With rapidly increasing prize pools, high-level competition, and more leagues then you can shake a stick at, 2016 was a landmark year for competitive CS:GO. The year kicked off with a bang and showed no signs of slowing down as the early parts of 2016 saw some of modern esports' oldest franchises undergo significant roster-shuffles while the year ended with a controversy that's sure to change the face of CS:GO player-owner relations for a very long time. So without further ado, here are some of the biggest moments that took place in CS:GO this year.

The Brazilian Saga

It should come as no surprise that the team that made the biggest mark in 2016 was former Luminosity Gaming and current SK Gaming's Brazilian roster.

The Brazilian squad's rise to prominence had been in the making since 2015 — the first year that FalleN and co. first attended a Major — but it was only after 2015's DreamHack Cluj-Napoca when the team truly came online as they swapped out steel and Boltz for a reformed fnx and up-and-coming player named TACO.

The team came into 2016 guns blazing and would go on to win back-to-back Majors in the form of MLG Major Championship: Columbus and ESL One Cologne 2016, a feat that had only previously been done by Fnatic.

While coldzera was named the MVP of both tournaments, Columbus was a tournament that stood above the rest as it was there where coldzera made his unforgettable jumping, no-scope, AWP 4k play.

The play was so good that it was honored by Valve and immortalized on Mirage (the map where the play happened) in the form of graffiti, which was subsequently tattooed on the player by celebrity tattoo artist Chris Garver.

RELATED: Esports Ink: SK Gaming's coldzera

But it was more than just singular plays that kept coldzera in the limelight as he is currently the second highest HLTV rated player of the year in events with prize pools above $250,000.

coldzera's consistency and explosiveness earned him the esports player of the year at the The Game Awards, which was presented by the most decorated Olympian of all time, Michael Phelps.

The Brazilians showed a rapid rise at the beginning of the year, but they're now in an equally rapid decline and have replaced fnx with fox. However, this shouldn't detract from their accomplishments and they are still a massive threat heading into the new year.

High Profile Roster Shuffles

With more and more organizations trying to break into the scene, and more and more cash flowing into the game's competitive ecosystem, one can argue that 2016 saw some of the most dramatic roster shakeups in the game's history. It began in January, when the Team SoloMid's former roster split from the organization to form their own, player-owned team named Astralis. This led to the creation of several new player-owned orgs like Heroic (SK Gaming's former roster), GODSENT and Norse.

We also had plenty of contract drama, as Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev started the year on Team Liquid and brought the organization to new heights at back-to-back Majors before moving to Natus Vincere. He hasn't quite made as much of an impact with Na`Vi as he did on Liquid, but there's no denying that s1mple's departure from Liquid was one of 2016's most talked about moves.

But s1mple's saga wasn't even the year's biggest move. That honor goes to the contract battle between Luminosity Gaming and SK Gaming that saw the Brazilian superteam move from the organization that brought them out of relative obscurity to one of the biggest esports brands in the world. But it wasn't a smooth transition, as the players claimed that they had signed contracts with SK Gaming after signing letters of intent to re-sign with Luminosity, and the two orgs both felt that they had claim to one of the world's best CS:GO rosters. In the end, the roster did move to SK Gaming but have not had the same success that they had as part of Luminosity gaming

Other big team swaps included FaZe buying G2 Esports' old roster, then G2 buying Titan's roster after the French organization folded. The Games Academy's Brazilian roster also moved to Tempo Storm and then to Immortals after Tempo Storm owner Andrey "Reynad" Yanyuk claimed that ELEAGUE officials were locking Tempo Storm out of ELEAGUE due to personal history.

Take a deep breath, because there's still more to talk about. Olof "Olofmeister" Gustafsson, Ladislav "GuardiaN" Kovács and Jacob "pyth" Mourujärvi all had to sit out parts of the year due to hand injuries, which opened the door for substitutes like John "wenton" Eriksson and the return of both Maikel "Maikelele" Bill and Sergey "starix" Ischuk. That's certainly not every big roster move that happened in 2016, but we're running out of space.

CreamyMoses, the meme that kept on giving

A meme borne at the tail end of 2015 during IEM Season X San Jose, wherein color caster Jason "moses" O'Toole received a cake to the face, has been an inside joke within the CS:GO community that has continued to persist in 2016 and has no signs of slowing down going into 2017.

It has spawned its own subreddit (created by On Fire colleague Semmler) which has spawned its own slew of memes and has been a staple of ESL events, such as the CreamyMoses badges from the ESL One Cologne 2016 Major.

However, it wasn't all fun and games as the creaming of moses was also one of the featured "events" at the ESL Pro League Season 4 Finals, along with SPUNJ waxing his legs and Sadokist and HenryG sharing an intimate kiss, that was all in support of the CS Global Offensive against Cancer fundraiser.

RELATED: Sadokist on Movember: 'The gaming community at large is very supportive of one another'

But things turned grim as moses, in corroboration with ESL's VP of pro gaming Michal "mbCARMAC" Blicharz, pulled off a Game of Thrones-worthy betrayal on Sadokist at IEM Season 11 Oakland.

It was an important lesson for Sadokist and the rest of the community: no one was safe. And as Sadokist promised vengeance for the betrayal, we're sure to see more cream, cakes and confectionery in 2017.

Skin betting and CS:GO gambling

It's hard to believe it now, but, just a few months ago, the backbone of CS:GO's online ecosystem was built on a skin betting and gambling economy. Betting sites sponsored teams, sold ads on broadcasts, and occasionally dominated Reddit discussion.

Until Gaben dropped the hammer.

It was revealed in July that popular YouTuber Trevor "TmarTn" Martin co-owned CS:GO Lotto, a skin gambling site that he advertised in his YouTube videos without disclosing his stake in the company. Valve acted quickly once the community caught wind of this, banning CS:GO Lotto and several other skin gambling websites from using Steam's API, as they claimed that it was not an authorized use of Steam.

Of course, that wasn't the end of the saga. CS:GO gambling suddenly became a hot topic of conversation as legislators began to catch wind of what was going on. In October, the Washington Gambling Commission ordered Valve to stop gambling-related skin transfers, and though Valve didn't do anything more than tell the commission about the cease-and-desist letters they sent in July, several skin gambling sites went dark. Some sites are still up, but the biggest players in the scene have either shut down, picked up gambling licenses, or otherwise ceased their gambling operations.

PEA Controversey

The year has nearly come to a close, but it seems that one of the year's biggest moments will continued to be a developing story in 2017. At the tail end of December, Slingshot Esports's Jarek "DeKay" Lewis reported that the Professional Esports Association (PEA) was going to bar its affiliated teams from competing in the upcoming ESL Pro League season.

A day after the report was published, Scott "SirScoots" Smith released an open-letter that was signed by 25 players that played on PEA affiliated teams Team SoloMid, Cloud9, Team Liquid, Counter Logic Gaming and Immortals. The letter seemingly confirmed the PEA's attempt to push the EPL out of North America without notifying the affected players.

The snowball kept rolling as notable in-game leader Sean "sgares" Gares tweeted out that he was parting ways with TSM and provided series of saved Skype and WhatsApp conversations between him TSM founder Andy "Reginald" Dinh.

The flood gates continued to open on Dec. 23, as sgares' tweet prompted a response from the TSM owner himself, which then prompted a response from SirScoots, a response from the four remaining TSM players and a further response from sgares.

A direct response from PEA was later released in the form of a Medium post from Immortals CEO Noah Whinston, which, among other things, stated that PEA players will be given the choice to either play in the upcoming EPL season or PEA's league.

"I believe every author of the player letter wants to participate in the PEA league, as well as EPL. Unfortunately, that option is not on the table," Whinston said. "If the only option for the PEA is to lose money by functioning as yet another year-round CSGO league, we’ll instead devote the PEA league’s resources to other game titles where over-saturation is less of a problem."

Concerns over the over-saturation of the CS:GO scene led PEA to attempt a compromise with WESA (which represents the EPL's EU teams) wherein the EPL would leave North America but the top four teams from the PEA league and EPL would meet in a cross-Atlantic championship. According to Whinston, WESA declined the offer, however WESA later released a statement saying that they were still interested in finding a solution.

The situation is far from resolved and given the nature of it, it's likely to be a hot topic of conversation in 2017.

Dennis "Tarmanydyn" Gonzales is a news editor for theScore esports who enjoys whiskey, D&D and first-picking Abaddon Slardar Clinkz Medusa Oracle a P90 my Souvenir Negev Discipline Priest. You can follow him on Twitter.