Ludwig shocked after YouTube deletes 100 hours of Elden Ring gameplay

Brent Koepp
YouTuber Ludwig next to Elden Ring screenshot.

Popular streamer Ludwig was floored after losing over 102 hours worth of Elden Ring gameplay footage. The 26-year-old’s five day stream was deleted by YouTube permanently. 

To celebrate the release of Elden Ring, former Twitch star Ludwig Ahgren planned a five day stream to beat the new epic developed by FromSoftware.

After completing the game for viewers, the Mogul Money creator was stunned when his entire broadcast was deleted. The YouTuber explained how he lost 102 hours of footage.

Ludwig playing Elden Ring during YouTube stream screenshot.
The YouTuber lost his 100 hour Elden Ring stream.

Ludwig’s 100 hour Elden Ring stream deleted

The content creator addressed the situation in his February 27 upload titled “YouTube failed me.” In the video, Ahgren explained that the Google-owned platform deletes VODs that go over a certain length of time.

“I just did one of the most impressive feats I’ve ever done, I played Elden Ring, and streamed it all until I beat the game. This took me 100+ hours total of uptime and 60 hours on in-game time,” he said. “I have a big big problem. YouTube kind of failed me. The way it works on YouTube is you can stream as long as you want, but if the VOD goes above 12 hours, then it won’t be saved. And my VOD was 102 hours, and none of it was saved.”

Ludwig then explained that his backup failed him as well. “My local recording failed. So the only VOD I have of my run is the very beginning and the last boss,” he said. “And all the middle is gone. Forever. It’s kind of a bummer. It’s just a little bit of a bummer. You just find some kinks in the switch every few weeks.”

Adding salt to the wound, Ahgren’s Elden Ring stream ended up being his most-viewed YouTube video ever. “It was my most viewed video ever. This stream got over 4 million views,” he stated before asking his fans to send him any footage they may have saved from the 100-hour stream.

“This is a call, if anyone out there has any of the VOD and wouldn’t mind, give me some clips, full length whatever it is. I’ll take anything if you want to shoot it over to me like in a Google Drive link or DM me on Twitter. To anyone who’s excited to watch it, I’ll try my best to piece it together. Hopefully, we can recover it.”

Ludwig clarified that he didn’t fully blame YouTube as he knew their policy. However, it still hurt to lose his entire Elden Ring playthrough. “I was a bit of dumb a** and have to own that. But dude, it was so many days of my life! And I’m losing all of it!”

About The Author

Brent is a former writer at Dexerto based in the United States, who covered topics such as Pokemon, Gaming, and online Entertainment.