If you walk down the same street every day for years, eventually, any change or difference, no matter how minor, will immediately leap out to you. This is Dust we’re talking about. Designed by David Johnston and first added to Counter-Strike in 2001, it’s not just the most recognizable map in Valve’s FPS game – it’s maybe the flagship map for the whole multiplayer shooter genre. Besides reskins and visual overhauls, in more than two decades, its physical geography has remained largely unchanged. But now, 23 years after Dust first arrived, the new Counter-Strike 2 patch has made a seriously game-changing addition to the shooter’s most iconic locale.
We’ve been doing it for twenty years. If you want to get onto the short catwalk, a superb vantage point between the Terrorist spawn and the Counter Terrorist ramp, you need a second player to boost you up – I always picture the old Pubmasters videos, with five players on one another’s shoulders, running in synchrony. For 23 years, this technique has worked fine. You jump on your comrade’s back, hop onto the short catwalk, and return to combat. But Counter-Strike 2 smoke bombs have changed the FPS game.
Now, with the bigger, more opaque smoke effects, one of the most recognizable Counter-Strike 2 maps is arguably imbalanced in the Terrorists’ favor – they can spawn, throw a smoke down the top mid, and effectively trap any CTs between the catwalk and the lower tunnels. Valve is taking action.
On the surface, the new Counter-Strike 2 update makes only minimal changes. But like that street you walk down every day, if you’ve been playing Dust since 2001, you’ll notice a gigantic difference.
The crates below the catwalk have been adjusted so that you can now jump up without the assistance of a second player – if you’re playing solo, you can make the famous leap all on your own, gaining that high ground more easily and making a quick escape if you find yourself corralled in by smoke grenades. Valve shares a clip of the change in action. You can see it for yourself below, in a video created by stalwart CS2 creator ‘WaterCS2.’
It seems like nothing. It’s just some boxes! But one of the oldest tricks in the Counter-Strike book is now redundant, and Dust has been slightly rearranged in favor of the CTs. The change is live right now. We’ll see how players react.
Personally, I’m divided. It’s a good update in terms of game balance, but editing Dust, in the year of 2024, feels like painting new eyebrows on the Mona Lisa. Maybe I’m just being a purist.
Check out some of the other best free Steam games, if you love Counter-Strike 2. Alternatively, get the latest on CS2 ranks after the new updates.
You can also follow us on Google News for daily PC games news, reviews, and guides, or grab our PCGN deals tracker to net yourself some bargains.