CS2 Rolls Out a Major Patch: All About Budapest Major, New Stickers and Sticker Slab

With less than two weeks left before the start of the Budapest Major, Counter-Strike 2 has received a major patch from Valve.

What's changed in the November 12 CS2 update?

The Budapest Major Pick'em challenge and Spectator Pass are now live

The main focus of the new CS2 update is the upcoming Budapest Major. The tournament starts on November 24, but eleven days before that, Valve released the traditional event hub. It includes a special tab with tournament information and allows players to buy team stickers and make Pick'Em predictions.

The format of Budapest Major Pick'Em has not changed. To earn the Diamond Coin, players need to complete all the goals: five correct Stage 1, Stage 2 and Stage 3 picks, as well as correct predictions for two quarter-finals, one semi-final and one final.

To get a coin, you need to buy a Viewer Pass. As usual, it is available in two versions: a basic one for $10 and a premium one for $18, which includes three souvenir packs. The same sets are also earned by upgrading a coin from bronze to silver, then to gold and diamond.

New CS2 stickers for the Budapest Major

Valve continues to support the participants of the Budapest Major. Capsules are now available in the CS2 Store with autographs of players and logos of teams competing in the Hungarian capital. There are three capsules with team logos and three capsules with autographs, depending on which stage the player or team goes to. Each capsule includes four types of stickers: paper, holographic, gold and embroidered.

Embroidered stickers in CS2: A new type of sticker

Embroidered stickers are introduced for the first time in CS2. They look like they are made of fabric and have a unique texture. This type has not previously appeared in any capsule, whether tournament or not. Interestingly, for the second Major in a row, Valve has added stickers with a twist: Austin Major's paper stickers glowed in the dark. The embroidered stickers of the Budapest Major do not glow, but they will undoubtedly find their fans.

Best Budapest Major CS2 Autographs

Not every player has come up with a creative new autograph, but some are worth considering. The absolute best belongs to Biguzera: the Brazilian managed to place a beer mug on his sticker! Aleksib wrote his nickname backwards, Snow drew a snowflake, lux turned his name into a smiling face, and Starry framed his nickname with his heart. Interestingly, ropz, who once had a broken heart in his autograph, made him whole this time. As for the strangest autograph – this award goes to Kyousuke. Fans are still trying to figure out what the Falcons player meant, but the mystery remains unsolved.

Sticker Slab: New Tool in CS2

Valve continues to shake up the market for skins and stickers. This time, the CS2 team has added a way to temporarily attach a sticker to a skin. To do this, players can use the new "sticker slab". It costs 50 cents and holds one sticker. The tablet acts as a key fob that can be removed at any time. Want to return a sticker? Just break the tread. This feature is likely to make Kato 14 sticker owners especially happy: they can now show off their rarest stickers in the game without losing value.

CS2 item rarity is now highlighted in the inventory

A small but nice change: Item rarity now stands out in your Steam inventory. Previously, only StatTrak skins, knives, and gloves had a special frame, but it wasn't attractive enough. It is now much easier for players to organise their inventory or browse the collections of others.

Skybox fixes, animation updates, and other little things

Finally, some less noticeable but important updates. First, Valve fixed the skybox on Inferno. It will be interesting to see how this affects the map selection in Budapest: remember, Inferno was the most picked map at IEM Chengdu. Secondly, the developers continue to improve Animgraph2, a new animation system. With this update, the gloves have been upgraded to a new model. The development team is also still refining the surfing mode: adjusting the movement values so that players can surf better and faster. Last but not least, Valve has made some performance improvements.

Overall, the update turned out to be quite large and exciting. The Bucharest Major is just around the corner, so let's hype!