Now be it in competitive First-Person Shooter (FPS) games or e-sports, one thing is for sure—Valorant is taking all of us by storm. So, check out where it started and how this game works and what made it so good that it’s slowly creeping its way into the world of e-games

History and Features

Valorant is Riot Games’ first big game in 11 years since the release of LoL. It was first launched with a teaser under the codename Project A in October 2019, the game began a closed beta period with limited access on April 7, 2020, followed by an official release on June 2, 2020. 

Before Valorant’s official release, the game took Twitch by storm and broke the platform’s “single-day hours watched record in a single game category” with 34 million hours watched.

And because of the continued demands of players, Riot has continued to evolve the game with new patches, upcoming agents, fresh game modes, and more that includes the addition of new maps, new agents and the likes,

Valorant is the company’s first foray into the FPS arena where the concept basically lies in using one of several Agents to play as one team attacks and the other defends.

It is a 5-on-5 character-based tactical shooter that has similarities with Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS GO) that makes it easier for CS GO players to maneuver the gameplay of Valorant. Not only CS Go but any PC game that requires perfect aiming.

However, Valorant is currently only available on PC, but Riot Games has stated that it is working on prototyping the game for consoles. However, the company has also cautioned that “there’s a way to play this game and there’s a way to experience this game that we’re not entirely sure translates completely to console play”.

Gameplay

Players can choose to Practice, Unrated game, Competitive game that involves the ranking, deathmatch that every agent is one’s enemy, Spike Rush that is won in four rounds, and Custom game.

Under the spike rush, it features five special power-up orbs, items that give teams special abilities or ailments if captured. They range from Health, which grants HP regeneration, to Deception, which reduces the enemy team’s vision.

While the free-for-all deathmatch new mode will feature 10 players per game and the first player to reach 30 kills wins. Nonetheless, deathmatch excludes any abilities as its mere focus is on gunplay with unlimited credits for weapons every time a player spawns. Yet whenever players are killed, health packs will drop.

In unrated and Competitive games, on the other hand, each team will have to defend their own base for 13 rounds where the attacker side will have to plant the bomb in which the defender side has the job to not let the attackers dominate any site. 

The location of sites differs from what kind of map will be assigned per match. Each map is a playground to unleash your creative thinking and with a purpose-built for team strategies, spectacular plays, and clutch moments. 

Moreover, each round ends in one of three ways—the spike is planted or detonated, one team kills all five members of the other team, and or the spike is diffused or never planted.

Players are given a 30-second preparation phase before the start of each round to purchase weapons and arrange loadout accordingly. And to buy also some time to think about what kind of weapons, armor, and abilities each player will have to buy which is very crucial especially in round 1.

Choose your own agent 

Right now there are 13 known agents in the game; Breach, Brimstone, Cypher, Jett, Killjoy, Omen, Phoenix, Raze, Reyna, Sage, Sova, Viper, and the new addition of Skye.

Each Agent has one ability that can be used at any point during the round. Each Agent also has two more abilities that you can choose to purchase during the buy prep period, as you would weapons or armor. 

Abilities range to four unique abilities. Players can enjoy unique abilities such as flashbangs, smoke grenades, conjuring walls, and sonic arrows that act as radar.

Moreover, each character also has an ultimate which charges as you get kills in a game and picking up orbs.

As with most FPS games, there are also four classes to choose from: Duelists, Sentinels, Initiators, and Controllers.

Valorant is a mixed breed of gunplay with tactical abilities that differ from agent to agent. And yet, with given scheme players are forced to think faster and even rely on one’s hunch. 

The magic word in playing Valorant to survive until the end is that creativity will be your greatest weapon. It’s more than the guns and bullets nor the fast hands you possess but rather creating opportunities to let your agent maximize its abilities.

Now, stand tall players. For as the famous line in one of the agents, “We are Valorant, we are fighters.” See you at the next match!