cs fans come

i have been watching cs since 2022 blast finals and i hv been keeping up ever since. one thing i cant get right tho. in val, we have masters and champs, which champs being at the last event of the year but in cs, there is blast and esl with iem events being equivalent masters events and blast finals being the final event. however, i see way more hype for majors than blast finals. is the major the equivalent of champs? (btw mb i put this post under the wrong forum category)

Major = not comparable
IEM = Champs & Masters
Blasts, PGL, BetBoom, EWC & etc = Normal 3rd party tournaments

Major poses another value, they were the first big events and are hosted in a collaboration with valve, sticker money is given out, it's basically the bigger event because of stickers as well as history.

ESWC was a BIG thing back in the day, was like csgo world cup with 1m prize pool

Major is like Champs with 10x the hype and stakes. Both happen once a year (majors happen a little more frequently but around once a year, max 2x a year)

Most IEM/ESL events are like masters, but keep in mind that instead of there being 2-3 masters events, in cs there is like fking 10+ of these in a year so there are more matches, thus storylines can be built and there is a lot more constant viewership that can occur. That being said, it does make some matches feel watered down at times in the group stages and such, but the finals are ALWAYS sick.

Overall the CS format gives way more events and thus leads to a more storied scene, making the majors more hype. This, on top of the fact that stickers bring in MASSIVE amounts of money for the players and teams makes the CS esports ecosystem pretty amazing. Next year too when the circuit is open, shi will go crazy. Riot is chill n shi trying to emulate the "sports" model into the structure, but the Valve style of just letting the community have free reign on tournaments and the structure is kinda sick and, atleast for me personally, i feel that it fits the esports identity FAR better than the system in place here in valorant.

wrote this a while ago to someone else.

Heres a website to see past tournaments easier if you’re new.
https://liquipedia.net/counterstrike/S-Tier_Tournaments

Events:
S+: Majors - sponsored by Valve and chosen TO organizes it (2 per year typically one usually in Summer and one in Winter); IEM Katowice (Feb/March) and Cologne (July/August) - events that feel like a major but not technically (organized by ESL); Blast World Final (typically in December) - slightly under the previous events imo in terms of hype and prestigiousness but still huge event (organized by Blast ofc)

Edit: World Finals will not exist next year. Due to the open circuit rule that will start in 2025, Blast redesigned their events (Bounty, Open, Rivals) for two seasons. I think Open will be the next S+ event by Blast, but we will see.

S: Blast Spring Final and Fall Final - season big events, Fall final is little more hype usually since it is in Copenhagen Royal Arena with a bigger CS audience; IEM events - big events but not as huge as Cologne or Katowice, around 3-4 events spread out per year, location depends but some in the past were in Sydney, Rio, Beijing, Dallas (very common per year), etc.

Edit: Again, these Blast Finals event will not exist next year. Due to the open circuit rule that will start in 2025, Blast redesigned their events (Bounty, Open, Rivals). I think Bounty and Rivals will both be S tier. (If you’re interested how these events work, its on Blast’s youtube channel)

S-: ESL Pro League (variable time every year)- this is borderline to S tier as it has a big prizepool, but this is a chill event, however games are still very hype typically; Blast Spring and Fall Groups - big events to get qualified to Blast Spring Finals and Fall Finals. If you bomb out, you get another chance to qualify through Blast Spring and Final Showdown which is basically LCQ; Gamers8 - new organizer event that was added recently with a huge prizepool but the event itself is smaller than the rest (unsure if this event will continue next year and so forth).

Edit: Blast Groups/Showdown will not exist next year. Gamers8 is now EWC and can be argued to be S tier, but for me it is still S- tier due to be lower in hype personally.

Rest are A or below tier you can find on the link. If you think this is a lot, there used to be more events back then 2015-2019. My thoughts is that I like how many events there is because I can always watch many good events throughout the year.

Edit:

All these TOs entering/reentering CS in 2025, Starladder, PGL, Skyesports, Perfect World, etc; these events seems to be good with hugh prizepools but for now we need to see them first before we rank them. I have higher expectations for PGL due to their CS event experience, so they may be S tier. The rest are probably S- tier or below. It is insane though that most of these are at least a million in prizepools.