BLAST has announced the four new Affiliate Member Teams who will be joining the circuit throughout 2024. This will give these teams guaranteed entry into certain BLAST CS2 events throughout the year.

Evil Geniuses recently ended its CS2 Partner agreement with BLAST, making room for Cloud9 to take its place, but an extra four teams have been added to a new total of 16.

Credit: BLAST

New BLAST Partner Teams for 2024

The new BLAST Partner teams are as follows:

Team Spirit
GamerLegion
Falcons
Virtus.pro

It should come as no real surprise that Falcons has purchased a spot, given the heavy investment into its CS2 roster. Spirit and Virtus.pro should be great additions, giving two of the best teams from the CIS region the chance to shine at more Tier 1 tournaments. Meanwhile, GamerLegion could go either way, with its roster still not at its best.

No more Partner Teams from 2025

The slots will only be valid for the entirety of 2024, with Valve bringing an end to the Partner events from 2025. With this in mind, it may come as a surprise that teams are willing to invest the money for a single year. However, it is believed the financial benefits of guaranteeing a place at these BLAST events outweigh the initial cost.

Changes to BLAST CS2 tournaments

The new teams will bring about some changes to the format of BLAST CS2 tournaments throughout the year. BLAST Spring and Fall Groups have been expanded to 16 teams, with six teams advancing to the Spring and Fall Finals. The remaining 10 will move down the Spring and Fall Showdowns. As a result, this adds two best-of-three matches to each group, with the prize pool for the Spring and Fall Groups changing to $190,000 each from $177,500.

Despite these changes, the Spring, Fall, and World Finals remain unchanged.

Here is the full list of BLAST Premier Member & Affiliate Teams throughout 2024:

Astralis
BIG
Cloud9
Complexity
Falcons
FaZe Clan
G2 Esports
GamerLegion
Heroic
NAVI
NIP
OG
Team Liquid
Team Spirit
Team Vitality
Virtus.pro