An early Twitch update to the platform’s stream categories has seemingly all but locked in Counter-Strike 2’s imminent launch, but will it really be on Wednesday?
The window for CS2’s launch during the Summer season has already passed, but despite the lack of an official release, Valve has nonetheless ramped up access to the closed beta. Allowing a solid chunk of the player base access to the closed test, just as long you have the right criteria.
Valve never announced an official launch date for the full build, leaving many players speculating for months on end. However, after a cryptic tweet on September 21 by the CS Twitter account reading, “What are you doing next Wednesday?”, many believe it to be coming on September 27.
But once again, it wasn’t an official launch date. Though now, a new Twitch update has potentially doubled down and teased CS2’s imminent release.
To celebrate the next decade of Counter-Strike, we've updated the name of the category. pic.twitter.com/96Ayvl7OuI
— Twitch (@Twitch) September 25, 2023
Announced by Twitch through their Twitter account on September 25, they wrote, “To celebrate the next decade of Counter-Strike, we’ve updated the name of the category.”
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Game devs can request name changes for their games on the platform, the same as how Blizzard eventually consolidated the Overwatch and Overwatch 2 Twitch categories once the sequel came out in 2022. Now, it appears Valve is following suit.
It seems Twitch has decided to preemptively change the category name from CSGO to CS2, perhaps as a confirmation that the game is close to some sort of official launch. They even kept the “Counter-Strike 2 Limited Test” category.
RIP CS:GO, fly high 🕊️
A new branch was added titled 'csgo_demo_viewer' to allow players to watch Source 1 demos. pic.twitter.com/qsW3odFLGe
— Aquarius 🛹 (@aquaismissing) September 25, 2023
This category change comes as the devs added a new stealth update, adding a “csgo_demo_viewer” which allows players to watch Source 1 demos.
Many players suspect that this is Valve making sure we can access our old CSGO demos as the sequel is seemingly about to release. Of course, all this does not mean CS2 really is officially launching on September 27, as Valve has been quiet on launch details. But we’re sure to find out one way or the other in just a matter of hours.