Desert Eagle | Code Red (Minimal Wear)

This is the Desert Eagle | Code Red in Minimal Wear (MW), and it sits on the border of two steps. Factory New costs more than three times as much, while the three lower wears are only slightly cheaper. It is a Covert pistol that drops from the Horizon Case. No side is fixed: in CS2 both teams can use it.

What the Desert Eagle | Code Red looks like in Minimal Wear

The skin is built from three zones. At the top are a bright red slide, barrel and front sight. In the middle, a silver-white inlay with black slots and fine engraving runs the full length of the slide. At the bottom are a dark frame, trigger guard and black grip panel, with only the magazine base painted red again.

Minimal Wear means light wear. The red paint on the slide is mostly intact, and the first marks appear on the edges of the silver inlay and along the top ridge. The engraving in the silver still reads. The float is set at drop and never changes, so the way a listing looks in its photos is final.

Where the Desert Eagle | Code Red came from

The artwork is by DasDas, an author from the Steam Workshop. The Horizon Collection with this skin came out on August 1, 2018, and the Desert Eagle | Code Red arrived in that same update. Valve's finish catalog lists it as number 711.

What to check before buying

What differs from listing to listing on the Desert Eagle | Code Red:

• the float: the band from 0.07 to 0.15 is only 8% of the skin's scale, and the scale gives this wear little room, so copies look alike;


• stickers on the body of the Desert Eagle | Code Red, and a name tag if there is one;


• the edges of the silver inlay, where wear shows sooner than on the red paint.

The artwork on the Desert Eagle | Code Red does not vary, so pattern plays no part in the choice.

What the Desert Eagle | Code Red costs in Minimal Wear

Factory New costs 3.35 times as much. Going down, the price eases gently: Field-Tested is cheaper by a factor of 1.23, and Well-Worn and Battle-Scarred by 1.27.

Four Covert Desert Eagles have a price in this wear, and Code Red stands third from the top. Desert Eagle | Golden Koi costs more than three times as much, and Desert Eagle | Ocean Drive a third more. Desert Eagle | Printstream is about a tenth cheaper.

Getting the Desert Eagle | Code Red

The pistol drops from the Horizon Case. A trade-up also yields the Desert Eagle | Code Red: ten skins one step below, all from the one collection. The Horizon Case has two Covert skins, so the Desert Eagle is one outcome in two.

StatTrak and Souvenir

The Desert Eagle | Code Red has a StatTrak version. Souvenir copies of the finish also exist, though no packages were released for it: those were made only for the tournament map collections. Such copies are built through the Souvenir-O-Matic, which puts gold tournament stickers and a player autograph on a regular skin from your inventory.

Stickers and craft on the Desert Eagle | Code Red

The red slide takes white, light blue and yellow stickers, while red and orange ones get lost on it. The silver inlay is light, so dark stickers show on it, but the engraving is better left uncovered. Light stickers look good on the black grip.

Who this wear suits

Minimal Wear makes sense for the Desert Eagle | Code Red in these cases:

• you want a red pistol for CS2 with intact paint, but without the factory price;


• it matters that the engraving on the silver inlay reads;


• you are choosing between the top wear and the next step down, which is cheaper by a factor of only 1.23.