Most Counter-Strike: Global Offensive skins were created not by Valve but by artists from the Steam Workshop. Often, the developers release cases with skins barely touched, unchanged. However, sometimes Valve has to redo, recolour, or even delete skins. Today, CS.MONEY Blog tells about skins that Valve decided to change before and after introducing them to the Community. Of course, including the legendary M4A4 Howl and many more!
This article is based on the guide made by Aquaismissing and Exerpas on Steam. Huge thanks to their work!
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Why Valve Even Change Skins?
Valve divides skins according to their brightness and saturation: the brighter the skin, the rarer it is, and vice versa. Therefore, when adding a skin to the game, the developers study the design and assign rarity according to its palette and shine. Sometimes, the devs have to ask skin creators to change the skin a little, shading it or redrawing parts—this was confirmed by HEXETH, a famous skin creator.
Another reason for changing skins is indeed the copyright. You must have heard of M4A4 Howl and why it’s so wanted and iconic. Howl became a unique example of how Valve changed a skin due to a DMCA violation. M4A4 Howl is the only contraband skin in CS:GO, literally a one-of-a-kind thing. Developers corrected other DMCA violations differently: simply re-made them or swapped the original designs to entirely new ones, but never have they deleted a skin completely from Collections.
CS:GO Skins with DMCA rights violations
Here’s the list of CS:GO skins that have violated copyright, therefore receiving DMCAs:
- M4A1-S Chantico’s Fire
- AK-47 Frontside Misty
- M4A4 Griffin
- M4A4 Howl
- AWP Doodle Lore
- Glock-18 Warhawk
These skins have received different reactions from Valve. The easiest and most common thing Valve did was to just redraw the skin so that it did not violate any copyright. It was the case for M4A1-S Chantico’s Fire, AK-47 Frontside Misty and M4A4 Griffin.
On the first two, Valve replaced the background patterns. Why? Skin creators behind M4A1-S Chantico’s Fire and AK-47 Frontside Misty used other people’s art, basically violating copyrights. In general, these two skins received minor changes: most likely, you won’t even tell the difference between OLD and NEW if you don’t take a closer look.
M4A4 Griffin, though, has been significantly modified. Here, the pattern was not the problem—the Griffin was. The whole drawing of a griffin was stolen, and Valve had to bring in their artist to redraw the mythical creature. This skin remained in the game.
Another way was to remove a skin from cases but leave it in the game. This happened to M4A4 Howl. Valve have replaced the drawing on the skin and changed its rarity to Contraband, removing it from the case and collection along the way. And they also did it to the Howling Dawn sticker. As a result, M4A4 Howl can neither be dropped from a case nor crafted, only bought from another player. By the way, this rarest skin can be found at CS.MONEY Trade. Have a spare $10k? Just click to buy!
Finally, the third way to fight DMCA violations from Valve is to entirely remove such a skin from CS:GO. It happened with AWP Doodle Lore. Shortly after the release of the Revolution Case, the art on Doodle Lore was stolen. And Valve decided to replace it with another Workshop skin: AWP Duality. As a result, all existing Doodle Lores turned, like werewolves, into another skin.
If you read carefully, you should’ve noticed that we avoided Glock-18 Warhawk. Well, this skin is just a copy of a gun from the real world. As a result, the skin remained in the game, and nothing happened to it. Some say the creator of the original design still receives royalties for it.
Adjusting Skins’ Brightness
It also happened that several times Valve made skins less bright so that it fits into the company’s guidelines for skins’ rarity. Here they go:
Valve made all these skins a little dimmer compared to the original Steam Workshop versions. M4A1-S Decimator stands out from the list: the Decimator series also include Tec-9 Decimator, both of Classified rarity, and if you put them side by side and compare, Tec-9 Decimator has brighter colours. Hold up, what? We don’t know, either. Only Valve employees can tell.
The same thing happened with SSG 08 Mainframe 001 and P2000 Urban Hazard.
Still, there were a couple of opposite cases when Valve increased brightness, even though they are less common. UMP-45 Wild Child is an example. Its Workshop depicts a relatively dull skin, worn-out and clumsy. But the in-game version is much brighter than the artist’s screenshots! Apparently, the developers decided that a Classified UMP skin should be very noticeable.
Recoloured Skins
There is another case of skin changes unrelated to either the DMCA or Valve’s skin guidelines. Five-SeveN Fowl Play. Or is it more correct to say, Five-SeveN Falling Feathers? This is the real name of the skin we see below, made originally by FLaMmenWerFeR. However, when added to the game, not only its name changed (this is a common thing), but the main colour also did: from orange to turquoise!
The colour change is a unique instance of Valve’s skin modification. We can’t tell what the motive behind such a decision was. Perhaps the developers felt that the colour coding for CS:GO sides (Ts and CTs) would be misleading. See, orange (red), and its shades are the colours of the Attacking team. Or maybe the whole point is that the developers like turquoise more.
Valve also changed stickers due to DMCAs
Valve had to change even CS:GO stickers because of DMCA violations. On several occasions, the developers had to completely redraw stickers that already made it into the game. For example, these two beauties: Death Comes and Just Trolling. How did they look initially? See for yourself!
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