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Oleksandr 's1mple' Kostyljev (Image Source: Twitter)
One of the biggest problems Counter-Strike has been facing for a long time is the cheaters in the game. Apart from this, people usually think of CS when someone says cheaters.
Oleksandr 's1mple' Kostyljev, one of the best CS players, once again expressed his frustration on this issue. In his recent post on X, he said, “You need to understand Counter-Strike that without proper anti-cheat - Premier f***ing sucks, no one gonna grind for rating like in Valorant, easiest way - connect with FaceIT anti-cheat, hardest way - create much better one.”
With CS2, Valve also introduced a new ranking system called Premier. Players win and accumulate points to climb the leaderboard. However, complaints regarding matching against cheaters every other match or sometimes regularly in higher ranks are becoming more common.
On one side, CS2 just had one of the biggest Major tournaments, on the other, casual and ranked players are unable to play a single game without cheaters.
The Solution?
S1mple’s statement is quite true, as many have just given up on playing Premier. Official forums, Reddit and other groups are filled with people complaining about cheaters in every game after a 15k rating. Compared to its competition, Valorant boasts a proper anti-cheat which works for the most part and detects cheaters quite fast.
An easy way to suggest is using the FaceIt anti-cheat in CS2. FaceIt is a third-party program which has its anti-cheat which is a bit more effective compared to the VAC. Players who want to play without cheaters often queue up using FaceIt. There are cheaters, but it is generally a clean experience.
The hard way which is suggested by s1mple and many others is creating a new anti-cheat. People ask for a kernel-level anti-cheat like Vanguard and Faceit. However, CS is also supported across Linux devices, and it is highly unlikely Valve will drop support for them, after all, the Steam Deck also runs on Linux.
Kernel-level ant-cheats are usually invasive and have access to the entire system. However, most players are ready to sacrifice privacy if they can play their favourite game with minimal cheating issues.