Astralis CS:GO players respond after FaZe NiKo Tweet sparks smoke exploit accusations

Astralis’ Counter-Strike: Global Offensive stars have responded to suggestions that they are using video settings that allow them to see through smokes better than other players.

The controversy first reared its head when FaZe Clan’s Nikola ‘NiKo’ Kovač responded to a kill that Andreas ‘Xyp9x’ Højsleth picked up against MIBR at the ECS Season 6 Finals, saying: “How the hell did Xyp9x see him there through the smoke?”

The Bosnian player went on to retweet a clip of the kill before tweeting the CS:GO developers and saying: “I’m not calling anyone out and they are not the first players which are using it and it’s not their fault. I hope @csgo_dev will look into it and try to fix it somehow.”

Twitter and Reddit users quickly were quick to suggest that both Xyp9x and Lukas ‘gla1ve’ Rossander are good at picking up kills through smokes due to some ‘special’ Nvidia settings, prompting both of the players to respond on Twitter.

NiKo believes a number of top players could be using special settings to gain an advantage.

“Btw i saw some people talking about Nvidia settings to look easier thru smokes,” said gla1ve, the team’s in-game leader. “I can say for sure that no one from our team would ever use something like that and none of us have any idea what that bug even is. We use our radar and gamesense.”

Xyp9x responded to NiKo directly, saying: “I have never known of those “nvidia settings” I could see his feet from my screen.”

He also explained that he had seen the opponent’s feet and reminded people that there have been spectator bugs with smokes for years: “Don’t know why the clip doesn’t show it. Super sad that pro players jump to these conclusions. They should know that smokes bugs while spectating after all those years.”

MIBR’s Gabriel ‘FalleN’ Toledo came to Astralis’ defence, asking fans to stop hating on the Danes and doubling down on Xyp9x’s comments about spectator bugs with smokes.

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The Brazilian team’s coach, Janko ‘YNk’ Paunovic, confirmed the sentiment, saying: “Completely agree, for example, watching cold’s screen on Mirage, I thought he can be seen on the edge, spectator client can be different.”

The observer for the match, Connor ‘Sliggy’ Blomfield took to Twitter to say that his graphics settings are always set to ‘very high’ for aesthetic purposes, saying: “What you see is not always exactly what they see.”

Team Liquid’s Epitácio ‘TACO’ de Melo responded to NiKo’s initial comments, confirming that there are settings that some pro players are suspected of using, but stating: “I never thought Astralis was using tho.”

Astralis have dominated the 2018 CS:GO season and are widely regarded as one of the best teams the game has ever seen.

After such a strong year, the suggestion that they could be using settings to gain an advantage throws doubt on their performances and explains why they are so keen to squash the witch hunt.

Jesper ‘JW’ Wecksell, who faced similar scrutiny with his Fantic teammates when they were on top of the world, also responded, saying: “When you are the undisputed number #1 people will start to find reasons to downplay you.”