Counter-Strike fans warn CS2 is too ‘unfriendly’ for new players

Counter-Strike 2’s high-skill ceiling is just too far out of reach for new players according to community complaints today. For those beginning their CS2 career, there is little to no means of honing their skills, and it’s turning Ts and CTs away.

The community ripped into CS2’s lack of support for newer players on social media, stating CS2 was “not new player friendly”. They pointed to haphazard rankings as one of the main key issues, but as far as the consensus was concerned, smurfing and missing content were the main problems in CS2.

Many claimed Counter-Strike’s infamous hacking epidemic is also part of the problem. Despite being free-to-play on Steam, the only way to lower your likelihood of encountering cheaters is by paying for Prime Status and some new players aren’t forking out the cash—especially after hearing the game wouldn’t cost them anything to play.

Without Prime Status, newer players have a higher chance of matching with cheaters who’ve bought new accounts. This is due to the Prime matchmaking’s paywall: Prime places gamers against others who’ve also paid, thus providing a soft barrier to repeat cheaters and reducing matches against newer accounts.

One player believes there’ll be many players whose CS2 experience has been instantly dampened by opponents harnessing cheating software. And without other, solid means of garnering experience in CS2—apart from modes like casual and deathmatch—some believe there’s no reason for new gamers to return.

To many players’ dismay, Valve released CS2 without several beloved features. Game modes like Danger Zone and Arms Race have been left behind in Global Offensive with no word from developers as to when they’ll arrive in the prequel title.

According to the community, Counter-Strike will remain a challenging experience for new players without these modes and features. And with the lack of community servers to supplement a sizeable portion of the player base, there aren’t many avenues for newer players to explore. 

Fortunately, Valve has kept updates for CS2 coming regularly, so there’s a chance we’ll start to see content ported over sooner rather than later.