Two new community (competitive) maps released for CS2 today, and one has callouts in the map itself. Created by FMPONE and MF_Kitten, we have Thera.

I decided to make a callouts map because it's the only way we will play for sure... although the new ranking system also helps, we won't be thrown in way over our heads when we play.

Thera looks to be a smaller map, but there are a fair number of upper and lower parts. However, since I used the in game minimap to make this map, the lower parts are darkened and not obvious. If anyone knows how to get the base layout map (much higher res, used to be shown in loading screens), please let me know. The map underneath the writing is terrible and I added contrast and denoised it a bunch just to make it useable.

As for the callouts, I changed a few parts. Here's the list of everything different (or could be different) about the in-map callouts:

• "B Balcony" is just an unnamed balcony next to B site (which, btw, is slightly underground, under the "B platform")
• I added "B" to "B platform", since "A platform" exists.
• I added "B" to "B ramp". For the same reason above, I thought "Ramp" and "A ramp" would be poor choices.
• I debated, but ultimately didn't add "B" to "Stairs". There is also "T stairs", which is underwhelming in comparison.
• Same as above, I did not add "A" to "Arch", even though "Mid arch" also exists on the map.
• I added "Bottom mid", as well as "T mid" to "Upper mid". "Upper Mid" is through the "Mid arch", which does make it a little disconnected from where I'd put "Upper mid".
• I added "Long A" to "Long hall". That's just what I'd call it.
• There are two callouts, "Upper catwalks" and "Lower catwalks", that are right above/below each other, so the callouts are just together on the map.
• I think "CT bar" should just be "Bar", since there is only one.

From 3kliksphilip

Some said the throphy is broken, is there any proof?

Blatant cheating on CS2, what do? Should we just not play CS2 until they work some solution out?

It's sad to see valve not making a new special medal or stickers for this major... They shouldn't have copied every last major for the first CS2 major...

Im currently thinking about doing a weekly Updates thread here, anybody interested? After all, without content the sub will never grow.

Has CSGO been renamed to CS2? If so why?

Will the game get renamed again in the future or be renamed backed to CSGO?

Hi! I’m trying to play on my fav resolution. 1280x960. But whenever I switch to it, slow mouse movements to the left and up don’t work, I need to move it fast to register. It’s fine on 16:9 or even 4:3 in menus. Any ideas?

I’m on Fedora 38 KDE Wayland

I played a dozen or so matches in CS2 and sometimes enemies had a Premier rank of around 2500-4000 but according to Leetify the were Global Elite in CS:GO matchmaking!I'm Gold Nova 2 in CS:GO so naturally I get stomped by those players. What are your experiences? Is the rank not representative yet?

[ MAPS ]

Inferno

• Various bug fixes and tweaks

[ GAMEPLAY ]

• Players who survive the last round before overtime no longer carry their items into overtime
• Disabled Casual matchmaking temporarily to avoid a bug where servers get stuck in the end-of-match state

[ SOUND ]

• Fixes for missing music in Casual mode

[ MISC ]

• Various bug fixes and tweaks to Premier UI elements
• Various bug fixes and tweaks to weapon finishes
• Fixed a crash that occurs when changing audio devices
• Fixed an issue where players who abandon during Premier map voting receive multiple cooldowns

Today we’re updating the CS2 Limited Test with a new map (Inferno!) and the all new CS Rating.

Your CS Rating is a visible measurement of your Counter-Strike performance, and it will determine where you stand on global and regional leaderboards. To get your CS Rating, play matches in the updated Premier mode (our Active Duty Pick-Ban competitive mode) either on your own or with your friends.

Counter-Strike 2: Beyond Global

Additionally, today we’re starting the process of inviting as many eligible players as possible to the Limited Test. To be eligible for a CS2 Limited Test invite players must have CS:GO Prime status, an active official competitive matchmaking Skill Group, and play majority of their official matchmaking games in one of the regions where the Limited Test is available.

Saving Time

Over the past decade, we’ve shipped updates to the economy and weapon balance to trim the fat and reduce the number of uncontested rounds in a match of CS.

Because of these changes, exciting competitive matches can be resolved with fewer rounds. And shorter matches mean players can play more, and more often. So with CS2, we’re moving to a maximum of 24 rounds in regulation time (with a 6 round overtime in case of a tie) for Premier, Competitive, and the Majors.

We expect the structure and flow of matches to evolve over time as the community adapts. And we’re excited to see where they go next.

[ GAMEPLAY ]

• Fixed bullet penetration through players

[ SOUND ]

• Audio mix tweaks and adjustments

[ MAPS ]

• All maps previously shipped in the Limited Test are available in casual and deathmatch matchmaking
• All maps and game modes previously shipped in the Limited Test are available for offline play

[ GAMEPLAY ]

• Dropped bombs no longer sink in water
• Reworked the bullet penetration system
• Enabled bot takeover where applicable

[ MAPS ]

Italy

• Various bug fixes and tweaks

[ MISC ]

• Added more hostage variants

[ GAMEPLAY ]

• Competitive and Private Matchmaking are currently disabled in the Limited Test
• Minor adjustments to smoke cloud shape

[ MAPS ]

• Added Italy to Deathmatch and Casual game modes
• Removed Anubis and Ancient

[ ECONOMY ]

• Unified StatTrak position on both CS2 M4 models to not occlude stickers
• Adjusted sticker sizes on CS2 M4A4 so they no longer overlap

[ MISC ]

• Updated hostage models

[ SOUND ]

• Audio mix tweaks and adjustments

[ WORKSHOP TOOLS ]

• Added support for multiple team introduction variants

[ MAPS ]

• Anubis

  • Removed from Competitive mode
  • Various bug fixes and tweaks

• Ancient

  • Added to Competitive mode
  • Various adjustments to lighting
  • Added missing collision detection to some debris

[ MISC ]

• Various adjustments to C4 animation
• Water rendering performance improvements

[ MAPS ]

• Anubis

  • Improved movement clipping map-wide
  • Adjustments to collision around pillars
  • Plugged holes in world geometry
  • Fixed issues with weapon and bomb clipping through world geometry

• Ancient

  • Improved water clarity at T spawn
  • Adjustments to jumpable locations
  • Adjustments to collision around corners
  • Various adjustments to lighting

[ MISC ]

• Fixed an issue with round restart in the middle of weapon reloading
• Fixed a case where incendiary grenades fail to detonate in water
• Ragdoll limbs splash when they hit water

A Level Playing Field

Counter-Strike is at its best when teams compete on a level playing field and when ability is the only limit to their success.

Over the past few years, we’ve seen professional Counter-Strike drift away from that ideal. The ecosystem has become gradually less open, with access to the highest levels of competition increasingly gated by business relationships.

We think that Counter-Strike should be an open sport. So we’re going to add new requirements to running large-scale competitive events. The finer details are still in progress, but here are the broad strokes:

• Tournament organizers will no longer have unique business relationships or other conflicts of interest with teams that participate in their events.
• Invitations to all tournaments will use our ranking system (detailed here), or otherwise be determined by open qualifiers.
• Any compensation for participating teams—prize pool or otherwise—will be made public and will be driven by objective criteria that can be inspected by the community.

Since tournament organizers have existing long term commitments, these requirements will take effect as of 2025. There will be some rough edges to the transition, but we’re committed to the long-term health of Counter-Strike as a sport and are looking forward to its bright and open future.

[ GAMEPLAY ]

• Disabled Wingman

[ MAPS ]

• Added Anubis to Deathmatch, Casual, and Competitive game modes
• Added Ancient to Deathmatch and Casual game modes
• Removed Overpass and Vertigo

[ MISC ]

• Taught chickens how to swim
• Weapons splash when dropped in water
• Adjusted grenade/water interaction sounds

[ ANIMATION ]

• Improved head animation when crouching while running
• Improved foot animation when quickly alternating between standing still and moving

[ MAPS ]

• Overpass
  • Adjustments to jumpable locations
  • Collision adjustments
  • Various bug fixes and tweaks

Quick link to check who of your friend list has access to the beta. With the last wave of invites I now have one friend on my friend list with beta access…

So it’s 1/66 or 1,5%.

Hopefully more invites are coming soon 😅

[ MOVEMENT ]

• Fixed some instances of pixelwalks across all maps

[ MISC ]

• Slight adjustments to some Holo stickers
• Fixed a case where some match stats would be reported incorrectly at the end of the game

[ MAPS ]

• Overpass
  • Updated some signage
  • Adjustments to jumpable locations
  • Adjustments for improved player movement
  • Adjustments to wall-bangable locations
  • Various bug fixes

HLTV reports that Valve approached tournament organizers for CS2 Major bids in 2025 and 2026. The dates are now shifted to right before the summer and the winter break, so the Majors will finally be the culmination of each season.

[ MISC ]

• Fixed a case where parties of two or more were unable to enter matchmaking
• Adjusted door interactions with dropped weapons and ragdolls
• Fixed a case where door interactions with players affected hit registration
• Fixed a case where four grenade icons would scale incorrectly in the team hud

[ ANIMATION ]

• M249 now has bullet belt animation

[ MAPS ]

• Vertigo
  • Various adjustments to lighting
  • Added sounds to potty doors
  • Fixed vacancy signs on potties
• Overpass
  • Various fixes

[ GAMEPLAY ]

• Added Wingman game mode

[ MAPS ]

• Added Overpass to Deathmatch, Casual, Wingman, and Competitive game modes
• Added Vertigo to Deathmatch and Casual game modes
• Removed Nuke and Office

[ WORKSHOP TOOLS ]

• Enabled undo/redo buttons
• Various bug fixes

[ MISC ]

• Added the "Secondary Fire Hold" option to the input settings menu
• The halftime countdown timer is now visible
• Fixed a case where the camera would not interpolate correctly when switching between chase and roaming spectator modes.
• Fixed a case where the viewmodel weapon would disappear for one frame when switching in-eye spectator targets.
• Added leading zeroes on StatTrak module
• Glove patterns and wear now more closely align with CS:GO versions
• Various improvements to foil stickers
• Various adjustments to the size of stickers applied to weapons--

[ MISC ]

• Fixed a bug with the sell-back feature
• Fixed a few financial fun facts
• Adjusted the main menu position of CTs holding the Dual Elites
• Fixed tooltips sometimes staying up when you exit the loadout screen
• Fixed some texture streaming issues
• Various improvements to stickers
• Improved sound synchronization for the first bullets during automatic fire
• Fixed a case where the death panel would appear if killed during the end of match screen

[ MAPS ]

Mirage

• Various lightmap fixes
• Smoke clouds now pass through the metal rollup grating in underpass

[ MOVEMENT ]

• Fixed a bug that would cause the player to sometimes move too far forward
• Various bug fixes

Release Notes for 6/15/23

[ MISC ]

• Fixed auto rebuy not working if you survived through the Deathmatch warmup
• Pressing the jump key to respawn in Deathmatch no longer results in an actual jump
• The buy menu now closes on right mouse button DOWN instead of UP
• Refunds are now correctly accounted for when tracking total money spent by user
• Fixed bad kerning in accolade descriptions
• Fixed a freeze/hang in Hammer
• The CS2 Workshop Tools convar helper page now has better descriptions
• Fixed aspect ratio for workshop submission screenshot
• Various improvements to the look of the M249, MP5-SD, Desert Eagle, Dual Elites, and Taser
• Added Zeus x27 to workshop submission weapon list

[ MAPS ]

Mirage

• Various map fixes

Release Notes for 6/14/23

[ MAPS ] Mirage

• Fixed a spot near bench that caused the server to lag
• Fixed various strange wallbangs
• Adjusted end of match screen

[ BUY MENU ]

• Fixed some edge case issues with sell back
• Buy menu color now matches cl_hud_color

[ LOADOUT ]

• Fixed edge cases with inspecting items
• Fixed a bad interaction between the acknowledge panel and inventory
• Fixed a glitch while refreshing the loadout tab
• Fixed some localization bugs
• Fixed various crash

[ MISC ]

• Fixed movement bug that would cause a slide along curbs in Dust II
• Flashbangs can be redeployed after thrown so that players can quickly throw multiple in sequence
• Reduced the single-frame flash effect when zooming out with sniper rifles