The upcoming death of the CS2 partner system has seen a major rethink at BLAST. At the BLAST Premier Spring Final 2024, the tournament organizer confirmed a huge shakeup to its 2025 format, showcasing what viewers can expect for BLAST’s CS2 schedule next year.
There’s a lot to cover, so let’s dive right into it.
Credit: BLAST
BLAST Bounty tournaments are unlike anything ever seen before in esports. 32 teams will be invited to the event, including 30 from the Valve Global Ranking and 2 wildcard teams. They will compete in a best-of-3 single-elimination bracket online, with quarter-finalists moving on to a BLAST Studios LAN in Copenhagen.
At the start of the BLAST Bounty CS2 tournaments, teams will be given a bounty based on their seeding. Match winners receive 50% of their opponent’s bounty as a guaranteed cash prize, with the other 50% being added to the victorious team’s bounty.
And get this: lower-seeded teams can choose their opponents, with seeds resetting each round. This means that lower-ranked teams are able to take one of two routes: choose another lower-ranked team for an easier run, or chase the cash against harder opponents. Remember, the Valve Global Ranking is based on prize money won, so this could be a great way to build up a ranking.
Credit: BLAST
BLAST Open tournaments are 16-team events, with 12 invited from the Valve Global Ranking. The four remaining teams will come through regional qualifiers call BLAST Rising, and then separated into two groups of eight. These groups will be played at BLAST Studios in Copenhagen. This is similar to the BLAST Groups format we see now, except with two groups rather than four.
The top three teams from each group at BLAST Open tournaments will qualify for the Playoffs, before heading out to the host cities to play out a big-stage CS2 event. BLAST has already confirmed that the Open Playoffs for 2025 will take place in Lisbon’s Altice Arena and London’s OVO Wembley Arena.
Credit: BLAST
BLAST Rivals is the final new CS2 event format announced by the tournament organizer. This will see the top eight-ranked CS2 teams come head to head, invited directly to see who is the best of the best. These will conclude each BLAST CS2 season, essentially crowning a season “winner” each time.
The eight teams here will fight it out in a best-of-3 GSL format, which then forms a six-team Playoffs bracket. Viewers will be familiar will this from BLAST’s current Spring, Fall, and World Final format, so this should feel very familiar.
Credit: BLAST
As a final surprise, BLAST confirmed that next year, NA gets another CS Major for the first time since 2018. The BLAST.tv Austin Major takes Counter-Strike to Texas in June 2025, where teams head to the Moody Center to compete for a $1,250,000 prize pool.
After the success of the BLAST.tv Paris Major in 2023, it was expected for BLAST to get another Major. Austin seems like a great place for the event to be held, so we can’t wait to see what’s in store in June 2025.
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