GO's Competitive skill ranks were based on which rating system?

Early reviewers complained the ranking felt ineffective when players of wildly different skill were mixed together at launch.

Which mode equips everyone with only an SSG 08 and a knife on a low-gravity map?

The SSG 08 is the rifle players informally call the Scout.

In Retakes mode, how many Terrorists defend the planted bomb against four Counter-Terrorists?

Players pick a loadout card at the start of each round instead of buying weapons.

Which new CS:GO equipment delivers a one-shot close-range kill with an electric charge?

The incendiary grenade was the other addition the series had not seen before.

Which popular community mod has players complete obstacle courses with advanced strafing and jumping?

The PC version supports private dedicated servers that can be heavily modified beyond the base modes.

What was the name of the August 2013 update that introduced weapon skins and cases to CS:GO?

The skin economy it created is widely seen as the update that pushed the game's player count past every earlier Counter-Strike.

Which purchasable events, accessed via passes, gave players objectives and an upgradeable coin?

Operation maps are community made, so some of the revenue goes to the map designers.

What did the October 2014 update add that plays the round MVP's own soundtrack for everyone?

Kits can be borrowed, sold and traded on the Steam Community Market.

Which classic map was remade and re-released in February 2016 as part of Operation Wildfire?

Valve said the goals were to balance the map and make it more aesthetically pleasing.

In April 2016 Prime matchmaking launched. What did a player need to link to their account to take part?

The aim was to keep legitimate players away from cheaters and from high-skill players on alternate accounts, known as smurfing.

In October 2016 consumable "graffiti" items replaced which older customisable feature?

Glove skins were added a month later.

Which publisher released a censored version of CS:GO in mainland China in September 2017?

Skulls were censored and the hammer and sickle was removed from Cache and Train.

What was CS:GO's hidden matchmaking score, introduced in November 2017, called?

Valve never lets players see their score or the full list of what goes into it.

In which month and year did CS:GO become fully free to play?

Anyone who had already bought the game was upgraded to Prime status automatically.

What was the name of the battle-royale mode added to CS:GO in late 2018?

The same update replaced the old Scaleform interface with the Panorama UI.

Operation Shattered Web (November 2019) was notable for introducing what to CS:GO?

Operation Broken Fang followed in December 2020 with the first cinematic trailer since launch.

CS:GO source code leaked in April 2020 alongside the code for which other Valve game?

Valve confirmed the leak was genuine but said current builds were not at risk.

How much per month did the "CS:GO 360 Stats" subscription cost when it launched in May 2021?

Players pointed out that free third-party sites offered similar stats.

In 2019 Valve made new keys untradeable after concluding key trading was being used for what?

Valve said "nearly all" key purchases that ended up traded on the marketplace were fraud-sourced.

In July 2018 Valve disabled case opening in which two countries over their gambling laws?

Two lawsuits over skin gambling sites had already been filed against Valve in 2016.

In the 2014 match-fixing scandal, iBUYPOWER deliberately lost to which team?

Seven players were permanently banned from Majors, though other organisers later let them compete.

Which iBUYPOWER player escaped the Major ban because he took no payment, and later won a Major?

The others' bans effectively ended the careers of two of North America's best in-game leaders.

The 2020 coaching scandal involved coaches exploiting a bug to do what?

The Esports Integrity Commission said almost 100 coaches would be sanctioned.

CS:GO set a record of how many concurrent players in March 2023?

The previous record of 1.3 million had been set in April 2020 during the pandemic.

The first significant TV rights deal for CS:GO put the ELEAGUE Major 2017 on which US cable network?

Turner followed up with Esports 101: CSGO and a docu-series in 2018.

CS:GO won a fan-voted eSports title-of-the-year prize at which ceremony in 2015?

It was nominated for Best Esports Game at the same show in 2017 and 2019 to 2022.

The first Valve-recognised CS:GO Major, DreamHack Winter 2013, was held in which country?

The $250,000 prize pool was partly community-funded through the Arms Deal update.

Which team won the first CS:GO Major in 2013?

It was an upset over the Swedish rivals who had gone 87-0 on LAN the previous year.

Which team's CS:GO lineup put together an 87-0 LAN map winning streak in 2012-13?

GeT_RiGhT, part of that lineup, was HLTV's best player in the world in both 2013 and 2014.

Ahead of MLG Columbus 2016, Valve permanently raised the Major prize pool from $250,000 to what?

At the same time the number of Majors per year dropped from three to two.

Which Brazilian team won MLG Columbus 2016 to become the first non-European Major champion?

The same roster won the next Major, Cologne 2016, playing under the SK Gaming banner.

Gambit Esports, the first CIS team to win a Major (2017), was mainly players from which country?

It was also counted as the first Asian team to win a Major.

Which team won the ELEAGUE Major: Boston 2018, the first North American Major winner?

Boston was also the first Major expanded from 16 to 24 teams and the first held across two cities.

Which Danish team won the most CS:GO-era Majors, with four?

London 2018, Katowice 2019 and Berlin 2019 made them the first team to win three in a row.

Why was ESL One Rio 2020, planned as the first South American Major, never played?

The prize pool had been doubled to $2,000,000 by merging two Majors before the cancellation.

Which team won PGL Major Stockholm 2021 without dropping a single map, a CS:GO first?

The final peaked at 2.75 million concurrent viewers, a Counter-Strike record.

s1mple, HLTV's No. 1 player in 2018, 2021 and 2022, is from which country?

He won his first Major title and the MVP award at Stockholm 2021.

Which organisation won PGL Major Antwerp 2022, the first international roster to win a Major?

They beat Natus Vincere 2-0 in the final.

Under which neutral name did Virtus.pro compete at IEM Rio 2022?

They beat Heroic 2-0 in the final.

Which French organisation won BLAST Paris 2023, the final CS:GO Major?

They beat dark horse GamerLegion 2-0 with home-country star ZywOo.

How old was ZywOo when he first won HLTV Player of the Year, the second-youngest ever?

He is one of only three players, with coldzera and donk, to win it in his first full professional year.

Where was the first Counter-Strike 2 Major held in March 2024?

It was played at the Royal Arena; the second CS2 Major went to Shanghai that December.

Who designed Dust II before the original Counter-Strike even shipped?

It received its first significant visual overhaul in CS:GO in October 2017.

The original Counter-Strike began in 1999 as a mod for which Valve game?

Minh Le and Jess Cliffe's mod grew so popular that Valve bought the IP and hired them.

Counter-Strike: Source (2004) was developed by Valve with which studio, later famous for Left 4 Dead?

It was a remake of the 2000 original on the then-new Source engine.

On what date did Counter-Strike 2 replace CS:GO on Steam?

The closed beta had started on March 22, 2023, the day the game was announced.

Support for which operating system was dropped when Counter-Strike 2 arrived?

All 167 CS:GO achievements were also removed, and only ten maps shipped at launch.

Which of these game modes was removed with Counter-Strike 2 and NOT brought back in 2024?

Arms Race was cut too but returned in early 2024.

Under Valve's rules, who holds a team's Major qualification spot?

Team EnVyUs lost its 2017 qualifier spot when three players moved to G2 Esports.

Since 2017 the Major group stages have used which tournament format?

Win three matches and you advance; lose three and you are out.

Which high-profile French pro was VAC-banned in 2014 while playing for Titan?

A VAC ban is a permanent lifetime ban from VAC-secured servers.

Where is CS:GO's co-developer studio based?

It is a short drive from Valve's own headquarters in the Seattle area.

In which year was Counter-Strike: Global Offensive first revealed to the public?

Development had begun in March 2010 as Hidden Path's console port of Counter-Strike: Source, and the reveal came on August 12, 2011.

Roughly how many people had access when CS:GO's closed beta began in November 2011?

Keys were handed out at showcase events, and the beta only widened once client and server stability problems were fixed.

Which platform got CS:GO in September 2014, more than two years after the other versions?

The game launched on Windows, OS X, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 on August 21, 2012, with Linux trailing behind.

Why did Valve drop its plans for cross-platform play between PC and consoles in CS:GO?

The console versions consequently froze in place, while the PC game went on to receive updates for over a decade.

What did two lawsuits filed in mid-2016 accuse skin-betting sites and Valve of encouraging?

The suits also alleged undisclosed promotion by streamers; Valve responded by cutting the sites off from Steamworks and several closed.

In Counter-Strike 2, a standard match ends when one team wins how many rounds?

That is a maximum of 24 regulation rounds, down from CS:GO's 30-round matches where 16 wins took the game.

How many maps make up the Premier mode pool in Counter-Strike 2's pick-and-ban system?

Premier also replaced CS:GO's 18 skill ranks with a numerical rating, while Competitive now ranks players per map.

CS2's revised loadout lets a player bring how many weapons in total into a match?

The split is five pistols, five mid-tier weapons such as SMGs and shotguns, and five rifles.

Which map did Valve rebuild from the ground up as an 'Overhaul' for Counter-Strike 2?

Dust II was a layout-unchanged 'Touchstone' map and Nuke got the 'Upgrades' treatment with new Source 2 lighting and materials.

Who composed the new music for Counter-Strike 2?

A soundtrack album followed on Ipecac Recordings, Mike Patton's label, on November 1, 2023.

Roughly how many Counter-Strike loot boxes were reportedly opened during 2023?

Eurogamer and Dot Esports estimated the cases generated about US$1 billion in revenue that year alone.

In Counter-Strike 2's Wingman mode, how many round wins does a team need?

Wingman is two-versus-two on a single bombsite; Retakes, by contrast, is decided at eight rounds.

About how many Steam reviews from CS:GO masked the wave of negative CS2 reviews at launch?

Rock Paper Shotgun estimated that reviews of CS2 alone would have shown a 'mixed' 59% rating on the store page.

What was Counter-Strike 2's invite-only beta, opened to select CS:GO players in March 2023, called?

On September 1, 2023 it opened to everyone who had bought CS:GO before it went free-to-play and was active in competitive matchmaking.