Good news: Valve finally released a new game. Unfortunately, not all is well over at Counter-Strike 2. In addition to the negative reviews, it appears that Valve intentionally left some players out of the first-person shooter.
While Valve touts the newest version of Counter-Strike as “the largest technical leap in CS history”, the game won’t be on macOS. Also affected are gamers still running older PCs, including DirectX 9 and 32-bit operating systems. Counter-Strike 2 will be exclusive to 64-bit Windows and Linux platforms.
Counter-Strike 2 represents the largest technical leap in CS history, and our goal is to continue to develop Counter-Strike for years to come,” Valve said in a Steam post.
“As technology advances, we have made the difficult decision to discontinue support for older hardware, including DirectX 9 and 32-bit operating systems. Similarly, we will no longer support macOS. Combined, these represented less than one percent of active CS:GO players. Moving forward, Counter-Strike 2 will exclusively support 64-bit Windows and Linux.
Valve’s decision to discontinue Counter-Strike on macOS is a big blow to Apple’s dreams of being considered a serious gaming platform. The company has invested in gaming over the past years, bringing titles like No Man’s Sky, Resident Evil 4, and Death Stranding natively to the platform.
To make up for the decision, Valve is offering a legacy version of CS:GO for players who cannot migrate to Counter-Strike 2 with their current gaming setup. However, support for the version of CS:GO ends on January 1, 2024. Valve is also offering refunds for players with Prime Status Upgrades on affected platforms. The refunds will be available until December 1, 2023.
The legacy version of CS:Go will be a frozen build, meaning it has all the features of the game except for official matchmaking. However, when support ends at the start of next year, certain functionalities that rely on compatibility with the Game Coordinator may degrade and/or fail.
Recent reviews for Counter-Strike 2 on Steam have been “mixed”. However, the overall review for the game is still “very positive, ” with Valve carrying over the reviews for CS:GO when it updated to the sequel. Valve has also delisted CS:GO when the sequel, drawing backlash from the community. Many gamers feel Valve’s decision is similar to Blizzard’s controversial move to replace Overwatch with Overwatch 2.
Some players are also disappointed that popular features from CS:GO are missing in Counter-Strike 2. One mode that is missing in the sequel is Arms Race. International players are also complaining about the increased tick rate in Counter-Strike 2, making the game “almost unplayable” in certain areas.
Now I’ve thought about it and this CS2 release was pretty bad.
No DZ
No War Games
No unranked MM
No short games
Many maps missing
Only 4 wingman maps
Skin pictures look goofy
Paris still on saleIt doesn’t feel thought out. Why promise to release in summer if it isnt ready..?
— Anomaly (@anomalyxd) September 28, 2023
Counter-Strike 2 is available for PC and Linux via Steam.
