Korean Zarya Player Accused of Cheating, Turns Out to Really Be That Good

In Korea, where the skill ceiling is way past the stratosphere, hacking accusations are taken very seriously. If you happen to be an incredibly good gamer, it pretty much hangs over your head like a proverbial Sword of Damocles. And recently, one particular Overwatch player had to experience that accusatory skepticism first hand.

Gegury (게구리) is a 17-year-old Korean female player with a really high kill-death ratio of 6.31 and winrate of 80% with 420 games played (at that time). These are numbers beyond most people’s imaginations in this young game, so other players started accusing her of hacking.

She plays for the Overwatch professional team Artisan, which won the qualifiers for the Nexus Cup by defeating all the other major Korean teams. With Gegury being one of Artisan’s players, an opposing team named Dizziness called for Artisan to report her to Blizzard Korea.

Two pro players from Dizziness were said to be the main instigators—ELTA and Strobe. There’s even word that Strobe sent death threats to Gegury for cheating. It’s said that Strobe demanded the Artisan coach to visit Gegury at her house and see how she plays for real (most players only know each other online). The coach told him that he’ll do so a week later, and Strobe retorted with:

“So if I gave you a month and we find out she’s hacking, I might visit her house with a knife.”

ELTA and Strobe were so adamant about her being a hacker that they bet their whole team’s pro-gaming careers on being right. With Overwatch being such a young game and only one out of 18 or so pro teams in Korea having garnered sponsorships (at the moment), there’s a lot on the line.

The leader of Artisan saw it fit to prove these allegations wrong, but saw no need for a whole team to quit pro-gaming over it. However, with how much drama the whole situation had created in the Korean Overwatch community, it was impossible to give ELTA and Strobe the same grace.

A few days later, Blizzard Korea responded by clearing her of these hacking accusations and had Gegury demonstrate her skills live on stream, complete with a camera to show her actually playing. (And it’s a good thing too, because Blizzard is harsh on Overwatch cheaters.)

It was indeed a sight to behold, with Gegury showcasing a very dominant Zarya with incredible map awareness and mouse accuracy. (Fast forward the video to 5:25 for the start of the game.)

She cried in the post-game interview out of both relief and frustration due to the stress the whole drama put on her. She wore a mask to protect her identity.

In lieu of this development, ELTA and Strobe retired.