The future of Counter-Strike 2 Cases

Counter-Strike cases were a milestone when they were added to the game. Millions are opened per month, but the recent updates have showed that the creators of Counter-Strike wants to change the dynamics of skins and cases.

These containers have raised a few eyebrows and has had some backlash with Valve being pushed to courts by New Yorks' Attorney general.

Recent updates are trying to pushback against these lootboxes. So with the current scenario, it begs the question: what is the future of Counter-Strike 2 cases?

Valve is giving alternative paths

Some countries within the European Union have started to close the door into Valves original system. Early on the players would be awarded cases, two per week. Having the case by itself wouldn't be enough to open it, a player would also need the corresponding key to unlock the container.

Unlocking the container the animation would spin until it stopped on the skin. The rush of getting a rare skin would make some players open hundreds, if not thousands of these items.

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It wasn't long until this system caught the atention by its similarity to gambling. Some European countries have closed the door, and Valve has adapted the game for these situations.

Players from these countries, for example, have access to an X-Ray that allows the player to preview the skin of the container without spending money on a key to open it.

Terminals, Renting skins and Tradeups

Two other updates that deserve atention are: Renting skins and the terminal.

Both of these updates are very clear that Valve wants to argument that players can achieve the skins of the game without going through the path of opening cases.

Renting skins allows you a time-limited access to a case, exploring new play skins, still Valve decided to go a bit further.

With terminals, players now don't need to pay anything in order to open a container. Instead they get offered a few skins, for a calculated price by Valve.

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You still need to get lucky, in order to get a rare item on your terminal, but the fact that opening a terminal doesn't need a key, releases some of the pressure on Valve's side about gambling.

These updates are signs that Valve wants to steer the model of Counter-Strike Skins away from the lootboxes, but without completly disrupting the market.

Nowadays, considering that you can trade up Covert Skins to a pair of gloves or a knife. Valve can argue that a player can achieve almost any item through playing the game, without needing to access these lootboxes.

Conclusion

As I said in previous entries, trying to predict the direction that Valve wants to take is very difficult. This means that what I argued in this article could be completly wrong.

It looks like that with the last updates, there shouldn't be anymore cases released. This system looks like is going to be deprecated with terminals coming in as their replacement.

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If the pool of cases starts to shrink more and more, this could drive the prices of these containers. Still Valve could add a terminal that has access to these collections which means the prices could be controlled.

Could cases be a good investment for the future? Yes, but again everything lies on the plans that Valve has for these types of items.

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