It’s late May, 2021. Masters Reykjavík: the first international LAN in VALORANT. This is the biggest event in the esport’s history, and North America’s second seed has just shocked the world.
This is the story of a Cinderella team who no one thought would even make it to the dance. The story of an underdog in cat ears. The story beyond the clip of Version1’s improbable run to masters and their unforgettable upset when they got there.
In-game leader vanity had transitioned from Counter-Strike to VALORANT just a month before. This was after taking his former CS:GO team Chaos Esports Club to first place finishes in IEM Beijing online North America and DreamHack Masters Winter North America in 2020.
Penny also joined the roster, coming off a second place finish at that same IEM Beijing online event with his former CS team, Triumph.
Then there was Zellsis, who joined following a brief stint with a VALORANT stack called Orgles5. This was after retiring from CS:GO in September of 2020.
Effys, by contrast, had virtually been a VALORANT pro since day one, in April of 2020. He boasted a six-month run with Gen.G, with whom he won the T1 Nerd Street Gamers invitational.
PLAYER1, another Gen.G VALORANT veteran rounded out the roster.
Initially, things just didn’t seem to click and Version1’s Challengers 2 and 3 open qualifier runs were ground to a halt by FaZe Clan and TSM. Masters 1 was well out of their reach.
Learn the whole story by watching the video above, or heading to Upcomer’s YouTube channel.
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