A round-of-12 playoff match between Natus Vincere and Heroic at ESL Pro League season 16 has gone past midnight in Malta due to rampant tech delays and a stunning amount of lag that is affecting several players, including superstar Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev.
The two CS:GO teams, at time of writing, are sitting in a tech pause on map three of a series that has already gone the distance. Both map one and two went to a full 30 rounds of regulation, with NAVI taking their pick of Mirage 16-14 before Heroic took their pick of Inferno 16-14.
But just a few rounds into Overpass, connection problems began to surface. S1mple began experiencing massive lag spikes despite the match taking place on LAN, and even after alerting officials and taking breaks, the problem persisted. In the sixth round during a one-vs-two scenario, s1mple was hit with lag so egregious that he just put his hands in the air and took his hands off the keyboard, producing a massive scowl on his face.
Even after another break following this instance, the problems continued, with NAVI’s computers freezing routinely and losing connection. It happened again just a couple of rounds later, with s1mple lagging his way through Bank to hold onto an AWP in a round that NAVI had already won. As teammate sdy closed the round, s1mple could only laugh as the match went to yet another tech pause.
This has already been an eventful and stressful event for NAVI’s signature superstar, who’s been involved in an incident involving ESL and a hotel room plagued by mold and insects. That incident has since been resolved between himself, ESL, and the hotel. The event itself has also seen a higher amount of tech delays and production mishaps than what’s typically expected out of ESL.
NAVI and Heroic are playing to advance to the quarterfinals of ESL Pro League season 16.
