Let's start the new year with a story about tournaments and events that are worth paying attention to in 2023. They will primarily attract the attention of everyone who follows the professional scene in CS:GO and appreciates intense matches. At the end of December, two of the three largest organizations that organize tournaments in CS:GO – BLAST, ESL and Intel Extreme Masters – have published the final calendar of events that await us in 2023.
Main tournaments
The key events of the year will be three tournaments held by IEM. The competition will take place in January-February in Katowice, in May-June in Dallas and in July-August in Cologne. The prize fund for the events in Katowice and Cologne will be $1 million each, and for the competition in Dallas – 250 thousand, and, besides, fewer teams will take part in the latter – 16, not 24, as in the other two. Of course, victories in Katowice and Cologne will be taken into account in the Intel Grand Slam. Calendar 2023-v3" class="fr-fic fr-dii" style="width: 800px;">
Although the list of the strongest teams is perceived in many ways as already established, and spectators are accustomed to seeing the same top players at competitions, the past year has shown that surprises can happen at any time, and the favorites are not immune from losing. We have yet to see how the ranking of the best teams in the world will change as a result of these tournaments.
In addition, two seasons of ESL Pro League – seventeenth and eighteenth. 24 teams in each of them will compete not only for a prize fund of $835 thousand, but also for a direct invitation to the major. The first tournament will take place from February 21 to April 2, and the second – from August 15 to September 23.
As you can see, the second half of the year will be especially busy, especially given the short gap between the above-mentioned majors in Dallas and Cologne. As for BLAST, this organization has not yet published the full competition schedule for 2023. The company's official blog mentions that negotiations are currently underway with several cities where tournament sites may be located
Upcoming updates
Major tournaments – not the only thing that will attract the attention of CS:GO players in 2023. One of the ongoing topics for discussion remains the possible transition to the Source2 engine. Many expected it back in 2022, and information found in the game files suggests that sooner or later this will actually happen, but Valve still hasn’t given an exact date. Therefore, it remains unclear whether 2023 will be the year of the long-awaited change for many. Perhaps the developers needed additional time to provide players with the opportunity to choose one of the engines – when Dota2 was transferred to Source2, the lack of such an option became a problem for some users. In addition, a new operation can be expected to be released in 2023, since more than a year has passed since the start of the last one (Waters of Prey). In any case, 2023 will definitely be an interesting year in CS:GO.
