Despite all Valve’s promises with CS2 and VAC Live, in 2026, we still see cheating in CS2, players grind day and night for years on end, and are still plagued by cheaters on all platforms at every level. They entered the race with other competitive shooters promising AI-powered anti-cheat, but we have yet to see anything.
Counter-Strike has survived everything from esports teams throwing for money to pro players cheating in LANs, but the one problem they can’t seem to shake is the CS2 cheating epidemic. It’s evolved beyond just community complaints, as we see in most games; it’s a structural issue within the game, losing players to third-party platforms that have now become the norm we don’t see anywhere else, and the player base has just accepted this reality.