The professional CSGO arena is accused of cheating and selling clarity

A shocking report from esports journalist, Richard Lewis, says that more than half of the top Counter-Strike: Global Offensive teams would have been banned from professional competition for cheating without the intervention of the organizers. solution to save face. The news comes a few days after the professional and semi-professional CSGO supervisory association, ESIC, said it would “exempt from prosecution of coaches, players and teams” suspected of cheating.

According to a more than three-hour video on Twitch on December 8, Lewis explains in detail the lies and intrigues that plague nearly every organization in CSGO, including players, teams, and tournament organizers. Often game developers will control their assets to prevent conflicts of interest and ensure the professional arena is clean. But that didn’t happen in CSGO thanks to Valve’s distinctive approach. And Lewin thinks that CSGO will definitely pay a heavy price.

Top teams stream snipe while others sell games for money

For viewers, what really determines the victory or defeat between the two teams is the skill of the players and the team. But evidence from the second half of 2020 shows that the CSGO professional arena is really just WWE-style wrestling. Lewis specifically spoke on stream about what many have long suspected: professional teams cheating at live tournaments by streamnipe, then match-fixing in low-level CSGO tournaments is very popular and everyone From the CSGO organizers, to the teams as well as the players to arrange the game so that they can make the most profit.

In early 2018, professional CSGO matches began to change from online to LAN arena. There, the tournament takes place under the supervision of supervisors, who collect all phones to prevent hacking, and monitor the behavior of players in and out of the game to prevent cheating. But travel restrictions force tournaments to return online. Players and coaches compete using a “guaranteed honor” instead of being supervised by an admin. And according to Lewis, a lot of teams have taken advantage of that loophole.

Lewis said that many of the top professional CSGO teams exploit that laxity to “stream snipe” – the behavior of watching their matches even though the stream is delayed (for the audience to watch). Lewis said that at least 10 teams in the current top 20 CSGO teams should have been punished by ESIC, but not thanks to the intervention of the CSGO tournament organizers – the sponsors of the ESIC association.

ESIC is subject to a conflict of interest

Early signals suggest that something is amiss within the top professional CSGO games in the first week of December, after ESIC did not issue a penalty for the teams suspected of streaming snipe at the tournament. This decision is very strange, especially when ESIC revealed the penalty of banning 37 CSGO coaches in the biggest cheating scandal ever in September. Similar to that scandal, this time many coaches are in the top. CSGO teams like CSGO and MIBR were also implicated.

But whether ESIC can be trusted as a third party custodian is a matter of consideration. ESIC receives funding as “membership fees,” from various CSGO tournament operators. Bookmakers also contribute to this fee, and that creates a conflict of interest by any penalty ESIC intends to impose.

This organization is based in Australia and is privately held. It is registered under four business names: ESIC Global Holdings, Esports Integrity Coalition, Esports Integrity Commission, and World Esports Federation.

With the news that top teams can cheat to win prizes, Lewis also reported that match-fixing in CSGO semi-pro tournaments is no big secret. The journalist made it clear that this is not only a regional problem but also a global one. Lewis claims to have received numerous chats to prove its existence.

Lewis highlights this issue in his next post when talking about Riot Games and their new shooter Valorant. In the post, Lewis asks the company not to make the same mistakes professional teams like CSGO and Valve have made.

“We’re paying a heavy price in Counter-Strike for refusing to cooperate… We have dozens of coaches banned for cheating and that number is growing. Our semi-pro league is full of bets and no one can afford to investigate all of them. The side that can do it (ESIC) has admitted to surrender… I don’t know how much longer everything is covered before it completely collapses,” Lewis shared.

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