Valve has announced a significant change to the Counter-Strike 2 (CS2) competitive calendar, confirming the cancellation of the Fall 2025 Major Regional Qualifiers (MRQs) for the upcoming StarLadder Budapest Major. Instead, all 32 participating teams will receive direct invitations based on the Valve Regional Standings (VRS).

The decision was driven by the current calendar of CS2 events for the second semester 2025, which even without the MRQs have $1 million tournaments with conflicting dates. According to the official statement,  the making of MRQs, in a context where the VRS was implemented to better integrate third-party tournaments, would be redundant. The invite date, however, remains unchanged and is scheduled for 8 October 2025.

“One of the goals of the VRS is to standardise community events so that they can be integrated with the Majors. At this point we believe that a separate qualification process for the Major is both unnecessary and disruptive. Therefore, we’ve made the decision to cancel the Fall 2025 MRQs. Instead, the 32 teams participating in the Budapest Major will be invited directly from the VRS,” stated Valve.

Valve also stated that more details regarding the invite distribution will be shared following the conclusion of the ongoing BLAST.tv Austin Major.

The StarLadder Budapest Major 2025 will feature a four-stage, 32-team format and a $1.25 million prize pool. It will be the second Major of the year to use this expanded format. The event will begin with three stages held at MTK Sportpark (24 November – 7 December), a 2,000-seat venue. The playoffs will then move to the 20,000-capacity MVM Dome (11–14 December).

Tickets for the event are currently on sale. This will be StarLadder’s first Major since Berlin 2019.