Right after Riot Games unleashed a hammer on the latest map in VALORANT – Corrode – players claw at its grates to sink their teeth into an unusually energetic downpour of love-hate reactions. The uproar surely keeps one’s spirits light.
Starting with the layout: Corrode is small. Like smaller-than-Split, some say. A player, JesterX, said that mid is basically the heartbeat of this game-one either controls it or gives free flanks to the enemy. Defenders are breaking out sweating, trying to cover every nook while getting poached from every corner due to some very tight angles. Noah (BlissValo) said it best: “Very tight and a pissload of corners.” That pretty much sums up both.
Now, for the smoke. Medic (bob79193868) called the mid “smoke central,” where some well-placed smokes would just kill rotation massively. So bad to be seen in ranked but pretty damn good in pro play.
On the other hand, some players aren’t hating it. Sean Ellsworth (LASeaN8) loves that detail: “More angles to watch than any other map,” which sounds stressful but some folks thrive on chaos. Then some other people are more meh-about it, as he puts it, “it’s just an ok map.”
Corrode makes for the faintly divided second group-turned-rip. Fenix (Fenix_25_) said straight up: “its a shit.” Brutal. And Wael Jamil (JamilWael7740) put it in all caps: “TRASH U FAILED RIOT.” Ouch. Even lone sentinels are having a hard time, furqan furki (Anonimouswb) calling it “a nightmare” if their teammates aren’t setting up right.
Some are trying to get used to it. Carter (NoAimCarter) confessed that he probably had played one game out of 15 on it, so the jury is still out. BingChillin’ (BingChillin8248) is currently learning and feels a need to tweak the pre-round barriers.
And now for the weirdest-ever-comeback. vvzz (V1tzS) sarcastically (hopefully) implores Riot “to lower the creator’s salary.” Harsh.
In either case, it moods differently for different people. Former being ardent champions of fast-paced, tight-angle gameplay; latter views it as a tight space of misery. But this does get everybody talking—the whole premise behind the map from Riot…
Verdict? Too early to say. But what we can say is that the map, Corrode, definitely sure as hell ain’t boring. So is that a good thing? Again, depends on whom you ask.
