After being accused of cheating in a videogame tournament, a 17-year-old girl proved without a doubt that she is one of the best in the world.
Korean pro-gamer “Geguri” is currently ranked as one of the top 10 Overwatch players on the planet right now. Overwatch is a team-based first-person shooter combat game that requires extraordinary hand-eye coordination and tactics. At 17 years old and a woman, Geguri is an anomaly in the male-dominated, testosterone infused world of esports.
Geguri is so good at the game, that she was the predominant reason her team UW Artisan won a major Overwatch tournament. She was so damn good, that two of the players on the opposing team, Dizziness, “ETLA” and “Strobe,” flatly accused her of cheating after the tournament. Strobe even reportedly threatened to come to her house with a knife.
The two bet their entire pro-gaming reputation on the idea that there is no way a woman could attain the kill ratio that Geguri did during the tournament. If Geguri was proven innocent, they pledged to quit the game forever.
Geguri’s entire brief history in e-sports — where she boasts an incredible 80-percent win rate over 450 matches — was called into question, as well as the manner in which she won. Geguri has a “kill ratio” of 6.31:1 — meaning that for every one time she is killed in the game, she has killed her opponent more than six times. That is extraordinarily high. No girl could be that good.
You can watch the video above to see Geguri’s superhuman aiming ability in action during the tournament, as she mows through opponents with her favorite character “Zarya,” a muscular woman with bright pink hair and a giant gun.
After ETLA and Strobe filed the complaint against Geguri, tournament officials investigated and found zero evidence that she was cheating. She’s just really, really good. But even then, there were still dark rumblings that Geguri must be rigging the game somehow. So the gaming site Inventory allowed Geguri to perform a live demonstration of her skills on a machine they provided.
Once again, Geguri dominated the game. You can watch an hour of the live feed below. The action kicks in around 5:40.
After this incontrovertible proof of Geguri’s skills, ETLA and Strobe finally did one honorable thing: they retired from e-sports, as promised.
Would all of this controversy has ensued if Geguri was a man? Possibly, but it’s doubtful. There are (very few) men ranked higher than her right now. No one is saying they must cheat. So we tip our hats to Geguri, a 17 year old girl who shut down sexism in the most satisfying way possible, by kicking the (virtual) ass of her detractors.