CS2 is PAY TO WIN NOW

Oh no, anti-aliasing lets you see stuff that non anti-aliased players cannot. Let's see how deep this PAY to WHINE conspiracy goes

[mini-_]

I'm a simple person, I see a red arrow, I click on it.

[jubi_]

DO NOT set your Shadow Quality to low, this will hide those massive shadows from construction lights.
Set it to "Very High" to get an advantage on multiple spots on multiple maps, or Low to get an advantage on this specific railing only.

EDIT: "High" works just as well. (I thought higher setting rendered further but it doesn't seem to in testing)

[ebubba]

No way valve actually deals with this, they'll slap some tarps or sheet metal over those sensitive transparent areas and call it a day

[luckydepressedguy]

Finally a reason to buy a rtx 4090, thanks philip

[shukterhousejive]

Final Fantasy XIII abused this quirk of MSAA to render hair, when the PC port dropped people wondered why MSAA was forced on until they found a way to disable it and everyone’s head turned into pixel soup

[Rokk_]

The reason this happens is because the grates are using Alpha To Coverage, which is basically a way to anti-alias see-through cutoff textures. It allows you to do "half transparency", without actually making an object transparent. Allowing the graphics card to then smooth out the line between "fully visible" and "fully invisible" by abusing MSAA. This eliminates the grainy "shimmering" or aliasing that you often see on foliage or chain-link fences in certain games.

Without anti-aliasing turned on, more of the grate texture will be visible and the gaps will be smaller because the texture doesn't get cut off until it goes FULLY transparent. 2x MSAA cuts off most of the texture or at least makes it half-transparent which makes it easier to see through.

This is not easily fixable unless they alter these specific textures for people with MSAA off.

[ansonx]

Hot take: Competitive players need a reason to use something other than the ugliest possible graphics settings. People who will never climb the ranks still stream the game with eye-searingly bad graphics because it's "the meta." I would be overjoyed if they all used AA because it was technically superior in 1 tiny area on a couple maps.

[jeffreymalone]

Those ‘computers covered in vaseline’ pictures are suitably disturbing ☹️

[nefariousmonkey]

It would be funny to replace the platforms on vertigo with breakable glass panes which can be shot to drop people off the map.

[leonard__]

disappointed you didn't use the nightmare inducing "man licking computer screen with his tongue covered in vaseline" -image :(

[georgeisratemint]

MSAA gives me a massive competitive disadvantage because when I turn it on the game crashes

[cyyyube]

I literally just got a wallbang on that exact same spot cause of this after switching from CMAA to MSAA 2x. Thanks Philip!

[Archer]

Try following (it hasn't yet been fixed)
Map: Nuke
Location: Ramp
Video Settings (recommended Low)
Try using M4A1-s Standing close to wall next-to box on and looking into Radio
Effect: backwall and enemy in radio should disappear

[raph]

visibility through wire fence has always been linked to good/advanced filtering

[sand]

this is the biggest red arrow i have ever seen in a thumbnail, i love it

[AtomicSpeedFT]

Glad I will be able to see the opponents clearly while jumping off the map on Vertigo with better AA!

[NotSoMelancholy]

This makes me almost wonder. Competitive advantages from graphics settings are nothing new in games but I’m kind of surprised no games have implemented a “competitive standard” setting.
Standard modes you run your own settings but all competitive matches would use the same settings.

I guess it might make things troublesome for players as you now have Min hardware requirements to run the game but if you want to play competitive you’d need to also meet the min competitive standard requirements as well

[advoneus]

This scenario is annoying because in 99% of competitive games, the lower quality settings have at least some form of advantages, but it is impossible for high settings to give advantages due to hardware restrictions and a higher gate for competitive entry.

[Al-nofm]

I dont even play CS and yet I find this content so complelling.

[richardhunter]

I always turned off AA, because I figured it made polygon edge detail easier to distinguish from texture detail. Good to know there are disadvantages as well.