counter-strike 2 guide|https://counterstrike2pedia.com/ players have often found creative means of using the game's community map aspect with some CS:GO players recreating popular locations from franchises like The Witcher . Now, a Finnish newspaper called Helsingin Sanomat is using the same feature to share details about the war in Ukraine among Russian gamers owing to the title's popularity within the community. A custom-made map dubbed "de_voyna," a fictionalized Slavic city, was released today that aims to echo some of the cities that have been destroyed over the course of the war. More interestingly, the map contains images and voice recordings captured by the newspaper's journalists on the ground situation, all of which players can interact with in-g

CS:GO is a staple title in the competitive shooting scene, but like any long-running game, the game's standard levels eventually wear thin. Modders help keep the game fresh for casual play by injecting extra mechanics, weapons, models, and arenas into the popular tactical shooter. Homage maps that port settings from other titles into the game are especially popu

The era of CS:GO skin gambling may be coming to an end as Steam updated its Online Conduct policy to prevent users from engaging in this type of activity. More specifically, the latest update to this policy states that Steam users shall not engage in commercial activities such as running contests, buying or selling Steam accounts, posting advertisements, or gambling. This last element is the most crucial one for Counter-Strike players , as it explicitly states that the action of gambling skins is now frowned upon by St

However, this isn't the first time a Valve product or service was indirectly involved in the war efforts. It was recently reported that the Ukrainian military is using the Steam Deck to remotely control turrets . Here, the Steam Deck runs a custom UI that allows the operator to be up to 500 meters (1,640 feet) away from the turret. The custom version is reportedly capable of installing any anti-personnel or anti-tank weapon as w

Skin gambling has been a regular activity for CS:GO fans , allowing them to bet on their cosmetics in hopes of winning better ones. Various platforms offer these services, with players placing bets on professional matches or joining lotteries using their in-game cosmetics as currency. Valve previously launched legal action against gambling sites that demanded access to the Steam API, automatically loading the users’ inventory to ease the betting process. However, since all CS:GO skin gambling websites don’t use this Steam API, players could still bet on their cosmetics if they wanted

The Counter-Strike franchise features some of the most impressive shooting levels in video games, including the legendary Dust 2 map. Dust 2 has, itself, been ported to a number of other video games as a custom level, most recently making the jump to Fortni

In order to further contain CS:GO 's French marketplace, perhaps to avoid market manipulation through the use of X-Ray Scanners, Valve is making one additional change. Loot boxes can no longer be purchased from the Steam Community Market in France. All CS:GO players in the country will have to earn their own loot boxes. Though, naturally, Valve will still allow those players to sell their loot boxes to those in other countr

As if that isn't frustrating enough, Valve has apparently "preloaded" the X-Ray Scanner with an item already. Meaning that players will have to purchase this item, regardless of whether they want it, in order to use the X-Ray Scanner on a loot box. The X-Ray Scanner may appear to be beneficial to players, but ultimately is just another effort at encouraging players to begin purchasing microtransactions . There's little reason to believe it's significantly beneficial over

Even the most popular multiplayer games sometimes need to implement AI-controlled "bot" characters. These can play a number of roles, including filling out extra spots to get more game lobbies running, or giving beginning players easier targets in the case of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds implementing bots on PC last year . Valve's Counter-Strike: Global Offensive has used bots to replace players who are dropped from a team, but as of today that is no longer the c

Another contentious change in the latest patch is the removal of the ability to highlight weapons during competitive matches using "pings." Twitter user unhappy_an suggests this alleviates a concern in which players could use discarded weapons to track when opponents are in a given locale, but at the same time it removes functionality for online matchmaking teams that want to tell allies where they can pick up suppl

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive has been on the market for over 8 years, and during that time it has accrued a truly impressive variety of custom maps, including a number of levels adapted from earlier iterations of the series. But modders are still contributing fresh arenas to the game, including an impressive recent rendering of one of The Witcher 3 's most famous Loca