Esports and public potsīattles between players in games like CS:GO and Dota 2are streamed online for anyone to watch, either on YouTube or alternative streaming sites such as Twitch. Crucially, developers have also enabled players to log in to their Steam accounts and access their skins to use as a virtual currency for other activities on third-party sites - the most popular being gambling. How do you bet with skins?Īs their quality and look improved, demand for skins increased, and their rise as a online currency began. Valve operates Steam on an open application programming interface (API), and unaffiliated third-party sites sprang up to allow players to purchase intricately-designed skins outside of Steam, using online payment tools like PayPal and Bitcoin.
The more popular the skin is, the more it costs. Players use the credits to buy skins for CS:GO and other games in the Steam Market, and store their skins in their personal Steam library. The cash is converted into credits, and can't be converted back again. To buy skins, players deposit money into an account on Valve's multiplayer gaming platform Steam. The game remained fundamentally the same, but now players could buy or win decorative covers for their weapons known as ‘skins’ - costumes or designs to enhance their character or equipment. Players fought terrorists in warzones across the world, and the striking realism of its design made it an instant classic.ġ2 years down the line, in a bid to breathe new life into the game, Valve released Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO). In 2000, the first-person shooter game Counter-Strike was released. They're purely aesthetic - they don't increase the character's abilities or impact the outcome of the game. What are skins?Ī skin is a graphic or audio download which changes the appearance of characters in video games. In ‘skin gambling’, gamers exchange virtual goods that they've won or bought in multi-player games for virtual gambling chips. Millions of pounds-worth are being gambled each year, much of it by children and young people.