The Origin of Fatality (1993)

At 12 years old, Johnathan loved competing in Mortal Kombat. He would scour Kansas City looking to play against anyone to perform the famous move on all opponents.  "FATALITY"

When he logged on to servers in his local area, he was asked what is your alias?  Thinking of what he would call himself, he could only think of one thing that resembled what he wanted to perform against all of his opponents for the foreseeable future.  FATALITY.  

It meant you won and and this is the final blow.  It was the extreme finale.  There is no better way to win, but to win with style, that's what FATALITY meant for the young Johnathan.

1996

Quake Online

Fatality started playing quake online, and instantly became addicted to competing against the best players all over the world straight from his living room.  This was the beginning of esports and competitive gaming and sparked Johnathan's interest in beating anyone he could find online.

"With the internet, you're not limited to the best players in your neighborhood or your city, you can play the best players in the world from your home!"

Local Area Network Tournaments (1996-1999)

The best way to find out if you're good or not, was always in person.  Fatal1ty would travel all over the mid-west to find the best training and the best tournaments.  In this span "Fatal1ty" would win 3 years straight across the mid-west before going to his first professional tournament.

Evolution of the n1ckname (1997)

Fatality was Johnathan's original nickname before he changed it to Fatal1ty with the number 1 in it.  The reason for the 1 in his name was because it was considered leetspeak which referred to being extremely skilled in gaming or awesome.

The primary purpose was to separate his stats from when he played online with a slow or fast connection.  On the fast connection, Fatal1ty found himself at the #1 spot on many leaderboards.

First Pro Tournament (1999)

The CPL, Cyberathlete Professional League held a tournament in Dallas, TX called Frag3 for $25,000!

Johnathan saved up $500 and convinced his Dad that he would travel to compete in his first professional tournament where he would go on and make his dark horse debut and shock the gaming world as one of the top quake players in the world.

Quake 3 Arena

The Best in the World? (1999)

After a very successful showing at Fatal1ty's first pro tournament, he was instantly a breath of fresh air to the FPS community.  His fighting style being very fast, exciting and aggressive lead to many companies wanting him to fly around the globe to represent USA.  First event being in Stockholm, Sweden to compete against the top 12 players in the world.

This is where Fatal1ty put on his best performance and won 18 games straight, losing 0. 

The Fatal1ty Slam (2000)

Four continents in 1 year. (Quake 3 Arena)

1st - XSi Sweden
1st - Razer CPL, USA
1st - CPL Germany
1st - World Cyber Games Challenge South Korea
1st - CPL Australia

#1 FPS player in the world?

The rivalry between Quake community vs Unreal community.  Which gamer was the best?  Fatal1ty wanted to find out.

MTV True Life: I'm a Gamer recorded documentary where Fatal1ty trains in a completely new game with only one thing on his mind.  Practice, practice, practice.

Fatal1ty enters new arena (2002)

Playing a completely new game which featured new fighting techniques and positioning, Fatal1ty had to master a new arena shooter which he never previously played.

Unreal Tournament 2003 Champion!

With all the pressure and unknowns, Fatal1ty mounts a feat and bests the best.  Winning every game with only one narrow victory where he hit the miraculous shield burst shot on his opponent to knock him off the ledge and win in overtime!

MTV True Life: I'm a Gamer episode turned Fatal1ty into a household name over night.

DOOM 3 Inaugural Championship

QuakeCON - Lights out! (2004)

Fatal1ty found himself in the lower bracket of the Inaugural DOOM 3 Championship and fought his way back to the finals where he pulled off a move in the game that no one has ever seen before.  

In DOOM 3, they introduced a feature where you could shoot out the lights in the hallways to make areas darker where you can hide in the shadows.  When playing in the deciding match, Fatal1ty was leading and shot out two overhead lights and hid in a shadow to showcase this new feature to the audience.  And to top it off his opponent ran right by his shoulder in the game which left the crowd in ahh.  

Fatal1ty closed out the match winning by roughly 10 frags and taking home the $25,000 prize.

PainkilleR $1 Million World Tour

CPL announces the world tour.  The biggest prize money ever awarded in esports history.  Traveling to over 10 different countries competing against the best players in the world to find out who ranks #1.

#1 FPS Gamer
     vs
#1 Painkiller Player

Fatal1ty finds himself in another game where he is not the favorite.  It will take heart, desire and his relentless approach to be the best to take over the current champion.

The Rivalry Begins

Matches started in Texas and went to Turkey, Sweden, United Kingdom, Brazil, Singapore, Italy and more.  The matches were always fierce until the summer of 2005 when Fatal1ty finally found his groove against the #1 ranked player.

Fatal1ty won again in Singapore and lost the next one in the UK.  Coming into the finals in New York City, it was anyone's game.

Biggest match in Esports History (2005)

With over 90 countries tuned in and being livestreamed on MTV Overdrive.  This was the beginning of livestreaming on a massive scale like you see today.

Fatal1ty was coming from the lower bracket once again and had to win two back to back series of best of 3 to take home the championship.

The Series for Legacy

This would be Fatal1ty's biggest moment to win this final tournament of his career.  It's been his destiny his whole career to win with the most pressure and in the biggest tournaments.  

"I don't care about the money, I care about winning!" -Fatal1ty

Fatal1ty started out fast with winning the first match with some impressive spawn fragging mid-game to take a solid game 1 win. 

Game 2 started very fast for Fatal1ty and as it was his favorite map, he won this one with ease.  This captured the first set for Fatal1ty and placed him and his rival tied for the final set of games.

Game 3 was an unbelievable battle of patience. Both players playing the map perfectly and not wanting to be the first one to make the mistake. The first kill came from the rival but in the process of confirming the kill, he fell to his death to keep the score tied at 0-0 at the 9 minute mark.

The battle would continue and proceed to a 4-4 tie at the 15 min mark which would push overtime. Two minutes left...

Fatal1ty being patient all game decides to go super aggressive for the first time to try to surprise his opponent at the gold armor which he accomplishes by landing 7 shots to his opponents 0. This lead to an incredible overtime win for Fatal1ty which put him in the absolute driver seat to win the championship in the final match.

Final Match for Immortality

The rival shows up and leads the game 6 to 0 early in the game on Fatal1ty's favorite map.  At this point, it's still early in the game and plenty of time to mount a comeback.  

Fatal1ty finds his moment by sneaking up behind his opponent and shooting a stake on his opponents backside.  This confirmed the kill for Fatal1ty and then lead to complete control for him where he went on a terror racking up kill after kill until he reached 20 kills!  Good game.  $150,000!

12x FPS Esports World Champion

"Practice, practice, practice.  It's the only way, the only way you're going to be number one, number one at anything.  Practice, practice, practice."

-Johnathan Wendel aka Fatal1ty