The Ukrainian Oleksandr "s1mple" Kosytliev (23) is the biggest star in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and is considered by many to be one of the best players in the shooter. He is now showing Riot's competition game Valorant on his Twitch channel . A commentator from CS: GO says: Riot can hardly believe his luck there. From a business point of view, it is a bad decision to support the competition for free.
This is s1mple: The Ukrainian s1mple is something like the icon from CS: GO. The 23-year-old has been playing for the top team Natus Vincere since 2016 as an AWPler, i.e. as a sniper, and is widely regarded as one of the best CS: GO players of all time, in any case he is currently the biggest star in the game.
The Ukrainian streams relatively rarely on Twitch, he has a problem with the platform, has been banned several times and is terribly upset about it . But when he's on the streaming site, up to 70,000 people watch him: Everyone wants to learn tricks from professionals.
What is he doing in Valorant ? Last Tuesday, after a long time, s1mple checked Valorant again: for the first time since July 2020. He announced his stream on Twitter with the remark "Valorant is actually too easy a game for him."
His stream to the game then lasted 7 hours, with 40,170 people watching it at its peak. On average there were around 26,000 viewers - so he's in the top 5 of the last 30 days.
Can the face of CS: GO play the game of the competition?
This is why this stream is so important: T he professional CS: GO commentator Auguste “Semmler” Massonat explains in a video why this stream is so important and, in his view, even difficult.
Because here “the face of CS: GO” advertises Valorant, the biggest rival of Valves tactical shooter, free of charge. Because Valorant is seen by many as direct competition to CS: GO, some even speak of the "CS: GO" killer.
Semmler explains in a video (via
YouTube ) that Riot Games has paid big streamers like Ninja and Shroud a lot of money to achieve an effect that s1mple is now giving them for free. This is a "big win" for Valorant, he explains:
“You just know, the champagne corks are popping when you see that s1imple turns on its stream and Valorant is streaming for tens of thousands of fans. Everyone at Riot is splashing around with champagne, the music is booming, everyone is dancing for joy on the table - this is really such a good event for them. "
August “Semmler” Massonat
Semmler then explains: Nobody would care if a CS: GO player from the 2nd or 3rd row shows Valorant on Twitch, but with s1mple it is something else.
He is the face of CS: GO, the player everyone knows. If the valorant wanted to play, he could, that's okay, but please not on Twitch. If he wants to remain the face of CS: GO, then he must remain loyal to CS: GO, otherwise rumors would arise that "CS: GO is a dead game."
The commentator says: s1mple certainly doesn't bother with these thoughts and is just playing Valorant with a few friends just for fun. From a “business” point of view, however, he considers this behavior questionable.
E-sports titles compete for the biggest stars and the best talents
That's behind it: The e-sports market is competitive. It's not just about spectators, but also about players who could be lost to Valorant:
- The “face of Overwatch”, Sinatraa is turned to Valorant before he could get his MVP skin from Blizzard
- The player Psalm came second at the Fortnite World Cup and received 1.8 million US dollars in prize money - he also switched to Valorant
- At CS: GO too, professionals stopped early to try their luck in Valorant - like Swag
In the last few months, many more professional players from Fortnite, Overwatch and CS: GO have switched to the “new, attractive Valorant”. The appearance of such a game then has ripple effects on the competitive games and is then watched with suspicion by people whose work is closely linked to one of the “old games”.
Semmler believes, however, that Valorant poses no real danger. CS: GO doesn't have to worry about "being a dying game" when you regularly have over a million players on Steam.
Valorant, he thinks, will certainly not go so well. In Korea, for example, it doesn't matter at all. Certainly Valorant's player base is tiny, he says: If they had good numbers, Riot wouldn't be able to stop yelling them in everyone's face.
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