It’s been 2 years since CS:GO’s last operation
ended. Let’s look back at their history.
A CS:GO Operation is like a temporary expansion
pack that you can buy, normally for $5.99,
but sometimes discounted later. They tend
to launch alongside a bundle of community-made
maps, and buying the pass grants you bonus
case and weapon drops, and as time went on
the operations got increasingly elaborate,
giving players missions and campaigns to complete,
and a limited time to do so. The more you
did, the more you levelled up your ‘operation’
coin which would then be proudly displayed
on your account forever more. If their maps
are featured, the mappers get a cut of the
money Valve makes from the operation. So you
were supporting them by buying the operation
passes.
There have been 8 operations for CS:GO, the
last of which ended exactly 2 years ago. Since
then, CS:GO has continued to receive new maps
and updates, but not in the same style as
the operations, which were BIG updates and
came all at once. It seems like a lot of people
miss these operations!
Which is funny, because I remember them being
slated by the community whenever they were
on. People would always nostalgically say
how much better the older ones were and so
on.
But now we haven’t had any for 2 years,
a lot of people feel it would be nice to have
another. And why not. They served as a reason
to load up the game and to play on maps and
gamemodes you otherwise wouldn’t, and it
was always something to get a bit excited
about.
The first was Operation: Payback, released
in early 2013, a few months after the map
workshop was made. The payback pass cost $5.99
and gave you ‘unlimited access’ to a map
group featuring 7 top-voted community maps,
and this upgradeable challenge coin. It started
as bronze, but after 10 hours of play on operation
maps would level up to silver, and after 50
would turn gold. 50 hours of casual gamemode,
and you had 4 months to do it in. This first
operation earned over $150,000, which was
given to the map makers. Even if you hadn’t
bought the pass, players who had could still
invite you to play on the exclusive maps.
Of the 7 maps featured in Operation Payback,
4 of them were for hostage rescue, which at
the time had only just been updated to how
the gamemode plays today. Before this point
you had to rescue (OR KILL!) them all, and
instead of picking them up, you had them chase
you through the level like something out of
Terminator.
Downtown was made by Tanuki. He was rather
lucky with this operation, also getting his
seaside defuse map featured. That one has
become a bit of a favourite, returning to
the game numerous times. Motel looks like
that level from Left 4 Dead 2, and had a working
glock with unlimited ammo you could pick up
just here- which was later patched out. Museum
is a very pretty hostage rescue map, being
FMPone’s first map for CS:GO. It’s also
the only hostage map from Operation Payback
not to be re-featured in a later operation.
Thunder is a remake of an original Counter-Strike
hostage map designed by Chris Auty, who also
made Aztec, Inferno and Vertigo. Favela looks
like a Call of Duty map, and last is Library,
which I believe is the smallest map ever to
be featured. One room, one bombsite and one
HELLOLALALAOLOLOT OF FUN.
Moving onto the second operation now, which
was Operation: Bravo. This launched in September
of 2013 and was so popular, it was extended
into February 2014. It featured 8 community-made
maps but these could be played competitively,
in casual or in deathmatch mode. The requirements
to reach a silver coin were slightly raised,
needing at least 10 hours of play AND 5 competitive
wins. And for gold, you only had to play for
30 hours, but needed to win 15 competitive
games. Owners of the pass had exclusive access
to weapon drops from the Alpha collection,
and more chance of obtaining bravo case drops.
Its original price has all but disappeared
from the face of the internet. Looking at
the operation page, you might think it cost
just 99 cents, but old youtube videos reveals
that it cost $5.99.
Operation Bravo originally contained 7 new
maps, but also Seaside returned, as Valve
were eager to try it out as a competitive
map. Later on in the Winter Offensive update,
Valve bundled their new Cbble and Overpass
maps into it as well. Of the community-made
ones, you’ll know Agency and Cache, both
of which became official maps in the game
later on. Siege is a remake of an original
Counter-Strike hostage rescue map. Ali is
a defuse map that would later be featured
in Operation Phoenix. Chinatown is set in
a Chinatown, and Gwalior is FMPone’s second
map for CS:GO, this time being defuse. Ruins
is a beautiful Aztec-like defuse map.
Operation Phoenix was a weird operation, containing
no new maps but instead featuring the 8 most
popular from previous ones and being released
just 15 days after Operation Bravo ended,
still in February of 2014. Phoenix was a half-price
operation at just $2.99, and owners of the
pass got exclusive access to Operation Phoenix
case drops for the duration of the operation.
Requirements for the silver and gold coins
were the same as before, being 10 hours and
5 competitive wins for silver, and 30 hours
and 15 competitive wins for gold.
The 4 featured hostage maps were Agency, Downtown,
Motel and Thunder, and the bomb defusals were
Ali, Cache, Favela and Seaside.
Operation Breakout, the 4th operation, changed
things a bit, and was released on July 1st,
2014. The community-made maps were available
to everybody, even those who didn’t buy
the operation pass. If I’m honest, I think
that by now the appeal of playing new maps
had worn off and the increasingly competitive
nature of CS:GO meant that players preferred
sticking to the good old Dust2, Inferno and
so on. You’ll find the operation maps reflected
this. While Payback and Phoenix each contained
four hostage rescue maps, this was reduced
to just one or two from the Breakout Operation
onwards. So instead of exclusive access to
community-made maps in official gamemodes,
how could Valve encourage people to buy the
pass? They decided to add meaning to the games
played on these new maps instead, introducing
an Operation Journal, showing your stats for
the operation, how your friends were doing,
as well as featuring missions you had to complete,
like getting a certain number of kills with
a particular weapon, or winning a competitive
game on a map. For the silver coin, you needed
to complete 5 missions, and for gold, 15.
Completing a mission would drop you a skin
from either the community-made Operation Breakout
collection, or from the Valve-made Baggage,
Cobble, Overpass or later the Cache collection.
During this operation, Cache became the first
community-made map to be ‘permanently’
included in the game.
Operation Breakout had 2 hostage rescue maps,
the first being INSERTION, which is a very
unique map that let you choose your entry
point. I think, aside from the dangerzone
maps, it’s the biggest CS:GO map ever to
be included. And the other is the water-logged
jungle of ‘Rush’- full of small huts that
were fun to Molotov- until you accidentally
set fire to a hostage inside and lost all
of your money. Come to think of it, some of
the defuse maps were pretty large as well:
there’s Black Gold, set across an entire
oil rig and developed by az, Holiest Cow…
and the Horse Strangler. There’s de_castle,
which was based on a castle in Slovenia that
I made a video about a year ago. The third
is Mist, an atmospheric and unusual defuse
map situated in and around a mountain base
with lots of drops and climbs everywhere.
And finally, de_overgrown which I was rather
fond of maybe because I actually won all of
my games on that map.
Breakout ended in October of 2014, just over
5 years ago. But it wasn’t long before the
5th Operation, Vanguard, came out. In fact,
even that was over 5 years ago now.
I’ll be covering the next 4 operations in
another video, which I did initially want
to include in this one, but I wasn’t able
to finish it in time for today. Like I said
at the beginning, it’s been exactly 2 years
since the last Operation, which is longer
than we’ve had to wait, ever before. But
then it was almost a full year gap between
Wildfire and Hydra… so I wouldn’t rule
it out just yet. Valvetime moves in mysterious
ways.
