- Counter-Strike 2 has already been available for one week
- However, it still has some teething issues
- Shroud says these will have a catastrophic impact on the franchise as a whole
Despite CS2 being one of the most anticipated games of 2023, not everyone seems to be happy with where the game is at right now, including popular streamer and former CS:GO pro Shroud.
Shroud Expresses Opinion Regarding CS2
CS:GO has been at the forefront of competitive FPS games for over a decade, being host to some of the biggest events in esports. With the arrival of the highly-anticipated Counter-Strike 2, the competitive scene is going to undergo some changes. With its new Source 2 engine the game brings new features and possibilities and fans have high hopes for the future of the game.
However, this opinion is not shared by the entire community, as some think Valve’s revamped flagship shooter might. Popular Twitch streamer and former CS:GO professional player Michael “Shroud” Grzesiek doesn’t seem to be so optimistic about the future of Counter-Strike. In a recent broadcast, the streamer called for some changes to the responsive smokes in the new first-person shooter. These new smoke grenade mechanics were one of the selling points of the game when Valve first announced the changes, but it seems Shroud is not too excited about this.
“They need to delete the smoke effect,” Shroud said while playing a game on Vertigo. “When you run out of the smoke when you’re f**king Batman. They literally need to delete that from this game. I think this game dies. CS dies with two. I think it does. I firmly believe that,” he concluded on a pessimistic note.
It’s not a surprise that Counter-Strike 2 has problems so early on after its release. In fact, it has become somewhat customary for big gaming titles to suffer many issues upon launch, only for them to be rectified at a later date, although this has negative consequences for the game’s reputation.
Counter-Strike 2 seems like it’s no exception to that rule as many players have been complaining about having connection issues or having to wait for very long times to find a match. This is due to the fact the servers are overloaded. It’s likely this is the reason that CS2 still hasn’t broken CS:GO’s record of concurrent players, despite the former being hotly anticipated.
Shroud’s take on the new game sure is a controversial one and it seems his teammate has quite the opposite opinion. “I feel like you’re a being a little negative,” said his teammate. Shroud then reconfirmed his statement, adding to it the rhetoric question “Which I mean, we had a good run no?”
Despite what Shroud said, Counter-Strike 2’s numbers keep going up a week after its release. However, many games have had such initial surges of popularity before entering a steep dive, so Shroud could very well be right in the end.