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As more and more professional CS:GO players make the move to VALORANT we have to ask: Is VALORANT really a threat to CS:GO?
A new project
In October of 2019, Riot Games suddenly announced a slew of projects, one of which was a new tactical shooter. From the get-go it was clear that this game was supposed to be a direct competitor to CS:GO. An economy system, gameplay that essentially boiled down to ‘aim for the head’, and several CS-luminaries who were acting in a consulting role.
Now, one and a half years later, it’s time to see where we stand. Project A, which has turned into VALORANT, has been seeing extensive play and the question on everyone’s mind is: has VALORANT become a threat to CS:GO? The answer unfortunately isn’t as simple as a yes or no. To answer this question it’s important to look at two major regions and see the main differences between the two. I am of course referring to North America and Europe.
Crossing the border
When looking at North America, it’s quite clear that VALORANT’s impact on the CS:GO ecosphere has been huge. The CS:GO scene, which appeared somewhat healthy in the last few months before the release of VALORANT, has been completely gutted. Almost all of the top talent moved to greener pastures, reminiscent of the gold rushes of old. Though it wasn’t just VALORANT which lured NA pro players away. Europe proved to be just as enticing and several professional players decided that a career in North American CS:GO wasn’t on the cards for them, and chose to continue in another region.
100 Gimmicks, 100 noobs, 100k.
Champs of First Strike. LETS GO BABY! #100T
Interestingly enough this transferring of skill has led to North America not necessarily bleeding dry but definitely experiencing firsthand the effects of the rise of VALORANT. However, the big winner in all this is without a doubt Europe. Yes, Europe has also experienced a loss of skill. Several players who have CS:GO backgrounds have made a successful transfer to VALORANT, but most of the elite players have continued plying their trade in Counter-Strike as opposed to jumping on the VALORANT bandwagon.
Level of talent
Those Europeans who are currently competing in VALORANT were never quite on a tier 1 level in the same way that players such as Nick “nitr0” Cannella and Timothy “autimatic” Ta were in the North American region. One could argue that players like Adil “ScreaM” Benrlitom and Kevin “Ex6TenZ” Droolans definitely fit the bill of players who belong in the tier 1 category but both players seemed to be on their way out and were having trouble staying at the top of their game.
With the North American exodus also came opportunities for European rosters to add American players to their rosters, and for North American organizations to sign European teams. VALORANT’s appearance essentially meant the collapse of North American CS:GO. Opportunities for players shrunk and tournaments became scarce. How different is that in Europe? It seems like the European scene is still thriving and has truly become the Mecca of Counter-Strike.
Finding profit in competition
Not just the scenes have been impacted, Valve too has acted on this sudden appearance of a challenger to the crown. Out of nowhere, the American developer started pumping out updates for CS:GO at a pace that baffled even their biggest supporters. New content was added at a blistering pace, problems with the meta of the game were suddenly fixed and CS:GO was finally alive again.
Release Notes for today are up. We’ve made multiple adjustments to Retakes and the ping feature, agent audio, mini scoreboard misalignment, and more: https://t.co/uxm93xtYYv
Everything in this piece has been looking at things from the perspective of an esports enthusiast, but the one big group that’s being forgotten is the one of the casual player. The player who just wants to have fun with friends and play a couple of games. They’re truly the big winner in all of this. The competition between Valve and Riot has reignited the spark of interest in tactical FPS and both companies appear to be profiting as a result.
CS:GO is posting record numbers and while there aren’t any player numbers for VALORANT, nothing has indicated that Riot is currently struggling in the player department. While obviously not a great barometer for the state of the game, the VALORANT subreddit has close to 800.000 registered redditors which would indicate that the game is in a healthy state.
In limbo
So the answer to the question of whether VALORANT is a threat to CS:GO is: “well yes, but no.” It’s true that the North American esports scene is suffering from talent that is leaving CS:GO for VALORANT but at the same time, the European scene is thriving and CS:GO as a game is seeing numbers it hasn’t seen for a while. The game is being updated regularly and competition between developers seems to have been the catalyst that Valve needed. And we are all better for it.
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