Valve boost player contrast in CS:GO and add Text Filtering

While it seems Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is now over the sudden massive popularity boost it saw in the last few months, that hasn't stopped Valve continuing to improve it.

First, they've added a Text Filtering option that's enabled by default to block out "profane" words used in text chat. So it seems Valve are trying to clean up some of the community issues in CS:GO but hey at least it's not as bad as Dota 2…

The bigger addition and one I appreciate is the new player contrast option, which is also enabled by default. Due to character colours, it can often be difficult to spot enemies in various different lightning conditions. It applies a special new filter to stationary characters that does this:

• Increases the character’s contrast against the background at far distances.
• Strengthens edge pixels for characters at far distances.
• Creates a small blur around a character to reduce background noise.
• Creates a small contrasting halo around a character when there is no color difference between the character and the environment.

Valve also adjusted the textures on character models, adjusted Fog that's applied separately to characters and the world to help characters stand out from the background at a distance and more. In most cases, all of the changes together should help you at a glance see a character and react. See some comparisons (click to enlarge and see another):

See the full Valve blog post on it here. You can play CS:GO free on Steam.