Hicham Chahine, CEO of Ninjas in Pyjamas, sparked outrage in the CS:GO community today by tweeting that stickers, one of the best benefits for teams and individuals who qualify for the Valve-sponsored competition, will not be provided for the BLAST Paris Major on May 8.
Later on, however, Chahine took it back once CS:GO fans started calling him out on Twitter and made it clear that he was joking while the fans are waiting for Valve to release the stickers for the last CS:GO Major ever. Chahine told Dot Esports he was just “reverse-jinxing” so Valve releases it as soon as possible.
Most fans knew what Chahine was up to in the beginning, though, as it’s known that Valve asked teams and players to send their signatures during the Major qualifiers in April.
“The CEO of an organization tweeting something definitive like this can genuinely make people think it is true and it is not a funny joke,” CS:GO journalist Danish Alana said. “Stop trolling,” another fan said.
The in-game stickers have been a staple for CS:GO‘s ecosystem since Valve introduced team stickers for the first time at EMS One Katowice Major in 2014. Later on, the developer added player signatures at ESL One Cologne Major in 2015, which allowed players to earn money from sales. The revenue generated by sticker sales is so massive that it helps some CS:GO organizations fund operations. The teams and players made over $70 million from stickers between 2021 and 2022, according to Valve.
The BLAST Paris Major will kick off on May 8 with 16 teams battling in the Challengers Stage and will finalize on May 21 with the showmatch and grand finals. Even though Valve is kind of delaying the release of the stickers, CS:GO fans should be able to purchase them sooner rather than later as time is running off.