"It's basically changed my entire life" - Erik Flom on his Counter-Strike journey

Just at the end of last year, Monster Energy flew the Radio Times out to Hungary for the Counter-Strike 2 StarLadder Budapest Major 2025, held within the MVM Dome.

It was a truly fantastic event, with unbelievable play on show from the teams involved, but, only one team could remain standing, and it was Team Vitality who ended up taking the trophy back home to France.

In amongst this, we got the chance to speak to venerable Counter-Strike player and streamer, Erik Flom (who otherwise goes by fl0m), for a quick interview about his thoughts on CS, past, present and future.

We also interviewed Chris Alesund, AKA GeT_RiGhT, and you can check out that interview on the Radio Times Gaming YouTube channel.

But as for Flom, who has been part of the scene for over two decades now, we were curious to hear what the biggest changes in Counter-Strike have been for him.

"I mean, the scale," Flom told us, without missing a beat. "I used to go to events, and I was hoping to win them, not to lose money. Now, you know… I've built my entire life. I have a great house, family. It's basically changed my entire life".

Compare this to when Flom first started, he tells us it was "very small potatoes. No salaries, no nothing. You're just doing it because you're stupid, basically. And now… we're in here. We're in Budapest, and there's an arena with 20,000 people."

It can certainly be easy to get swept up in the moment of it all, particularly when you're among thousands of people, with pyrotechnics going off, punctuating the craziest strats you’ve ever seen in esports. But not all in Counter-Strike land has been hunky dory.

Last year, Valve made changes to how the controversial skins market operates, causing some to see the value of their Steam inventories go down by thousands of pounds, with others becoming richer overnight.

The move came out of nowhere and sent shockwaves across the community. But had it affected the professional Counter-Strike scene? Flom wasn’t convinced.

"When they talk about the market crashing, it didn't go below where it started for the year. I don't think most people realise how insane it was, like where it was at, and still is, and now it's already kind of bounced back, and I think it's on pace to basically be right where it was, or, if not, higher."

Flom also sees a distinction between how people interact with Counter-Strike, with the streamer saying that there are those who love to watch and play the game, but "the people that are sitting there monitoring Counter-Strike in this market, checking their inventory value every single day, I don't think they're necessarily translating into watching every single Counter-Strike match."

With Counter-Strike 2 in rude health, we wanted to know what Flom hopes for the game’s future and how it might grow to accommodate new audiences and players.

"I mean, I'm biased, because I come from North America, but basically growing the other regions for the game."

Taking inspiration from the traditional sporting world, where "in the US [the NFL] tries to do games in Europe," and you have the "NBA trying to make sure that they're always advertising and fully international." Flom hopes to see this same kind of action, but in reverse, as "Europe is already such a strong home ground" for Counter-Strike.

Inroads have already been made into other markets, as Flom notes that "Blast and ESL, I think, have done a great job of starting to spread that out to other regions as well, especially in China and… Asia in general."

I like the idea of building up, like, basically Asia, North America, South America, because that's kind of where I think we're gonna generate more fans, more good health for the game, and just making sure that Counter-Strike continues to grow."

As for what Flom hopes for himself in the future, he told us that he is "just gonna keep streaming and doing my thing… I'm not going anywhere anytime soon."

When asked if he could ever see himself becoming a coach, Flom was insistent and said, "I definitely don't want to be involved with [a] team. I will not be coaching… Competition of any sort? No, I'm good. I'll host the competition, but I'll just be back here."

And as the interview was conducted before the big finale, we asked Flom if he had to put a Karambit on it, who he thought was going to take the trophy home.

"I think it's gonna be the Shanghai Major again. I think it's gonna be FaZe-Spirit. At this point, I'm tired of telling people why FaZe can win games, so I'm just kind of riding the wave now."

Hopefully, Flom didn’t put a Karambit where his mouth was, as it was Team Vitality that beat FaZe clan 3-1 in what was truly a white-knuckle final.

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