Cheats is one of the main problems of CS:GO. But it’s one thing when dishonest players get caught in matchmaking, and quite another – when professionals read. Blog CS.MONEY talks about cases of reading among pro-caesers.
What are cheats?
To begin with, we will determine what the cheats are. These are prohibited programs or changes in source code that gives an advantage over other players. There are many cheats in CS:GO, but the most common are wallhack and aimbot. With the help of wallhack you can see through the walls, and aimbot helps to shoot better – it can even automatically point at the head immediately after pressing LMB.
In CS:GO there are also legal cheats: in order to activate them, you need to prescribe the sv_cheats 1 command. But you can turn it on only on your server, and in official games, of course, it will not work.
Which of the pro-players was banned for cheats?
The most famous example is naturally Hovik KQLY Tovmassian. The Frenchman played for the Titan and performed well. But, as it turned out, not without outside help. In November 2014, his account was blocked forever. Because of this, his team suffered, which was removed from the Winter 2014 DreamHack.
KQLY admitted that he used cheats. True, he specified that he did it exactly a week – and not in pro-games, but in matchmaking. It is impossible to verify the reliability of the words of the Frenchman, but this is not so important. I started the chits once – be ready that your account will fly to the ban.
“I did not use it after that. I was going to join Titan and I did not need to take unnecessary risks while I had all that I needed: a top team, with a solid structure behind it. My curiosity failed me and now my career is over CS after 12 years”.
For cheats was banned and the best player in the world, Alexander s1mple Kostylev. His story is completely different: he launched cheats in CS 1.6, but the blocking extended to CS:GO. And Kostylev did not banned the VAC, but the tournament operator ESL, which, in general, is not so scary. However, because of this ban, s1mple missed several majors.
For a long time, Valve’s policy towards cheaters was radical: he received a ban once – forever hired at tournaments from the game developer. But in April last year, the rules softened. Now, if more than five years have passed since the ban, the player has the right to participate in Valve events. It is important to understand that the VAC itself is not removed. That is, you will have to play from another account.
Elias Jamppi Olkkonen received a VAC ban when he was 13 years old. Naturally, then he did not think about the career of a pro-player. But over time, he became one of the most talented players of his generation, but due to the lifelong blocking, top clubs did not invite him. So, for example, the Jamppi transfer to OG fell through.
Before changing the rules, Elias even sued Valve – to no avail. And then he completely left to play Valorant. When the rules were changed, the Finn rejected all offers from the CS:GO teams. Says he wants to play Riot shooter.
False allegations of cheating
Sometimes honest players are accused of cheating – simply because they play well and are almost unknown to anyone. At the beginning of his career, for example, Yegor Flamie Vasilyev was also considered a chiter – because he was so good in online matches. But then he began to visit the LAN tournaments – and all questions disappeared.
Gambit stars have a similar fate: Dmitry sh1ro Sokolov and Vladislav nafany Gorshkov. Almost the entire career, they play together, and at the very beginning of the journey they were also considered cheaters – well, unknown young guys cannot play cool. Turns out they can. In 2018, sh1ro and nafany won the Russian eSports Championship – since then, of course, no one has considered them chiters.
The most famous example of false accusations is the case of Robin ropz Kool. The FaZe Clan player made a name for himself on the FPL, where he played with pro players as a 17-year-old teenager. And these very pro-players did not believe that ropz was clean.
This is how ex-Fnatic player Jesper JW Wecksell reacted to the Estonian:
“Fuck that ropz jerk. I don’t understand why we still haven’t banned him. He will never play on the LAN, he does not even want to join any team. “
There were so many accusations that Faceit invited Kool to the office – so that he played from there and proved that he did not cheater. The player was given devices – and ropz lit. He played even better than usual. Well, soon Robin signed Mouz.
A new level of cheating
Cheaters are so inventive that often banned programs go beyond the same wallhack and aimbot.
Last year, at the first RMR tournament for the CIS, a scandal thundered with the Ukrainian team Akuma, which first beat K23, and then dealt with Virtus.pro and NAVI. Questions to an absolutely unknown team appeared after the match with the grandees – everyone went to review the demo.
On replays of broadcasts, people noticed that Akuma players constantly take their eyes somewhere to the left of the monitor. And they did it even in clutches – that is, in those moments when you need to be focused on the sight.
On demo, people found very strange movements on the map from Akuma. For example, players could simply run along the long on the Overpass with knives, without any information. And they did it more than once.
Almost all pro-communities were sure that Akuma was playing dishonestly. It was assumed that the players had access to live information from the server – that is, on the left on a separate screen they simply saw the radar. This is the most popular version.
ESIC became interested in the story with Akuma: launched an investigation and recommended not to invite this team to tournaments. But in the end, it was not possible to prove anything, no one was punished. And the players themselves categorically denied all the accusations.
Cheats from real life
Traditional sports and eSports have enough differences, but both there and there participants in the competition are checked for doping. But after all, players in CS: GO sit all match, and they do not need additional energy that banned drugs can give. So then why are they tested for doping?
Banned drugs can increase not only the level of physical activity, but also stimulate the brain. Once Corey SEMPHIS Friesen, a former Cloud9 player, admitted that at one of the tournaments his team hosted an adderal.
Adderal is a combination drug used in the treatment of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, as well as narcolepsy. In addition, it is used as sports doping and an enhancer of cognitive abilities. Positive effects on mindfulness and memory were proven by research in 2015.
At the large LAN tournaments, esportsmens are regularly checked for doping. There have been no scandals with the discovery of illegal drugs. We hope that it will not be.
We talked about the chiters on the pro-stage, about different types of chitas, about false accusations of dishonest play and doping. Stay with the CS.MONEY blog! There is a lot of interesting things ahead.
