Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is a great game: it can bring incredible pleasure and highly negative emotions. Today, CS.MONEY Blog tells how to keep the good parts and remove the bad stuff from your gaming experience.
An important note before reading: depression is a serious illness. The title has it to attract attention. If you have it, do not self-medicate and contact a specialist. The post will talk about how to deal with burnout from the game and not how to treat natural depression.
Causes and symptoms of burnout
The longer you do one thing, the higher the chance of burnout. This happens not only to office workers but also to avid gamers. The most common causes of burnout are lack of achievement or progression, high expectations or unrealistic goals, constant stress, and lack of rest.
All of these reasons can and are encountered by players in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. At the same time, many do not realize their condition and continue to play matches, one after another. Burned-out players are dangerous to themselves: stress is no joke and can be unpleasant for other people around. If in matches you came across a player who gave up after losing in a pistol round, it is highly likely that they are a victim of burnout.
Symptoms of burnout include increased nervousness, aggression, imbalance, difficulty in making decisions, and concentration. Even headaches! These problems can cause defeatism, distrust, and a lack of will to win.
How to fight burnout?
If you’re already burned out, the best way to bounce back is to take a break. Not for half an hour, not for one evening. It’s good to take a break for a week or even longer. During this time, you can take a break from the game and recover from the stress of the endless plays.
Fighting burnouts without interrupting routines is pretty impossible. Therefore, if you feel that the game does not bring you pleasant emotions or stresses you out, take a break and do something else. This is the best way to restore your sense of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive.
A focus on relaxation will help speed up the process. The best place to start is just to sleep. Healthy sleep significantly improves the quality of rest. Try to go to bed and wake up simultaneously, do not overeat before bed, and do not stick to your devices after midnight. By adjusting your rest, you will quickly remove stress and be able to start enjoying the game again.
Another nuance is changing your activities. Often, a couple of evening matches become a habit, a daily ritual. Breaking a habit is not easy. Therefore, it is better to replace CS:GO with something else. For example, another competitive shooter like Call of Duty. You can also choose a fundamentally different type of activity. Evening bike rides or watching a new Korean horror movie can take your mind off the urge to rush Bs.
Prevention
Taking a break is a great way to get rid of burnout. But there is an even better method. Simply do not allow it. To prevent burnout, you need to find its roots. You will have to dig on your own and find out what infuriates you the most in the game. Although below, we list a few popular reasons and how to avoid them.
No progression or visible result
Matchmaking in CS:GO or on third-party platforms uses a system of evaluation and selection of players. The idea of such a selection is as follows: in each match, teams of equal or close strength face each other. The problem is that in such systems, sooner or later, all players hit a plateau: they find their optimal rating and lose their growth rate in degrees. As a result, there is no progression or visible effect.
To fix this, you should start setting smaller goals for yourself. For example, not taking LEM in ten matches is not a realistic goal, but dying less often, throwing smart flashes more often, or learning and applying new throws. By setting clear, simple, and relatively quick goals, you will see progress and growth in the ranks along the way. If you set the right goals, of course.
Constant stress
Another popular reason. CS:GO is a competitive game; in such an environment, it is impossible to avoid stress. The best way out of the situation is simple: control the amount of stress. Give up the habit of drunkenly playing 5-8 games in a row. Instead, take breaks between each match to calm your nerves and prepare for the next game.
Some people find breathing exercises helpful in dealing with stress. Others prefer to drink tea or take a short walk. And someone just watches dank memes on YouTube. It doesn’t matter how you distract yourself from the game; the main thing is to do it regularly so that the evening with CS:GO does not turn into a furious stress marathon.
Aggressive environment
It’s no secret that CS:GO matchmaking is full of very toxic players. Even if you have the highest Trust Factor or the coolest FACEIT subscription, you can still meet someone who will spoil the vibe.
The best way to deal with this is not to play alone. Playing with friends, a partner, or your significant partner differs in quality from playing solo. Try to play regularly in a pleasant environment. You will receive normal communication in return.
By the way, other game modes can dilute the stagnation of competitive matches. We’ve already made a list of the most exciting game modes in CS:GO. So be sure to check it out and, of course, try not to get yourself burnt out because of CS:GO.
