Multi-time Evo champions are hard to come by, but that number shrinks to an even smaller number once you try to find players who have won a title in different games. Leffen is now the latest to join this exclusive club after winning Guilty Gear Strive at Evo 2023 on Aug. 6 with a crushing 3-0 win over NBNHMR.
After over a decade of playing Super Smash Bros. Melee at the highest level, and winning Evo 2018 in what is currently the game’s final appearance at the event, Leffen has continued to branch out into different fighting games.
Since picking up Strive at launch in 2021, he quickly rose to prominence as a top player—even managing to win Evo 2021 Online for Europe, though that isn’t counted as a direct Evo title. Winning Evo 2023 in Strive makes him a two-time Evo winner like Mang0 and Armada before him, but he was able to do it in a second game outside of Smash, something that no other Smash player has managed to do before—which also allowed for him to shut the haters, and Mang0, up.
“It must really suck to hate me, it must be a really tough job,” Leffen said to Dot Esports. “I mean, with Mang0, it’s all fun and games because we’re good friends. I think he knows deep inside that him saying that kicked my motivation into an extra gear because I had already done so well.”
After winning the Ludwig Ahgren Championship Series 5, Leffen noted that he didn’t have “a chip on my shoulder” like he would have had he not won a big event recently. So his mindset heading into the top six at Evo was a bit more relaxed until he woke up and saw all of the hate and doubt on social media.
Related: Evo 2023 wrapped: All top 8 results and major announcements
Because of his outspoken and occasionally aggressive nature, the Smash community has a very love-hate relationship with Leffen. That somewhat carried over to Strive, especially when he picked up a divisive character like Happy Chaos. But even though hundreds of people were calling for his defeat, he didn’t let it phase him and instead made him think “You know what? I think I really want to win this one too.”
“Lud’s event was one of those tournaments where I came in as an underdog and every set was scrappy, like I had to clutch out almost all of those sets and lost a bunch in the beginning,” Leffen said. “After that, I thought “It is fine to win like that, it’s impressive” but in my mind, it’s way cooler to win as a favorite and a top seed. I want to win right through practice and knowing all of my matchups, not relying on playing good that specific day. I think the coolest win is when you win and it’s like, oh, of course, he won.”
With that mentality shaping his perspective from early July, Leffen dedicated himself to focusing on Strive so he could give that tournament his best shot. Because, win or lose, approaching it like that meant he can “push himself the furthest” toward his goal of winning Evo in that way.
And win he did, dominating the top six through winner’s side and dropping just a single round along the way. It was a crushing performance from someone who knew they were favored and wanted to definitely show he is the best in the world.
“When I got into grand finals and [the commentators] did that announcement and asked who was rooting for me or NBNHMR, everyone was rooting for him because he plays Nagoriyuki and is from America,” Leffen said.
“I just thought to myself that I am going to make this such a boring set. I want to make them shut up. Like, this is America and I’m Swedish. I get it. I accept my role. But I wanted to make it clear. I didn’t want a scrappy set where I won because I had a set advantage. I wanted to make a statement.”
For anyone trying to belittle the win as “easy,” NBNHMR is a known decimator of Happy Chaos players and a top Strive competitor in his own right, which makes a win that dominant even more impressive.
So after winning a tournament with 2,474 entrants, a new record for Guilty Gear and topping Evo 2022’s biggest output despite being dwarfed by Street Fighter 6, Leffen is going to take a week off before deciding on his fighting game future.
Leffen has said on several occasions that he wasn’t going to be able to split his focus across Strive, Melee, and other games like SF6 so cutting at least one was an inevitability—and something that Tekken 7 Evo champ Arslan Ash also struggled with.
Related: Arslan Ash wins historic fourth Tekken 7 title at Evo 2023—but he isn’t finished yet
He said he wants to continue competing in Melee and Strive, along with trying SF6 but is looking at it realistically. For now, he plans to continue playing SF6 to see if he can qualify for Capcom Cup, especially since he can compete online and not have to travel for it thanks to how the Capcom Pro Tour format, while “trying to find the best solution” for his competitive future.
