Valve’s upcoming limited beta of Counter-Strike 2 sees Dust 2 and Mirage come and go in competitive mode, slowly cycling through the map, and the latest is another OG, Nuke. Main points of the new version: Where have all the cars gone?
Valve has not only tested new versions of the classics, but also published a casual playlist (the CS2 version of Office can be accessed in this mode) and made improvements to make the best-in-class audio even better. . Our latest update adds a distance effect to all positional sound sources, fixes some audio bugs, and adds “a unique audio occlusion layer to aid vertical sound localization in Nuke”.
But most importantly, new animations have been added. For the first time in Counter-Strike history, players can now inspect grenades. If you haven’t played Counter-Strike, guns, knives, and gloves all have in-game inspect buttons that allow your avatar to hold the item at different angles so you can see how beautiful the paintwork is.
This grenade inspection animation suggests that Counter-Strike will likely get a grenade skin at some point in the future. I’m not really sure what can be done artistically with such a relatively small object, but well, what do I know. In fact, skins are and still are the lifeblood of CS:GO and CS2, so it’s only natural to find new ways to skin existing parts of the game. That said, it’s also possible that the animation was added purely for people to poke fun at the very impressive liquid animation inside the Molotov cocktail.
I was particularly active on Twitter this morning. That means there is an update for CS2. Today we’re adding Casuals, swapping Mirages for Nukes and Offices, tweaking audio, fixing slow crouching bugs, and addressing bunny hopping. And now you can inspect grenades. pic.twitter.com/CMjRARG1rHJune 30, 2023
The note also says that Valve has “improved inspection behavior for various weapons,” but after going through some of my stashes, I’m not sure what that tweak refers to. All the animations I checked looked more or less the same. Valve also changed it so that players can’t jump at the end of warmup time, but as someone who was always jumping in place at the end of warmups, this feels a little mean.
Limited testing of Counter-Strike 2 is currently underway alongside CS:GO’s regular service, and the free-to-play sequel is set to release sometime this summer, with everything from its predecessor Locks, Stocks, and Barrels. be taken over. Pretty soon we’ll all be able to see flash grenades from all angles before we’re blinded by the wrong angle of throw.
