Popularity of M4A1-S decreased after new update
Data shows that the community of CS has started to switch back to the M4A4.
12 days ago Valve published a new update to CS:GO. Here one of the most significant changes was the adjustment of the magazine size to the M4A1-S, which was reduced to 20 from 25.
We asked Scope.gg to analyze all the data from community games (1 million matches in total) from two weeks before the patch and then after. The popularity of the M4A1-S before the patch was significant, with the rifle being used 50% of the time during rifle rounds.
Here are the numbers before the patch:
FACEIT:
M4A1-S: 50.48% - M4A4: 3.74%
Matchmaking:
M4A1-S 43.44% - M4A4: 6.67%
And here are the numbers after the patch.
FACEIT:
M4A1-S: 42.98% - M4A4: 10.25%
Matchmaking:
M4A1-S 37.76% - M4A4: 11.16%
Already now the impact of the patch has been significant. It will be interesting to see if this trend will continue, and what the professional players will do at the upcoming IEM Cologne.
In this video you can see how much impact the buff of the M4A1-S has had on Counter-Strike recently. A fact that Valve seems to try and limit with the recent update.