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Valorant has been blowing up a storm in the FPS community ever since its closed beta release in April this year.
Many professional players and streamers are of the opinion that Valorant is one of the most accessible tactical shooter games to have come out in a very long time. As it features both the elements of CS: GO and Overwatch, it’s not all that surprising to see how the game has got so immensely popular in just a month’s time.
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Valorant's popularity exploded to such an extent that even some professional CS: GO players have announced that they would be leaving the Counter-Strike Pro scene and join Valorant instead. Big names like Tenz, Freakazoid, ScreaM and Brax have decided to seek out a career in Valorant, as CS: GO has just gotten a bit too stale for them over the years.
So here is a list of some of the most notable CS: GO pros who have jumped ship to Valorant over the last couple of weeks:
5 CS: GO pros who have jumped ship to Valorant
#1: Tyson ‘TenZ’ Ngo
Tyson ‘TenZ’ Ngo from the Cloud9 CS: GO roster was one of the first professionals to have decided to move to Valorant as soon as the beta came out. In one of his interviews, Tenz stated:
“I've decided to go pro [in Valorant] because when I was playing the beta, I realised I haven't had as much fun as I was having in a long time. Although it might be seen as risky to switch games, I feel that the future of this game is very bright. I will no longer be playing CS: GO while I am playing Valorant professionally.”
Tenz agrees with many of the professionals to the fact that CS: GO is not as exciting as it once used to be. Valve has done nothing new for a very long time to make CS: GO fun again, which is one of the reasons why so many players are moving from CS: GO to Valorant.
Tenz sounded very serious about pursuing a professional career in Valorant when he said:
“My plan going forward is to assemble the best team that I think is possible relatively soon,” explains TenZ. “I hope to see a pro scene similar to the League of Legends structure and compete at a world-class level.”
#2: Ryan “Freakazoid“ Abadir
The 27-year-old CS: GO veteran Ryan “Freakazoid“ Abadir announced on the 10th of May that he too would be quitting the CS: GO pro scene. Abadir after being in CS: GO for 10 long years is now moving onto pursue a career in Valorant.
Freakazoid was known for playing in teams like Cloud9, Echo Fox and Ghost Gaming where he built up a big reputation and an even bigger fan base. Although he got a lot of criticism from some of his fans for moving on to a new game, Abadir took to Twitter to explain his situation and said:
“Professional players frequently change their teams. How is it any different for gamers to change a game?”
#3: Adil “ScreaM” Benrlitom
ScreaM is known in the CS: GO community for some of his most insane one-tap plays. Hence, this 25-year old Belgian prodigy’s decision to switch to Valorant came as quite a shock to many fans across the world.
ScreaM has played with a lot of teams during his time as a CS: GO pro, where he attained his most success in G2 Esports and Team Envy.
Spain's greatest CS GO export Oscar "Mixwell" Canellas, who played for teams such as Optic Gaming and Cloud 9 in the US, also recently pledged allegiance to Riot Games' newest FPS venture. The Spaniard also stated that oversaturation of tournaments has more or less killed the competitive scene.
One of Valorant’s most attractive qualities that appealed to ScreaM was how much more fun and satisfying it was to kill an enemy there as opposed to in CS: GO. Unlike Tenz, ScreamM's decision to join the Valorant pro scene was not made in a heartbeat. He first invested a lot of hours in the game before arriving at a decision.
In the recent Fnatic Proving Grounds: Valorant Open tournament, ScreaM led Team Prodigy to victory. Apart from ScreaM, the team consisted of other big names like Mixwell, Dafran, KingMezii and Shaiko.
#4: Braxton “Swag” Pierce
Braxton Pierce, better known as Swag, is the first-ever officially signed Valorant Pro. He got chartered up by T1 even before the game got an official release.
It’s amazing how some esports orgs are signing up players for Valorant even when the game is still in its beta stages.
Swag, or Brax, was known as one of the most talented players to have hit the CS: GO esports scene, till he got banned by Valve for five-years as he and his teammates were involved in a match-fixing scandal.
Valorant opens up a new gateway for Swag to try having another shot at a professional career.
#5: Michael “dapr” Gulino
Michael Gulino, better known as Dapr, is the latest addition in the line-up of pros to have left CS: GO for Valorant.
After his Nort-American team bad news bears got disbanded, this 21-year old wasted no time in announcing that he would be pursuing his career in Valorant from now on.
Dapr is tired of “being in the bottom pro league loop” all the time, because of which he wants a fresh start as he no longer sees a future in Counter Strike.
