Reigning Apex champions fall prey to game-ending bug in first match of new ALGS season

The Apex Legends Global Series is back for year three, and unfortunately, so are some of the bugs that crop up even in the private lobbies ALGS matches are played on. And in North America’s very first ALGS match of the new season, the defending champions from last year lost out on points due to a bug that spelled their near-instant demise.

Aussie squad DarkZero shocked the world by winning both the Split Two Playoffs LAN in Stockholm and the ALGS Championship in Raleigh last season, upending many players’ and fans’ expectations for teams from the APAC South region.

The team moved to North America for year three of the competition, seeking out better opportunities and better internet.

Unfortunately, that didn’t play out for them in their first ALGS game.

With only a few other squads left in the lobby and their eyes on a solid start to their year three campaign, two members of DarkZero, IGL Zer0 and Sharky, realized they had been bugged, somehow teleporting across the map and being stuck in place. They were left there until the Ring finished them off quickly.

It appears DarkZero were attempting to use a Valkyrie ultimate to get out of trouble and gain better position in the final safe zones.

While the ult was charging, star controller fragger Genburten was knocked down. It appears this interaction, with the particular geography DZ were attempting to use Valkyrie ultimate from, resulted in the bug.

“Where did you guys go?” Genburten asked before the team realized the bug would result in their exiting in eighth place without being able to advance further in the lobby.

Despite Valkyrie’s dominance in pro play over the last year of ALGS competition, her ultimate remains a risky proposition for teams at times, as it has been known to glitch teams under map geography, and sometimes teleport them across the map. A similar situation happened at the ALGS Championship to the Korean squad representing FOR7 when they too were teleported out of the safe zone and to a quick demise at the hands of the ring.

DarkZero at least managed to collect decent points before they lost their first ALGS match of the year because of a bug. But the team is sure to be sour at the points they missed out on because of dying to an Apex technical issue.