Valorant, a counter-strike like game, is actually more popular than the current Halo game.
And let's not forget PUBG, originally a PC-only game, that was wildly popular. No aimbot in there either and not only was there no auto-aim, bullets don't even go where you click because they obeyed physics!
Emperically speaking, whenever a new game comes out with a more "hardcore" mode with less auto-aim... a newer game comes out and just brings back auto-aim, and suddenly the community switches over to it.
People really like autoaim. Whether they consciously know it or not... kind of doesn't matter. People seem to have more fun and that's all a game designer wants.
Plus there was call of duty, then overwatch, then pubg, then fortnight, then valorant. The PC ones tended to not have auto aim. Of course consoles tend to have auto aim but console gamers are also more casual and mass market… but the auto aim just makes up for the inaccuracy and speed of joystick control.
Also fortnite didn’t destroy pubg. People just got tired of the game. Most pubg players I know just stopped playing, and there were a lot of adults that played it. Fortnite had a totally different crowd (basically preteens and kids) because the game was free to play whereas pubg cost a whopping $30 and required a beefy computer.
If you really wanted to be a player without autoaim / bullet magnetism / all the stuff Halo "aimbots" into your controller, you'd be playing Counterstrike.
But no, people play Halo. Because people like (subtle) aimbots making their headshots more consistent. Games like Halo (and other FPS games that came after Halo, such as Battlefront or Call of Duty) all take this auto-aim concept to varying degrees.
Its now a staple of modern FPS games.
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But yes, I recall the "mouse practice" people would do to get better aim on Counterstrike. Those headshots don't happen by themselves: there's a lot of "move the mouse" practice in Microsoft-paint (practice moving one pixel at a time or whatever), and learning the positions of your wrist.
Most people don't care about that level of dedication or practice. I think it suffices to say that typical FPS gamers today prefer the subtle aimbot to handle that level of muscle memory.
I'm being a bit hyperbolic. Obviously the "Counterstrike" players and community cares about this stuff. That's why they still play Counterstrike. But I also am ready to admit that their community is a small minority of players in the greater FPS genre.
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"360 No Scope" happens to take advantage of this bullet magnetism / autoaim as well. Moving the reticle quickly IIRC engages the auto-aim bot a bit more.
> It's the reason why sweep shooting works so well. Sweep your crosshairs across the screen, pull the trigger when it crosses something, it'll hold onto them slightly as it goes by.
The game's "auto-aim" system effectively fires two bullets for each frame. If your target is "between" the two bullets, then it counts as a hit.
Sweep-shooting is moving the crosshairs really fast, so that these two "bullets" are spaced as far apart as possible. So you've grown the auto-aim area.