Drei Ratschläge an Dein 14jähriges Ich!

Live a healthier lifestyle, rest your eyes more and treat your parents wich more respect.

Was steht auf Deiner Visitenkarte?

My name is David Tan, my job title is professional gamer

Was ist das coolste an Deinem Job?

The coolest thing about my job, I think, is the fan interaction, because you go to a LAN, and then you get a crowd screaming, and then all look up to you. You're an idol and their role model. It feels good that you inspire a lot of people to become better just by doing what you love. I'm not doing anything special, like saving lives or anything. I'm just doing what I like doing, my job, and people get inspired by me, so that's pretty cool.

Welche Einschränkungen bringt Dein Job mit sich?

Before I became a pro gamer, I was just a regular gamer, right? So I had a lot of bad habits. The challenge was to curb the bad habits. Basically waking up on time, eating good, getting rid of all the nasty habits, you know? No more biting your nails, no more taking a shower every two days. I take a shower twice a day now. Always being able to show up on time - that's the most important thing. And not only just showing up on time, but showing up on time and ready to play - when you mind is there. Even today, a lot of pro players still don't do that. And you gotta have a champion's mindset to be a pro gamer.

Worum geht es in Deinem Job?

To be a professional gamer, my task is obviously just to win. Basically that's about it. But also my responsibility is being a good teammate. And being a good teammate means supporting your other teammates and being not just good in game, but out of the game, as friends, as a brother. You also have to have some responsibility to study your opponents foremost, beforehand. And also the responsibility of practicing. People think pro gaming is just playing video games all day, and then you get good. No, it has a lot to do with research, study and teamwork. Depending on which game you play - the game I play requires teamwork. The most games these days all require teamwork. And teamwork requires you to be able to associate with people. So people think that pro gamers are caved in, autistic nerds who don't go out to talk to people. It's actually the opposite. You have to be very sociable, and you have to work together as a team. The game I play is called Dota 2, it's a MOBA, kind of like League of Legends. It's the second most popular game in the entire world. It's a five-on-five game. So, you and four teammates will play against a team of five players, and usually the team with the better strategy and mechanical skills wins. We wake up, eat breakfast, shower, and get into a really good mindset to start the day, because, when you play at the highest level, you need a clear head. So then we eat good food. We eat together as team. And then we discuss the matches and strategies beforehand. Before we play the match, we solidify our strategy. And then we play our match. After we finish our match, it's on dinner time already. Then we eat dinner, and talk about the games, and then we go to sleep. So it's like morning 'til night, only about the games. And eating. But we eat good.

Wie sieht Dein Werdegang aus?

I was born and raised in Singapore. I started playing games as long as I can remember, like, as a small kid, playing Nintendo and watching my brother play. I played it after him, because I'm the youngest one, and I don't know I started getting good. I think it was when I first started watching DotA 1, competitively. Watching competitive games. Which is when I wanted to become a pro gamer. And this was when I was as young as twelve years old. I'd be just playing the game and trying to become the best at it. It wasn't until 2009, in Heroes of Newerth, when I was the top of the MMR ladder, one of the top players, I got invited to a team, and my debut was in a LAN called NASL, when I was playing against the Fnatic squad, and we beat them. That was my debut LAN, so afterwards my career just kind of took off from there. My biggest achievement was probably a six-month win-streak in HoN, where we didn't lose a single game, and that was with Peter, the current leader of Evil Geniuses, in HoN. And my other biggest achievement in Dota was qualifying for TI5, with a 1-month-old team, and winning the Majors recently in Frankfurt, and willing over a million dollars with a three-month-old team.

Ginge es auch ohne Deinem Werdegang?

It would not be possible to achieve it without my background. What kind of skills do you need to be a pro gamer? I think you need a very solid base when you're young. Something that develops your mind. For me, when I was a kid, my parents were already drilling a lot of things into me. Because I'm an asian kid. To give me piano lessons, violin lessons, swimming lessons, chess lessons. I was trained in the two grandmasters too, in chess. So I got really good at chess. And for my captain, Tal, from a young age he was trained to be a martial artist, so he was always, like, fast with his mind, quick with his mind, and martial arts is all about predicting your opponent's moves, right? And being really fast and reactive, and really smart, so all those little things that we do at a young age develop our mind as we mature. I read an article that says, the more you teach a young baby, aged 1-3, the brain soaks the information 3 times as fast, so I think all those little things helped me grow into the person I am today.