They have gone through a long evolution before becoming the most loved aspect of CS:GO by players. We will talk about how operations have changed since the release of the game.

What are operations?

They can be described as a paid temporary add-on with Battle Pass functionality. The main feature of operations is earning cases, skins, agents, and other in-game cosmetics. All this can be obtained by completing missions and recouping the cost of the pass.

The first operation was released on April 25, 2013, and was called “Payback” - it was a thing where the operation coins first appeared in the game and it was bronze right after you buy a pass. It could be upgraded to gold after playing the operation maps.

Also in the “Payback” there were 7 community maps and the same number of cases named after a particular map. Of course, the first skins were not as colorful as more recent ones.

Payback was followed by Operation Bravo. It was represented with 9 cases, one of which (Dust) contained the now popular Desert Eagle | Blaze. The Cache map was added to the game, Cobblestone and Overpass were added during the Winter Offensive update, and coins began to improve in competitive mode.

Next up was Phoenix. This operation was one of the shortest (3.5 months), but the thematic case included the most popular AWP skin in the past, namely Asiimov. The operation case itself began to drop only to those who purchased the pass, therefore, the freebies, unfortunately, became fewer.

"Breakout" was even shorter. Despite the fact that this operation was the shortest (July 1, 2014 - October 2, 2014), it was very rich in content. It not only added a Cobblestone case with AWP | Dragon lore but also added an operation log and missions, the passage of which improved the coin.

Vanguard presented an updated version of Train and introduced such a thing as operation campaigns. There were 4 of them at that time, two of which (Maghrib and Eurasia) were purchased separately for $3. For completing campaign missions, items and stars were given, and the latter improved the coins of the operation.

In Bloodhound, the structure of campaigns has changed: not only did they have a story element, but they also added variety after the addition of missions like “Assassination” and the cooperative PvE mode “Guardians”. Items were available for a drop every week when you increase the rank.

In terms of innovations, the next operation “Wildfire” was not rich - the developers decided to repeat the same formula as in “Bloodhound”, updating only Nuke and adding the “Twins” cooperative campaign.

A bunch of three new modes (War Games, Second Pilot, Weapons Expert) have been added to Hydra, as well as a new coin tier - diamond. Items began to be given out upon leveling up, as well as for completed Sentinel missions - a solid upgrade against the backdrop of Wildfire.

Even more the format of operations changed in Shattered Web - it looked like a battle pass, and stars could be bought separately if they suddenly were not enough to receive one or another reward. 100 stars for completing missions was enough to get all the rewards of the operation, and, of course, to get a noticeable plus, recouping the money spent on purchasing the pass.

The players were also very pleased with the “Broken Fang” - its most important innovation was the Premier Mode, which was later added for all players. In it, maps were chosen by veto, as in the pro scene. The developers also introduced the Ancient map, which was later introduced into the official map pool. The icing on the cake was the “Retake” mode, where you could practice retakes and defend the bomb after it was planted, and the operation store with stickers, agents, and skins. It's also worth mentioning that Broken Fang is the first to add a community map (Jungle) for the Danger Zone mode.

The formula for the latest operation, Hunting Waters, remains the same as in Broken Fang, except that the number of community maps was smaller - 5 versus 7.

In what direction can the next operation evolve?

Looking back at how operations have changed since the beginning of 2013, the most interesting part of these additions is just the innovative fresh modes. Ideally, the developers could create a mod comparable in scale to the "Danger Zone" - its addition came at the peak of the popularity of the battle royale genre. Keep in mind that Valve has been introducing such novelties lately every second operation, which means that after the “Hunting Waters” we will have a content-rich Battle Pass waiting for us.

It kinda reminds us of an Assassination scenario straight out of CS 1.6 where the goal of CT was to get a VIP player (having only USP and twice as many health points) to the extraction zone or kill all the Ts. Or why not borrow the mode Capture the flag from Team Fortress 2, balancing it to the realities of CS:GO?

There is also the possibility of adding some other kind of game cosmetics and statistical tools, but we will be glad if the developers surprise us with something completely different.

Nothing is known about the release date of the next operation. The previous one ended on February 22, 2022, and in the worst case, we will have a big break, like between Hydra and Shattered Web (November 2017 - November 2019), but dataminers regularly monitor CS:GO updates, and work on the operation is clearly is underway, so that in 2023 the chances of its release are high.