Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is very popular on Steam and is considered one of the most played games on the platform. The first-person shooter has now set a new player record.
What record is that? On February 11, 1,320,219 people played CS:GO at the same time, according to Steam statistics. This surpasses the previous record of 1,308,963 from April 2020. The game was released in early 2000 as a modification and officially launched on Steam in 2012.
Currently (as of 12.02.23), the record has dropped again, but CS:GO remains the most played game on the platform:
- With over 900,000 concurrent players, CS:GO is far ahead in first place on Steam.
- In second place is the newcomer Hogwarts Legacy with 560,000 active players.
- Third is the MOBA Dota 2 with 508,000 players.
Regular updates and major tournament attract players
For many months, the active player numbers in CS:GO have been slowly but steadily rising. After the peak in April 2020, the numbers did drop, but they have been steadily increasing again since July 2021 (via steamdb.info).
What is behind the success? On one hand, a major tournament in CS:GO is running over the weekend, from February 10 to February 12, 2023. At IEM Katowice 2023, 24 teams are competing in Poland for a prize pool of 1 million euros. This attracts many players to check in on the shooter again or to cheer for their favorite teams.
On the other hand, the team behind the shooter has hardly changed the core gameplay in the past. And this in a genre that is constantly changing or releasing new games. Counter-Strike: Global Offensive has been offering the same gameplay formula for over 10 years: easy to learn, but hard to master.
The remaining changes can be counted on one hand: there have been new rankings, an improved progression system, and a handful of new maps. Game modes and weapons have remained untouched, except for one change in November 2022. But that change was quite significant and altered one of the most important weapons of the popular shooter.
Counter-Strike is also known for something else: the outrageously expensive skins that you can buy and sell in the game. We’re talking millions of euros. Some players are willing to pay a lot of money for certain rare skins. And all of that is gone if your account with the skins suddenly gets banned:
