There have been rumors that Counter-Strike 2 is on the horizon, though it’s crucial to treat them with a grain of salt until official confirmation is given.
Well-known Counter-Strike journalist and commentator Richard Lewis have supposedly heard rumors that Valve is preparing to release a new version of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive soon, with a beta perhaps arriving as soon as this month or April.
Counter-Strike two is rumored to be the project’s working title and has supposedly been in the works “for some time.” Lewis claims that the current version of CS: GO has been “mostly neglected for some time” because Valve has been focusing on Counter-Strike 2.
The Source 2 engine will power Counter-Strike 2, which “should increase the optimization and graphical fidelity of the game,” say these reports. It is also rumored to include 128-tick servers, a measurement of how quickly a game’s server can process data, similar to Valorant.
Also, Valve is hopeful that gamers won’t need to rely on other matchmaking services with the new update because they’ve significantly improved the system.
Counter-Strike two is “almost ready to go,” according to the insiders. Still, what this new version would imply for Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and its competitive environment are unknown. According to Lewis, a new version of Dota 2 named Dota 2 Reborn was ported to Source 2 and existed alongside the original. Both versions eventually converged into a single one.
Through our coverage, you can also learn a variety of things about other games:
Another piece of evidence that could point to the integrity of this report comes from Gabe Follower 2, who pointed out that the newest NVIDIA drivers “added support for unknown software executables labeled ‘csgos2.exe’ and ‘cs2.exe’.”
An additional Gabe fan claims they have “fairly reliable information that Valve has been testing CS: GO on Source 2 with the help of third-party QA companies in the US and EU since at least early December. I can’t confirm this 100%, but it’s decent enough to share.”
They also say that this new version “won’t be a new game, it won’t be Counter-Strike 2, it won’t be a rebrand, just CS: GO Source 2. And your skins are fine. They will be available in the new version.”
Again, it’s necessary to take everything with a grain of salt and wait for official confirmation. Still, at least we won’t have to wait too long to find out if this is real, in contrast to some of the more nebulous “I heard so and so is in development” reports.
According to SteamDB, there are 583,156 people online in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, despite the game’s first release being back in 2012. Dota 2 is second with 262,745 players.