Valve announced it was hard at work on Counter-Strike 2, a replacement-slash-upgrade to the first-person shooter CS:GO, with a limited beta test currently available for select community members to try out.

The game’s website calls it “the largest technical leap forward in Counter-Strike’s history, ensuring new features and updates for years to come.” The game will run on Valve’s Source 2 engine, providing better graphics overall for players.

In a series of videos, the team at Valve discussed what upgrades and tweaks they were making to improve the gameplay experience.

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The game’s worlds will be leveled up with better textures and geometry, and improved lighting. Aside from this, some in-game maps will be slightly tweaked with these upgrades while others will receive a more extensive overhaul to take advantage of the new engine the game will be running on.

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The game’s server architecture will also be adjusted to allow for sub-tick updates, which let the server know the instant a player moves, fires a weapon, or throws a grenade.

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Speaking of grenades, you can also expect smoke grenades in game to be more impressive.

“Smoke Grenades are now dynamic volumetric objects that interact with the environment, and react to lighting, gunfire, and explosions,” the team said. This means more natural smoke spread, and the smoke from the grenades interacts with the environment – imagine clearing a smoke cloud with gunfire or explosions – much more responsively.

The game’s frequently asked questions page pegs the release timing for Summer 2023 in the US.

Counter-Strike 2 will be free-to-play. – Rappler.com