CS:GO has been constantly in the news since its phenomenal release and rise to success. There is not a single gamer that doesn’t know about Valve’s legendary game. Its player base is massive, comprising millions of players in total and millions active daily playing it to date. Even one of the most developed eSports environments for any game is for none other than CS:GO.
There are multiple reasons why the game is still alive and growing, even if it’s almost 10 years old now. One of the major reasons is Valve’s continuous updates to the game. While some people think this is out of developer-love for a game they hold dear, it’s actually because of more materialistic reasons – skins.
Skins are an integral component of the CS:GO franchise and cash in enormous amounts of revenue for Valve. According to cs.money, players are more than willing to spend hundreds of dollars to get their favorite CS:GO skin without any remorse. In fact, just last month in June, the CS:GO community saw a transaction of $780,000 (!) for two skins between two Chinese CS:GO players.
This is how much CS:GO players love their skins. However, this love has arisen several myths that aren’t true in the least. These myths about CS:GO skins are untrue but most people think them out to be true. That’s why in this article, we’ll be talking about several myths about CS: GO skins that most people think are true and bust them down.
Myth #1 – Skins lose quality over time.
One of the most commonly talked myths in various forums, websites, and servers is the myth that skins degrade or lose quality over time, or the more they are used in matches. This myth is commonly circulated amongst new player circles and has arisen from a severe lack of information about skins, and how they work.
Let us clarify for once and for all – skins don’t lose their quality over time no matter what happens. They are only obtained in that condition. That is, whenever a player purchases a skin crate, opens it, and receives a skin, that skin is assigned a random wear tag. This wear tag dictates what the condition of the weapon would be and how it’ll look when you use it.
These conditions are ranked from worst to best, with the worst condition being “Battle-scarred” and the best being “Factory new”. The prior has a really bad condition and it shows the moment you use the skin. On the other hand, the latter looks excellent, shiny, and entirely new. This myth can easily arise when a player with a bad skin condition like “well-worn” sees a player on youtube who has the same skin but it looks brand new.
Myth #2 – Skins don’t affect gameplay performance.
Yes, that’s right, skins affecting gameplay performance is not a myth. While skins offer nothing in terms of mechanical value, this does not mean that they don’t have any impact on performance at all. Skins offer a value that is unique to only them – psychological value.
Many players have found that equipping their favorite skin on their gun boosts their confidence and performance a lot, especially when they do it for the first time. This is actually a logical phenomenon and it’s called the placebo effect. Basically, the placebo effect makes our minds think that having skins on your guns is a sign of skill (since most competitive players have skins on their weapons) and boosts our confidence by a lot.
This boost in confidence then later results in a surge of performance that helps players gun down their enemies with much better accuracy. Not only that, if you choose the perfect skin for the perfect map, say a desert camo skin in dust, then it can actually help you camouflage yourself when you are hiding. This is especially great for guns with long barrels like the AWP that can be seen easily from afar.
Myth #3 – You can only buy skins from Steam Marketplace.
The Steam marketplace is not the only exclusive site for buying skins. In fact, it’s one of the least preferable places for many skin buyers. Now where do most people buy skins from, you might ask? Well, the answer is that there are countless websites out there that are more than willing to sell you quality skins as per your preference.
These websites often offer skins directly without any hassle. Players don’t need to go to the effort of buying skin crates, opening them, and relying on chance to get the skin they want. They can simply visit one of the verified skin marketplace websites and buy the skin they want from there.
This streamlines the entire process of getting the skin you want. Buyers who use these websites to buy skins need not be worried about Steam taking action against them because they don’t have any legal grounds to do so. Steam does not own any of these websites. However, if you do plan on purchasing from such third-party websites, ensure that they are reliable and verified by the community.
Myth #4 – Skins don’t do anything except provide cosmetic value.
This is considered one of the biggest arguments against buying skins – they are nothing but cosmetic value in a videogame that isn’t even real. It is often quoted by either non-gamers or people who haven’t played CS:GO long enough to understand its true essence and how skins are an important part of it.
For many players, equipping the same skin as their favorite professional eSports player is their only chance of feeling like they are in their shoes – a dream many young CS:GO players aspire for. Telling them their skins are nothing but useless virtual cosmetics is a sure way of breaking their dreams apart into a million pieces. CS:GO skins provide emotional and monetary value to many of its owners and CS:GO players take great pride in them.
Conclusion.
There are many myths about CS:GO skins that are circulated around in the community. We hope this article helped you identify some of them and if it did, please consider following our website for regular updates as it will help us immensely.
