Valve’s flagship event, Dota 2’s The International, is under fire once more, this time for the poor practice and playing conditions teams are being asked to endure. The latest flashpoint came when Team Spirit posted a video to Twitter, showing the facilities they have been assigned in the run-up to the event.

What makes the video more worrying is that the Russian side has not just been given a poky practice room, which would be bad enough. On top of that, the room will also be where Spirit plays their group stage matches, which they need a good placement in if they want to secure an advantageous seed for the main event.

The room Spirit is in appears to be a converted hotel/hostel room, with a sink and microwave, as well as fold-out desks for players to play on while competing for a share of $40m dollars. One of the players even compared the conditions to his living situation while at university, joking that at least this time he has a microwave, which was not part of his setup back when he was in dorms.

Other gripes included a lack of internet access 20 minutes before their practice was due to start and the fact there was not even toilet paper provided in the bathroom attached to the facilities. Spirit allege that teams in the lower parts of the DPC rankings were given worse facilities by design, and the top ten have rooms where they can at least "lean back in their chair".

The news comes after a disastrous few days for publishers Valve and the other companies involved in the running of The International, who were forced to make a last-minute announcement that tickets for the event had all been refunded. This is due to the current situation with COVID in the host nation of Romania, which has not developed in the way Valve was apparently hoping.