A new update for Counter Strike: Global Offensive is now live for the PC, which tweaks the Hostage Rescue mode and also includes various miscellaneous fixes for the game.

For the full patch notes of this recent update, scroll down below:

March 21st Patch Notes

• Added new Hostage Rescue map cs_militia
• Update Hostage Rescue Mode rules
• Hostage positions are randomly assigned at the beginning of the match. The hostages will start at these positions for the entire match.
• Hostages are now carried by CTs instead of following behind.
• Hold +use for 4 seconds to pick up a hostage. (Equipping a rescue kit will decrease the time required to 1 second.)
• CTs win a round when the first hostage is rescued.
• Reduced round timer. Round time is extended when the first hostage has been picked up.
• Rebalanced money rewards to accommodate new rules.
• Hostages now indicate whether they are above or below you on the radar.
• cs_office, cs_assault, and cs_italy have updated to use random hostage spawn points.
• Added convars to modify new hostage rules
  • mp_hostages_max – Sets the maximum number of hostages to spawn.
  • mp_hostages_rescuetime – Setting 0 removes the time extension when CTs pick up the first hostage.
  • mp_hostages_spawn_farthest – Setting 1 forces hostage spawn points to choose be the farthest possible combinations.
  • mp_hostages_spawn_force_positions – Setting a comma separate list (ex: 0,2 ) forces specific hostage spawn point combinations.
  • mp_hostages_spawn_same_every_round – Setting 0 randomizes the hostage spawn points every round.
  • mp_hostages_takedamage – Setting 0 allows hostages to be hurt.
• Added hostage entity properties for new hostage rules
  • HostageSpawnRandomFactor – Allows to increase probability of hostage random spawning rules to use that spawn point.
  • HostageSpawnExclusionGroupN – Hostages sharing same spawn exclusion group will never spawn together.
• The action of defusing a bomb will now terminate when you turn your view too far from facing the bomb.
• Players always play a quiet client-side jump sound that can only be heard by the jumper.
• Players play the regular jump (step) sound when moving greater than walk speed that can be heard by both the jumper and all clients in earshot.
• The timer that performs the random map selection visuals now properly gets killed when the scoreboard hides.
• Fixed convar mp_weapons_allow_map_place not properly eliminating map-placed weapons. NOTE: FY servers will need to set this convar to 1.
• Added an option to func_dustmotes entity volumes that lets them choose to not be affected by wind.
• Fixed in-game clipping for triple-monitor rendering configurations.
• Added overtime indicator to GOTV spectators miniscoreboard.
• Radar should now correctly follow spectated player when spectating via GOTV.
• Adjusted score and MVP rewards for gameplay events related to planting, defending and defusing the bomb, and for reaching, protecting and extracting hostages.
• Steam overlay game details will now correctly show players score.
• Fixed special characters of player name not correctly displaying in some UI elements.
• Fixed a bug where friends were banned from joining parties where one of the members failed to recently accept a competitive match.

In addition, VG247 is also reporting that this patch went live sooner than it was intended with a very interesting piece of code being discovered. Counter-Strike: Global Offensive may be seeing it’s own version of a “season pass” in the near future, as well as adding an in-game store, according to these lines of strings found when this update was released prematurely.

But, when the proper patch was released on its original schedule, Valve removed any mentions of the season pass with a new line of strings consisting of “CSGO_Ticket_CommunitySeasonOneSpring2013_Leak” “lol”, according to a reddit member.


What do you guys think?