Fatal1ty

Johnathan Wendel (Fatal1ty)
Fatal1ty
Status	Active
Date of birth	February 26, 1981 (1981-02-26)
Hometown	Independence, Missouri
Nationality	United States
Current team	Independent
Games	Quake Quake 2 Quake 3 Aliens versus Predator 2 Return to Castle Wolfenstein Call of Duty 2 Counter-Strike: Source Unreal Tournament 2003 Doom 3 Painkiller Quake 4 Counter-Strike Team Fortress 2 Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
[http://www.fatal1ty.com Official website]

Johnathan Wendel (born February 26, 1981), also known by the pseudonym Fatal1ty (pronounced Fatality), is a professional electronic sports player, philanthropist, and entrepreneur. Jonathan is considered the world's first prominent and accomplished professional gamer. He is also considered one of the best professional gamers in the world.

Biography

Wendel has won approximately US$500,000 in cash and prizes from professional competitions, mainly in the Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL). In addition to receiving numerous product partnerships with his company Fatal1ty Brand (Fatal1ty, Inc.), he has been featured in mainstream newsprint publications such as Time, The New York Times, Forbes, and the BBC World Service. He has also been featured on 60 Minutes. He has a training regimen where he practices at least eight hours each day, sometimes more.

Wendel has been a successful competitor in many first-person shooter games. He debuted as a professional gamer in October 1999 by placing 3rd in the Quake III Arena tournament at the CPL's FRAG 3 event. He has competed in tournaments with Counter-Strike, Call of Duty and Quake III Arena which he won with his team clan Kapitol at the first-ever CPL Teamplay World Championships (FRAG 4).^{[citation needed]} Most of his successes have been with one-versus-one deathmatch games including Quake III Arena, Unreal Tournament 2003, and Painkiller. During his career, he has won a total of twelve world championship titles, including four player of the year awards with the Cyberathlete Professional League and one with the World Cyber Games.

On March 13, 2003, MTV featured Wendel on the True Life series. It was filmed in Kansas City, Kansas; San Antonio, Texas; and Dallas, Texas. The episode documented his life and how he prepared for the Cyberathlete Professional League's Winter 2002 Unreal Tournament 2003. Among those featured alongside Wendel in the professional gaming industry were his friends Phil "shogun" Kennedy, and Brian "astro" Lewis, who were also very well known in the professional gaming circuit.

Wendel started a business, Fatal1ty, Inc., selling his brand of gaming mouse pads, "FATpads". He later expanded this into other gaming equipment through a business partnership with Universal abit, Creative Labs and XFX to create motherboards, coolers, sound cards, video cards, computer mice, computer cases, headphones, power supplies, and even clothes bearing his moniker.

Wendel was the spokesman of the now defunct Championship Gaming Series and has temporarily put aside actively competing.

Wendel was awarded the first Lifetime Achievement Award in the four-year history of the eSports Award.

Notable accomplishments

All winnings listed are in USD.

Aliens versus Predator 2

• 1st CPL World Championship ($40,000, Ford Focus)

Doom 3

• 1st QuakeCon 2004 ($25,000)

Painkiller

• 4th Electronic Sports World Cup 2004 ($10,000)
• 2nd CPL Summer Championships 2004 ($5,750)
• 4th CPL Turkey March 26, 2005 ($5,000)
• 6th CPL Spain May 1, 2005 ($2,500)
• 2nd CPL Brazil May 28, 2005 ($10,000)
• 2nd CPL Sweden June 18, 2005 ($10,000)
• 1st CPL Summer Championships 2005 ($15,000)
• 2nd CPL UK September 4, 2005 ($10,000)
• 1st CPL Singapore October 16, 2005 ($15,000)
• 2nd CPL Italy October 22, 2005 ($10,000)
• 5th CPL Chile October 30, 2005 ($3,500)
• 1st CPL NYC World Tour Finals 2005 ($150,000)

QuakeWorld

• 6th CPL 4-Year Anniversary Event 2001 ($1,000)

Quake III Arena

• 3rd Frag 3 1999 ($4,000)
• 1st XSR Invitational 2000 ($15,000)
• 1st RazerCPL Tournament April 2000 ($40,000)
• 1st BattleTop Universal Challenge July 22, 2000 ($15,000)
• 1st World Cyber Games Challenge October 2000 ($25,000)
• 1st CPL Australia ($10,500)
• 3rd CPL Holland
• 2nd QuakeCon 2001 ($10,000)
• 2nd CPL Brazil

Quake 4

• 4th WSVG Kentucky June 18, 2006
• 4th WSVG Intel Summer Challenge July 9, 2006 ($6,500)
• 9–12th QuakeCon August 5, 2006
• 5th WSVG London October 8, 2006
• 3rd Digital Life October 15, 2006 ($2,500)
• 5th World Cyber Games October 19, 2006
• 2nd WSVG Finals New York, December 10, 2006 ($10,000)
• 1st Championship Gaming Invitational Los Angeles, December 17, 2006

Unreal Tournament 2003

• 1st CPL Winter 2002 ($10.000)
• 3rd Electronic Sports World Cup 2003 ($3.000)

World championships

• CPL: 4 (2000, 2001, 2002, 2005)
• WCG: 1 (2000)

External links

• Fatal1ty's official website
• Interview with GotFrag.com
• Interview with TomsHardware.com
• Interview with Dr. Blogstein's Radio Happy Hour
• Interview with the BBC
• Interview with 60 Minutes
• Interview with Forbes Video
• Interview with Spike TV
• Interview with AOL Games
• CES 2007 Interview with LIVEdigitally
• Interview with Nice To Kill You e-Sports Club (in Spanish)
• Featured article at CNN.com (April 11, 2007) under "People You Should Know"
• Interview with GRRR.pl from Poznan Game Arena 2007
• Interview with Geek Entertainment TV 2008
• Interview with Neocrisis.com
• Interview with pr0gaming.com