Smooya on the OMEN Esports Report: Practice your map movement to get good

On the latest episode of the OMEN Esports Report, BIG AWPer Owen “Smooya” Butterfield joined the broadcast to discuss Counter-Strike: Global Offensive’s London FACEIT Major. Smooya’s team placed sixth in the tournament and took home $35,000 in prize money.

Astralis took first place in the tournament, which many considered a blowout. The team earned a $500,000 prize. For Smooya, they’re a team that’s mastered CS:GO—and other rosters can learn from them.

“For Astralis, they’ll do whatever it takes to win,” Smooya said. “They understand how to win. They understand every role. They have a system.”

BIG is a “baby Astralis,” Smooya added. He said his team isn’t able to outplay some teams just on mechanical skill, but rather focuses on team play to win. That playstyle will keep Astralis on top, Smooya said. “It’s going to take a lot to stop Astralis. Everyone thought Navi would defeat them, and they got demolished.”

Smooya also offered a few tips for players who want to get good at CS:GO. The first tip? Practice in the Recoil Master Weapon Practice. Smooya uses the map for five to 10 minutes a day to kick off his CS:GO time. It’s just a good way to check out your spray and recoil patterns, as well as your aim. The second tip is to check out pre-fire maps to practice cross-hair placement. “This map is important for learning where someone’s head will be when you peek a corner,” Smooya said. 

Lastly, Smooya said players should practice movement and map jumps to be efficient in getting around CS:GO maps.

Earlier on the show, Twitch streamer Spamfish appeared to take on the CS:GO headshot challenge. Digital Foundry also visited the set to go over Nvidia’s new $800 GeForce RTX 2080 graphics card and its impressive stats.