A professional CS2 player experienced a game crash while playing a pivotal round in the Valve-sponsored Major tournament, potentially causing his team to lose the entire match. Read on to learn more details about the crash, and the organizers’ response.
CS2 Crashes In PGL CS2 Major Copenhagen 2024
"Divine Intervention" Strikes Down Virtus Pro’s "Jame"
Yesterday, during the Valve-sponsored CS2 Major organized by Romanian esports company PGL, a player experienced a horrifying game crash in the middle of a crucial moment, causing his team to lose the round and perhaps subsequently the entire match. Professional player and in-game leader "Jame," who plays under the esports organization Virtus Pro(VP), was hiding from enemy fire in the back-site of Inferno’s bomb site B when his game crashed, rendering him unable to control his character and revealing his position to easily get killed by the opposing team of G2 Esports.
Official tournament rules for professional CS matches deem that, in the case of game crashes during a round, they will only be replayed if no damage has been dealt to both teams. Seeing as the crash occurred in a post bomb plant scenario where VP and G2 were both a player down, the organizers and referees did not invoke a round restart and let the game play out.
The game crash could not have come at a more unfortunate time. It was a best-of-3 series and VP had won the first map in Overpass. In the second map of Inferno, the game reached a thrilling tie at 11-11, where the first team to score 13 would win (provided they don’t tie at 12-12). If VP had closed out the game on the second map, they would have won the entire match and proceeded to the Major playoffs.
However, Jame, the in-game leader and AWPer, crashed and died, leaving their team’s chances of holding down the bomb site undeniably weaker, causing them to lose the round. During an interview with hltv.org, the main news outlet that covers the professional CS scene, G2 player m0NESY claimed that during that round, their in-game leader HooXi told the team, "Let’s save[retreat], but see if we kill one guy and then we can retake." If not for the crash, G2 would have retreated to save their guns for the next round, giving VP the 12-11 advantage. VP would have been one round away from winning the match and getting to the playoffs in front of the Danish crowd in Copenhagen.
VP would go on to lose the map of Inferno 11-13, and then lose the next map of Anubis 6-13. This loss caused them to be eliminated from Major contention. Needless to say, fans of the sport were not happy with the crash, blaming the tournament organizers for their faulty computers, and even Valve for having a faulty game be launched and pushed for competitive play.
Tournament Organizers Blame NVIDIA
PGL took to Twitter(X) to make an official statement on the controversy. They clarified that the "technical malfunction occurred due to an NVIDIA driver crash, resulting in a game crash," and that they are in the process of working with NVIDIA to "identify and fix the issue."
G2’s NiKo, a player from the opposing team to VP, also took to the social media platform to denounce any blame on the tournament organizer. He claims that these crashing issues have been "happening constantly for over a month," and that the game has been ripe with so many bugs still unfit for competitive play.
A community member going by Aysafromnazareth offered their own insights and investigation, deducing that the crash was the same bug that has been plaguing the game not just for this tournament, but even a previous one in IEM Katowice nearly two months ago. They state that the bug causes the game to alt-tab and leave players unable to rejoin the game. They defend PGL and claim that "Counterstrike has a lot of memory leaks problems and a lot of other people experienced[sic] crashes with different scenarios, and PGL or other TOS[tournament organizers] shouldn’t be pointed out for those game crashes."
Lastly, Virtus Pro posts a message from Jame himself speaking to the camera and the fans seeking a response. "Right now, after the defeat I feel empty, no emotions. But in my head, I understand that it’s not worth paying attention to, because the level of play we showed on Anubis where there were no bugs doesn’t correspond to the team that should be making it to the playoffs, in my opinion." He goes on to explain that they shouldn’t be having close games in the first place, and shouldn’t have been outplayed on the third map.
"Yes, we could have made it, but it’s a part of life. We need to move forward."
Sources:
Twitch clip of crash
Hltv m0NESY post-match interview transcript
