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xQc

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xQc
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Lengyel at ShitCamp 2021
Personal information
NameFélix Lengyel
Born (1995-11-12) November 12, 1995 (age 26)
Laval, Quebec, Canada
Career information
GamesOverwatch
Playing career2016–2019
RoleTank
Team history
2016DatZit Gaming
2016–2017Denial eSports
2017Arc 6
2018Dallas Fuel
2018GOATS
2019Gladiators Legion
Career highlights and awards
Twitch information
Channel
Years active2014–present
Followers9.68 million
Total views460 million
Follower and view counts updated as of December 21, 2021.
YouTube information
Channel
Years active2015–present
Subscribers1.87 million[1]
Total views972 million[1]
YouTube Silver Play Button 2.svg 100,000 subscribers 2018
YouTube Gold Play Button 2.svg 1,000,000 subscribers 2020
Updated: December 21, 2021

Félix Lengyel (French pronunciation: ​[feliks lɑ̃ʒɛl], born November 12, 1995), better known by his online alias xQc or xQcOW, is a Canadian Twitch streamer, internet personality, and former professional Overwatch player. Lengyel played for the Dallas Fuel in the Overwatch League for part of the inaugural season before being released due to repeated controversy and suspensions. Lengyel has also played in the Overwatch World Cup for Team Canada in 2017, 2018 and 2019. He now streams full-time on Twitch as a variety streamer for the Canadian esports organization Luminosity Gaming.

Early life

Lengyel was born on November 12, 1995, reportedly in Laval, Quebec, Canada.[2][better source needed]

After completing his secondary school, Lengyel went on to study humanities at a CEGEP before switching to administration. He ended up dropping out after 3.5 years, just before graduating,[3][failed verification] and started streaming games on Twitch. Lengyel first started off playing League of Legends on Twitch under the name xQcLoL but later discovered the game Overwatch and started playing it competitively.[4][5][6][failed verification]

Career

Overwatch

DatZit Gaming

Lengyel began his career as an Overwatch player as the main tank at DatZit Gaming, a semi-professional esport organization based in Montreal, Canada. On August 13, 2016, Lengyel and his team won the Dreamhack Montreal 2016 Overwatch tournament.[7][8]

Denial eSports

Lengyel continued his career as a main tank player on the Overwatch team "Q?" which was later picked up by Denial eSports on October 12, 2016.[9]

Lengyel also claimed that Denial owed $2,900 to its players after reportedly not paying them.[10][11]

Arc 6

After Denial eSports disbanded, Lengyel and the other members of the team played together under the name "YIKES!" which was later changed to "Arc 6" after being asked by Blizzard since the logo could not be used and the name was deemed unmarketable.[12][13][14] After qualifying, they played in Season Zero of Overwatch Contenders but were ultimately eliminated in the group stage. On July 9, 2017, Arc 6 participated in their last tournament, the Beat Invitational: Season 2 tournament, beating FNRGFE but losing to Rogue to take third place.[15] Eventually, Arc 6 went their separate ways to focus on tryouts for Season 1 of the Overwatch League. No official statements were released by Arc 6 or Lengyel regarding his departure from the team until it was announced that he would be part of the Dallas Fuel in October.[16]

Dallas Fuel

On October 28, 2017, Overwatch League franchise Dallas Fuel announced Lengyel would be joining their roster as their 9th player.[16] Lengyel played with the team for several matches before coming under fire due to homophobic remarks made on his Twitch stream directed against rival player Austin "Muma" Wilmot of the Houston Outlaws. Lengyel was suspended by the League for four matches and fined $2,000 for violating the Overwatch League Code of Conduct. The Dallas Fuel later extended the suspension to include the entirety of Stage 1. Lengyel made his return at the beginning of Stage 2, leading his team to victory against the Los Angeles Gladiators, and was chosen as Omen by HP's Player Of The Match.[17] Shortly after his return to the Dallas Fuel lineup, Lengyel received a second suspension and fine for multiple social media violations and use of disparaging language towards the Overwatch League casters.[18]

GOATS

Lengyel then said he was going to take a break from professional play, retiring to become a full-time streamer. He continued full-time streaming for several months, before making the decision to return to pro play, playing with the Contenders Trials NA team GOATS.[citation needed]

Gladiators Legion

On February 2, 2019, it was announced that Lengyel joined Gladiators Legion, the academy team of the Los Angeles Gladiators competing in Overwatch Contenders, as a substitute main tank.[19] In late 2019, the team announced that they would discontinue competing in Contenders.[20]

International career

Lengyel (left) at the 2018 Overwatch World Cup.

Lengyel also played for Team Canada in their 2017 Overwatch World Cup campaign. They qualified for the World Cup after beating the Netherlands by a score of 3-0. The team made it all the way to the finals of the tournament before being defeated by defending champions, South Korea.[21] Lengyel was named the event's most valuable player.[22]

In the 2018 Overwatch World Cup, Lengyel played as a main tank on the starting roster for Team Canada. Several months prior to the world cup, the head coach of Team Canada, Justin "Jayne" Conroy announced on his Twitch stream that Lengyel, along with players Lucas "NotE" Meissner, Brady "Agilities" Girardi, Lane "Surefour" Roberts and Liam "Mangachu" Campbell, would be welcome to join the Canadian national team without going through the regular trialing process.[23][24] He played in the Los Angeles Group Stage, finishing second place to move on to the quarterfinals at BlizzCon.[25]

In July 2019, Team Canada announced that Lengyel would return as the starting main tank for the team at the 2019 Overwatch World Cup.[26] The team did not manage to pass the Group Stage after losing all four of its matches.[27]

Streaming

Twitch

In the wake of the suspension of the Legion's 2020 Contenders season, Lengyel chose to continue streaming full-time on Twitch. He streams for an average of 9 hours every day and has a viewer count that regularly exceeds 60,000.[28][29] In October 2019, Lengyel was the most watched Twitch streamer and ranked as the 29th most followed.[30] In addition, he is one of the most subscribed to Twitch channels, having over 35,000 monthly subscribers on average.[31] While he still plays Overwatch, his streams are currently more focused on variety. He often browses new releases on Steam and plays games based on suggestions from his viewers. Lengyel also does IRL (In Real Life) streams for events like TwitchCon, BlizzCon, and he has also done PO Box Openings, Media Share Streams, Viewer PC Set-Up Reviews and has even opened Pokémon booster boxes on stream.[32]

On February 2, 2019, Los Angeles-based esports organization Sentinels signed Lengyel to their Twitch content creator roster as a variety streamer. The signing announcement also shared that Lengyel would be joining Overwatch esports team Los Angeles Gladiators as a substitute player.[33] On August 27, 2020, Lengyel was released from his Sentinels contract and later signed to Luminosity Gaming.[34]

In March 2020, Lengyel was invited by Riot Games to take part in the Valorant closed beta where viewers could obtain a beta access key by watching his stream. Between April 7 and 15, he streamed more than 112 hours of Valorant, which included 3 streams that lasted for more than 20 hours.[35] He also reached his current all time peak in viewers (222,720) and total unique viewers in one stream (1,971,819) on April 9, 2020.[36]

Towards the end of March 2020, Lengyel started playing chess on stream. On April 2, fellow streamer and Grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura came on his stream to teach him how to play chess.[37] In the following months, Lengyel would include chess games in most of his streams where he attempted to improve his Chess.com rating.[citation needed] On May 25, Chess.com announced the first of the PogChamps events, where 16 streamers would compete in a chess tournament for a prize fund of $50,000.[38] Lengyel ended up in the consolation bracket after losing every game in the Group Stage, but won against fellow streamer Fuslie in the quarterfinals.[39] He was defeated in the semifinals by Ludwig Ahgren.[40] Lengyel's collaboration with Nakamura and the subsequent PogChamps events are widely believed to have inspired a surge in popularity of chess on Twitch and other media platforms, such as YouTube.[41][42][43][44]

On October 1, 2020, Lengyel announced on his stream that he had signed to Luminosity Gaming as a content creator. [45]

Name

Lengyel's online alias comes from the last letter of his first name, Félix, and the abbreviation of his home province, Quebec (QC).[46]

YouTube

Lengyel also has a YouTube channel that he created back on March 8, 2015, where he uploads on a daily basis, his stream highlights, reactions, and full playthroughs of games he plays on stream.[47][original research]

Controversies

Player account suspensions

Prior to major incidents in the Overwatch League, there were known cases of controversial acts. His account was suspended twice for violating Blizzard's Terms of Use. The first incident occurred on November 17, 2017, where Lengyel was booted mid-match from a competitive Overwatch game with a suspension message.[48] He was suspended for 72 hours for "misuse of the reporting system". Lengyel had used the in-game reporting system for reporting players for supposedly invalid reasons. He had reported a player for refusing to switch off of a hero, even after repeatedly dying.[49]

While streaming in December 2017, Lengyel threw a competitive game. Blizzard responded with a seven-day suspension, and Lengyel posted a video to publicly apologize for his behavior.[50][51]

On August 11, 2018, Lengyel's account was suspended once again for violating the Abusive Chat policy. He had apparently been reported by teammates several times for this offense. Overwatch World Cup issued an official warning for the suspension, but he was allowed to play.[52]

Just a few weeks after his Overwatch account was suspended he received a permanent ban from League of Legends for being "extremely inflammatory and offensive" in the in-game chat. He was among the 0.006 percent of League of Legends players negative enough to receive a permanent ban.[53]

Overwatch League suspensions

Over the course of his time with the Dallas Fuel, Lengyel was suspended twice. His first suspension came after Dallas Fuel's loss to the Houston Outlaws in Stage 1. Lengyel made homophobic remarks towards gay Houston Outlaws player Austin "Muma" Wilmot. The Overwatch League then fined Lengyel $2,000 and suspended him for 4 matches. Dallas Fuel later extended that suspension to the remainder of Stage 1. Lengyel later apologized for the comment, writing "I didn't say what I said on stream with malicious intent, I legit did not compute the whole thing before ... Hope I can turn this into something good, sorry."[17][54][55][56][57]

Lengyel was fined and suspended for using the Twitch emoticon "TriHard" in a "racially disparaging manner", and using disparaging language against Overwatch League casters and fellow players on social media and his personal stream.[58] This time, Lengyel received a $4,000 fine and was suspended for four matches. On March 11, 2018, Dallas Fuel announced that the team and Lengyel had mutually parted ways.[59] In an interview, Lengyel said that although he likes to play at a professional level, he also enjoys creating content on Twitch. If he receives an offer to play in a professional team again, he said he would have to think about it for a while before making a decision.[60]

Twitch bans

On July 31, 2019, xQc was banned for 3 days for streaming a satirically explicit video where pornographic scenes were edited as to appear "Safe for Work".[61]

On February 29, 2020, xQc was banned for 3 days for showing nudity in an adult-themed game based on Connect Four. The NPC took her clothes off after xQc won a game of Connect Four versus her.[62]

On November 18, 2020, xQc was banned for 7 days after stream sniping in a Fall Guys Twitch Rivals event. He also received a 6-month ban from Twitch Rivals and was forced to forfeit his prize winnings from the event.[63][64]

Awards and nominations

Year Ceremony Category Result Ref.
2017 2017 Overwatch World Cup MVP Won
2018 2018 Esports Awards Streamer of the Year Nominated [citation needed]
2020 Canadian Game Awards Streamer Nominated [65][66]
2020 2020 Esports Awards Streamer of the Year Nominated

See also

References

  1. ^ a b "About xQcOW". YouTube.
  2. ^ Asarch, Steven (August 16, 2021). "Meet xQc, a top Twitch streamer who's faced criticism and suspensions for everything from watching nudity in an adult-themed game to using a homophobic slur". Insider. Retrieved August 27, 2021.
  3. ^ "Twitch Clip - CÉGEP". Twitch. June 2, 2020. Retrieved July 16, 2020.
  4. ^ "Twitch Clip - XQC on Dealing with Adversity". Twitch. June 2, 2020. Retrieved July 16, 2020.
  5. ^ "xQc Reacts to 'Who is xQcOW?' by Mintino Gaming". YouTube. November 4, 2019. Retrieved July 16, 2020.
  6. ^ "- YouTube". www.youtube.com.
  7. ^ @DreamHackCanada (August 14, 2016). "Congrats to our top 3 for the Overwatch tournament! 1. @DatZitGaming 2. Tilted Like Pisa 3. TBD" (Tweet). Retrieved July 15, 2020 – via Twitter.
  8. ^ "DatZit Gaming - About page". DatZit Gaming. Retrieved July 15, 2020.
  9. ^ "Denial.Overwatch Revealed". Denial eSports. October 12, 2016. Retrieved July 13, 2020.
  10. ^ "Denial Esports Issues Statement on xQc's Allegations of Non-Payment". Unikrn News. January 28, 2019. Retrieved November 25, 2020.
  11. ^ Ryan (January 29, 2019). "xQc Claims Denial Esports Lied About Paying Players Owed Money". GamingConviction.com. Retrieved November 25, 2020.
  12. ^ @xQc (May 2, 2017). "Our team has parted ways with @DenialEsports and will continue to play with the same roster under @YikesOW" (Tweet). Retrieved July 13, 2020 – via Twitter.
  13. ^ @Arc6OW (June 25, 2017). "After much discussion amongst the team YikesOW has re-branded to ARC 6! We'll debut the new name tomorrow at conten…" (Tweet). Retrieved July 13, 2020 – via Twitter.
  14. ^ "xQc Reacts to 'Who is xQcOW?' by Mintino Gaming". YouTube. November 4, 2019. Retrieved July 13, 2020.
  15. ^ "Overwatch BEAT Invitational Season 2". over.gg. Retrieved July 13, 2020.
  16. ^ a b @DallasFuel (October 28, 2017). "From Canada, please join us in welcoming @xqcOW to the Dallas Fuel! #BurnBlue" (Tweet). Retrieved July 4, 2018 – via Twitter.
  17. ^ a b "Dallas Fuel on Twitter". Twitter. Retrieved July 5, 2018.
  18. ^ Wolf, Jacob (March 11, 2018). "xQc released from Dallas Fuel after receiving second Overwatch League suspension". ESPN. Retrieved June 16, 2020.
  19. ^ Abbas, Malcolm (February 12, 2019). "Popular Twitch streamer xQc joins Gladiators Legion as a substitute main-tank". Dot Esports. Retrieved February 13, 2019.
  20. ^ Peres, Pedro (December 5, 2019). "XQc discovers he was dropped from Gladiators Legion on stream". Dot Esports. Retrieved December 18, 2019.
  21. ^ Van Allen, Eric (March 11, 2018). "Overwatch World Cup Comes Down To A Fight Over Meters". ESPN. Retrieved March 17, 2018.
  22. ^ Wolf, Jacob (January 19, 2018). "Dallas Fuel suspend xQc for anti-gay slurs; Overwatch League fines player". ESPN. Retrieved December 18, 2019.
  23. ^ "Team Canada Coach Jayne announces xQc, NotE and more to join team roster". Overwatch Wire. June 3, 2018. Retrieved October 30, 2018.
  24. ^ Brathwaite, Brandon (June 2, 2018). "XQc, NotE, Mangachu, Agilities, and Surefour Will Be Invited to Play for Overwatch Team Canada". DBLTAP. Retrieved July 15, 2020.
  25. ^ "Canada announce final starting roster for 2018 Overwatch World Cup". Overwatch Wire. July 10, 2018. Retrieved August 15, 2018.
  26. ^ Richardson, Liz (July 29, 2019). "Team Canada introduces Overwatch World Cup roster". Dot Esports. Retrieved December 14, 2021.
  27. ^ "2019 Overwatch World Cup - Group Stage Results". Overwatch League. November 2, 2019. Retrieved July 15, 2020.
  28. ^ "xQcOW Statistics". Twitch Tracker. Retrieved June 3, 2020.
  29. ^ "xQcOW Twitch Statistics". Twitch Tracker. July 16, 2020.
  30. ^ Hore, Jamie (December 4, 2019). "XQc was the most watched streamer on Twitch last month". The Loadout. Retrieved June 3, 2020.
  31. ^ "Twitch Subs Count Statistics". TwitchTracker.
  32. ^ "xQcOW - YouTube". www.youtube.com.
  33. ^ "SENTINELS SIGN XQC". SENTINELS. February 2, 2019. Retrieved September 2, 2020.
  34. ^ "xQc parts ways with Sentinels". Reuters. August 27, 2020. Retrieved September 2, 2020.
  35. ^ "LIST OF STREAMS WHEN XQCOW PLAYED VALORANT". TwitchTracker. July 13, 2020. Retrieved July 13, 2020.
  36. ^ "STREAM ON APR 08, 2020 :