We’ve heard it a thousand times in matches from fans, and it looks like they have a point: North American Counter-Strike is desperate for some new blood as highlighted in the Mountain Dew League finals, which Chaos easily took in a coordinated display of teamwork and understanding of the title.
Yet while Chaos (GS #37) is mired currently by MIBR (GS #14) fans continuing to flame the team after MIBR took a massive loss against the NA team, the actual story surrounds second place winners, Team Mythic (GS #82).
Headed up by Erik Flom, the team consisted of five players; three of which that hold a combined Counter-Strike playtime of under twenty hours. The team didn’t practice and simply tried plugging against the professional teams to fascinating victories with tactics such as ‘we go B again’ played every T-side.
The team continued to goof-off in multiple matches, discussing everything from whether or not they can bait MIBR fans into accusing them of aim-lock to whether Flom drinking GFuel on stream is considered to be an advertisement. This isn’t to imply that the team was trolling the league, merely that they didn’t have precise calls occurring and didn’t seem entirely fazed by most strategies and results against them.
Erik Flom had this to say, on stream, when asked if he felt Team Mythic could clutch a win against Recon 5:
Listen…anyone with some competitive spirit isn’t going to go into a match without wanting to win. We might be the underdogs, and I know we don’t practice, but there is definitely a way.
Team Mythic was comprised of Flom, Donovan ‘zNf’ Froid, Adam ‘Polen’, Corbin ‘C0M’ Lee, and Kaitlin ‘Keiti’ Boop.
Kaitlin surprised many throughout MDL where she consistently was able to rout the enemies using only the Desert Eagle and impeccable aim; she typically plays League of Legends on stream, and nearly every round she played was punctuated with the statement ‘I ****ing hate this game.’
Team Mythic had strong wins against Oceanus and New England Whalers, yet struggled to offer a strong showing in either match-up against Chaos in the quarter-finals and finals, losing to clean sweeps each time.
The NA FPS scene, in general, is in a decided amount of turmoil; many professional fraggers have left their teams to shoot their shot with the newly released Riot shooter Valorant, eager to be a part of the beginning of what could become the newest competitive shooter. This isn’t to say Counter-Strike is unpopular, either: the title is consistently one of the most-played games on Steam, which is a resounding feat considering the popularity of the platform.
Some players that have announced that they have left CS:GO for Valorant have already come back, but there is simply no denying the state of NA CS:GO is subpar. This, however, can be viewed as an opening for one willing to look for the silver linings.
Counter-Strike is as popular as it has ever been, and with a bafflingly strong professional scene at that. There are easily viewable gaps for the next great fragger coming from NA to join the likes of Nathan ‘lead’ Orf and Russell ‘Twistzz’ Van Dulken. It just takes a bit of commitment (and a massive grind) to become that legendary icon.