CS:GO now free to play in China

Valve have partnered up with Perfect World, one of the largest publishers in China, to offer Counter-Strike: Global Offensive for free to all Chinese players; provided they can prove their identity. If they can't, they'll still have to cough up the yuan.

Crossfire is currently the largest shooter in China and is also free-to-play. Interestingly, Crossfire is based upon Counter-Strike 1.6 and is published by Tencent, who also publish League of Legends for the region. So Valve have opted to join forces with Perfect World, as both games are competitors to Valve's current endeavours.

No doubt this will give CS:GO a boost in numbers on Steam, but will be able to topple the new king, PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds? Time will tell.