Counter-Strike: Global Offensive has introduced a paywall for its Prime upgrade, in an attempt to cut the number of cheaters players encounter, especially in ranked mode. CS:GO has been free-to-play for over three years, and while this has helped maintain a healthy playerbase, it also allowed cheaters and hackers to freely access every portion of the game.

However, Valve has reversed this decision and removed a free path to Prime status from the game. The developer explains its decision in a blog post, citing that "[Prime] benefits have become an incentive for bad actors to hurt the experience of both new and existing players."

This means that free-to-play Counter-Strike players can no longer receive XP, ranks, drops, or Skill Groups. However, every game mode is still available, as are community servers and workshop maps. Valve has simply put ranked mode behind a paywall in order to discourage cheaters. As it stood, players who were banned for cheating could simply make a new account and progress enough to achieve Prime status, before cheating in high-level CS:GO ranked lobbies and ruining everyone's experience again.