The first Counter-Strike 2 Major is taking place in Copenhagen, Denmark in March 2024, according to PGL’s announcement today, but the fans’ reaction to the news is mixed at best. Many are skeptical that PGL can deliver the top-tier production that CS2’s first Valve-sponsored event deserves thanks to its track record.
“On one hand we finally get a major in Denmark and it feels right that it is the first CS2 major, on another hand [it’s] PGL,” one CS fan said on Reddit. “I feel like ESL or BLAST are way more competent, [there are] too many technical issues at PGL Majors and it’s not a good look for CS2‘s first Major,” another fan said.
PGL is a tournament organizer based in Romania that has hosted three CS:GO Majors in the past—Kraków, Poland in 2017, Stockholm, Sweden in 2021, and Antwerp, Belgium in 2022—and all three of them had their own problems. The Major in Poland, for example, was by far one of the worst in terms of production. Several players complained the PCs PGL provided weren’t good enough to play CS:GO, and one of the matches even had to be concluded off-stream due to technical problems.
While production got better for Stockholm in 2021, tech issues and behind the scene problems still affected the product. Talent members Duncan “Thorin” Shields and Richard Lewis dedicated a whole episode of the podcast By the Numbers to talk about how it was the talent members who kept the show running and saved PGL Stockholm Major from being one of the worst Majors ever. PGL’s CEO Silviu Stroie acknowledged the critics in an interview with Dexerto and said the tournament organizer was working to improve across all areas for PGL Antwerp.
Despite the promises, some of the issues persisted in the RMRs for PGL Antwerp Major, mainly related to the audio production, and while the tournament was arguably PGL’s best work in comparison to the previous two, the broadcast still had some tech problems as you can see below. It also doesn’t help, from a viewer standpoint, that PGL had issues while running Dota 2’s The International 11 last year, including an audio problem that allowed players to hear talent cast their games, which raised concerns about competitive integrity.
So, unless PGL does a perfect job with CS2‘s first Major, it will be hard to convince fans that the tournament organizer deserves to host a tournament of this level. The Major is the most prestigious event in CS esports and fans expect top-tier production to follow the games.
The BLAST Paris Major in May 2022 will be the last Valve-sponsored tournament for CS:GO as CS2 will launch worldwide this summer after the limited test phase ends. The Source 2 update has already generated a ton of interest in the scene and made the game reach a viewership milestone on Twitch this year.
Dot Esports reached out to PGL but has received no response at this time.
