I'd like to hear czm's point of view on this, personally.

He had prior experience with quake and he played many hours a day since the early days of quake 3. He was just at the right age and dedicated.

No big secret IMO.

I personally consider it a bigger deal to have been top at the game from 2002-2005.

I agree, cooller is the best player ever.

practice practice practice
and a bit of ego-maniacal perspective about himself, of course

gamer food

^

He was one of the first to make use of low sens with high accel.

His aim was top tier, yes.

He tried to "memorize everything". Every situation, every shot, every motion. This required enormous amounts of energy and play time.

I've played with him many times and he has a very strong attitude in that he doesn't mind losing a TON of games in an effort to improve. He'll put in 10 hours+ of game time, lose 90 % of the games and call it time well spent. Next day that 90 % is guaranteed to be lower. He's very competitive but willing to take a lot of punishment to get into game shape. He just doesn't quit.

A ton of energy and drive, and a willingness to suffer for the prize is what made him a dominant player.

Take this game for example from 2000:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4L0M4kJDdk

It looks really normal nowadays, but that's just it. He was way ahead of his time in terms of movement/aim/item control. For a while it was like playing someone from the future because he was so far ahead of the curve.

Of course players like ZeRo4 caught up to and even surpassed him eventually, followed by a tsunami of highly skilled russian players (cooller, cypher, lexer, pele, death, kik, unkind, forze, polos, the list goes on).

Namely ZeRo4 had a more prudent balance with respect to adapting to situations during the game vs. home preparation. Fatal1ty wasn't a fan of thinking on his feet, and he was kind of weak at fast games like quakeworld. Later though he learned to better handle his own weaknesses and remains a contender for the crown in any tournament he chooses to enter.

who's forze lol

I think this is very, very well put and exactly what made him so good. Because yes, he was good, and this post gives him all the credit he deserves without raising him to unrealistic heights.

he had ok aim, nothing special but in no way bad.

his main strenghts were his positioning and decisions, which he basically perfected for each situation because he REALLY practiced alot. he was basically his era's rapha but with lesser natural talent (hence the need to practice alot)

His preparation is pretty much unrivaled. (maybe Tox and rph is at the same level or even better)

he committed to discipline like a sportsman and his approach was very systematic I think

Man, this is all nostalgic and shit. Brings a happy tear to my eye :D

But seriously, aside from happy feely tears; no homo.

What made him dominant in almost every aspect (even his aim, mind you. He used what, at the time, was a superior ballmouse; can't even remember which one it was, but along came boomslang and that was favored afaik) was his already extensive knowledge of moving around a map and predicting locations of enemies etc, as well as having perfected a mindset with cleared space for timing items, among other things.

This all came down to what so many others before him has said, but the way I remember it from him is the most compelling (me being a bit of a fanboy back then, and playing Quake was, and in a sense still is highly prioritized). It went like this:
"How to get better? Practice. To keep practising. It's the only way you're going to get better. It's the only way you're going to be number one. Number one in anything. Practice, practice, practice."

To this day I still remember these words and I still try to live by it when I ache to win matches against higher level players.

dedication and open mind.


i remember infamous av3k iview, the one with cellphones and shoes, when he was asked about q4, and he replied, "fatality will find the perfect way to play q4, and after some time other players will learn from him"

i read in early quake3 he did item timing very serious and perfect. some said he changed the gameplay. today you cant really say to the enemy player "itemwhore" :D

i saw once some old duel demos (blue, doomer) and the guys werent primary after items. as strange as it sounds.

PS: very old q3 demos are akward to watch, so many missed shots, slow movement, the use of ALL weapons. it looks like a jam session or a warm up - with the view of todays gameplay.

What makes Fatal1ty dominant?

It's because he's a top.

I've not seen him playing CA