Paris has finished sorting the contenders from the passengers. Of the dozens of teams that flew in for Esports World Cup 2026, only sixteen are still standing, and even a generous slot count couldn't keep the surprises out: for a handful of the biggest names here, this tournament is going nowhere near the way they drew it up.We're breaking down every round-of-16 tie below, and at the end we've put

The all-black loadout is a build everyone gets around to sooner or later. It doesn't ask for rare patterns, low floats or hours of palette matching — you just need the pieces to agree with each other on shade. It's also harder to pull off than it sounds. There's surprisingly little true black in CS2, and half the finishes filed under "dark" turn out on closer inspection to be grey,

On August 14, 2013, Valve shipped the update that stopped Counter-Strike from being just a shooter. The Arms Deal Update brought in decorated weapons, two cases, eight collections tied to maps, keys, trading, Steam Community Market listings and the inspect view.The community wasn't impressed. Half the forums argued that paint jobs had nothing to do with competitive CS and that Valve was messing about instead of fixing the balance. The

We promised a separate piece on Cryptids, so here it is. But we have to start with the numbers rather than the artwork.It's been almost a month since the second Call to Arms-ory was announced, and the Cryptids tag on the Workshop has pulled in roughly twenty pages of submissions. A good chunk of those are variations on the same three ideas: a silhouette in the woods, a saucer in