This message caught my attention because I saw the verb apparently in the first position in a Hauptsatz, it's an error message that is displayed when you lose connection to a game. I know the conjugated verb in a Hauptsatz is in position 2, so there must be something omitted here, i reckon? Also, i was wondering if you even can use "Verbindung" here without it's article? Maybe this message is ungrammatical? I appreciate your help.
I think, this is as a rather direct translation for the English "Couldn't establish connection". I guess, what is omitted here is "The computer..."/"Der Computer...", "The program..."/"Das Programm..." or similar. Regarding the missing article, this is most probably due to the translation. Messages in computer software are frequently shortened in such a way.
German is a topic-drop language. You can say sentences like:
If it is clear from the context, you can leave out the thing that is in the position before the verb. That is what is happening here, although admittedly it is not 100% clear whether the thing left out is an "ich" or some third-person subject like "das Programm", "der Client"; it makes no difference in meaning.
As for the missing article, that is just headline language; just like in English, articles can be left out in headlines. This was likely directly translated from "could not establish connection".
