StarLadder Budapest Major suffers multiple technical difficulties on Day 1

Darragh Harbinson, Senior Editor

Last Updated: 24/11/2025

The StarLadder Budapest Major 2025 has suffered multiple technical difficulties on the first day of the competition.

The issues saw the interruption of competition as the tournament organiser sought to alleviate the technical problems.

Twitch and YouTube suffer from missing audio

Issues became evident on StarLadder’s main channel as the broadcast cut to an introductory desk segment featuring Freya Spiers, Jacob ‘Pimp’ Winneche, and Alex ‘Mauisnake’ Ellenberg.

It soon became evident that the segment had no audio of the desk host or analysts; instead, only background music audio played as the broadcast talent had their discussion.

A curious aspect of the issue was that, while the issue was evident on YouTube and Twitch, it was not present on the Kick broadcast of the event.

In the meantime, the audio of casters Hugo Byron and Harry ‘JustHarry’ Russell was functioning on Twitch, making it clear it was not a deliberate decision from the TO.

The issue persisted when the game between M80 and B8 began, with commentators Chad ‘SPUNJ’ Burchill and Alex ‘Machine’ Richardson not audible.

The issue was later partially resolved, with echoey audio on the stream, before being fully resolved.

The situation drew memes and sardonic messages from both the community and the talent involved on social media.

Long interruption during FaZe contest

The contest between FaZe and Lynn Vision was interrupted with FaZe leading 3-2 on the CT-side, with the main stream going down.

When restored, the stream did not return to the game but to a logo graphic.

Fnatic vs Red Canids, the only other game left in Round 1 of Swiss Stage 1, is also to be contested but has not begun yet.

The second stream did not suffer an outage, but the stream was similarly sent to a ‘be right back’ placeholder while technically difficulties are being worked out.

As of the time of publication, the delay has lasted approximately 50 minutes.

Update: Streams have been restored following a delay of over one and a half hours.

Commentator Chad ‘Spunj’ Burchill explained on the main stream that the venue suffered from “some power issues.”

The issues follow a ‘protest’ in the arena, seemingly against the removal of the Gamdom logo as a sticker in the game.

Gamdom owner, ‘Felix R.’, has denied any involvement, claiming it was caused by rival site CSGOEmpire to ‘sabotage’ the gambling company.

CSGOEmpire sparked controversy at the PGL Copenhagen Major in March 2024, due to its owner organising a stage rush which interrupted the quarter-final between Mouz and G2.

Darragh Harbinson, Senior Editor

Darragh Harbinson is an esports writer specialising in Counter-Strike. He has written for Esports News UK, Esports Insider, UKCSGO, Dexerto, and Rush B Media.

All Posts By Darragh Harbinson