(Dynamic weapon pricing, CSS 2006 11.10.2006)

Clip of event

Counterstrike has always seen some fantastic innovations implemented through the years, I
I thought this was a great idea at the time... The principle idea was to integrate market mechanics directly into weapon prices, thus weapon values adjusted based on popularity (demand). Only the way it was implemented wasn’t offset by two factors: it wasn’t nuanced by round reward remuneration (affordability of expensive items), and more importantly didn’t predict the downside to the devaluation of unwanted weapons (the bottom). Henceforth sought after guns became too expensive to consider purchasing, leaving many players having to make do with ‘middling’ guns, and the glock became so cheap you could stand at spawn and spam out hundreds of them, which (surprise!) is exactly what people did. Glock spam slowed the servers down to the point the game became an unplayable lag fest. Hence this scenario is what this skin commemorates.

After many weeks DWP was removed, although nowadays in CSGO weapon pricing still exists - its actively managed by the devs over very long periods which gives these eras a ‘weapon meta’. This allows the pros adequate time to adjust and calculate team buys over seasonal periods. This slow, steady and managed method appears to work best with the community.

I made a tileable low-tier pattern that shows ‘cascades of glocks’ as if they were being spam bought, ingame gravity is why they flow in an arked motion.

I extracted the Glock model from CSS which I had to rebuild one side as it was partially missing, I then created cascades in 3D and then shaded and outlined them. In the early quick tests I pitted an outline aesthetic vs silhouette, and preferred the outline as the silhouette made it difficult to discern what the object was, although theoretically a silhouette would lend itself best to a camo pattern which would tie in nicer with the name ‘DWP-PAT’ (a pun on military naming convention of some camo patterns). Ultimately what depicted the glocks clearest won out. It’s a bit messy, but so was the spam!

I’ve incorporated some dithering effects to add some interest, the blockiness has visual associations with file data/bytes which I’ve used to represent packet loss in the background; as this is a pattern skin I dont have the finesse with wear as afforded to a fixed positon design, but I’ve attempted to make it so ‘blocks of packet loss’ appear the more worn the finish. Low tier designs are typically more bland so I’ve stuck with tan/orange/brown hues.

Other CS20 submissions on 'unexpected results' theme...