Regarded by many as one of the greatest Valorant players of all time, Tyson “TenZ” Ngo’s retirement has left fans wondering if he’ll completely vanish from the scene. Here’s what’s next for the VCT Masters Madrid Champion.
When Valorant was released in 2020, TenZ was one of the first players ever to hit the highest rank of Radiant in North America. While his journey in Counter-Strike wasn’t anything to write home about, TenZ’s Valorant content was an instant hit.
Eventually, the pro player joined Cloud9 as its star duelist, earning stripes as one of the names to watch out for in Valorant. Fast forward to 2021, TenZ won VCT 2021 Stage 2 Masters Reykjavík under Sentinels’ banner. That started a streak of wins for Sentinels with TenZ at the helm. However, the team’s downward trajectory in 2023 forced the pro player to relinquish the duelist role and experiment more with support characters.
While Sentinels now finds itself in a stable spot after winning the VCT 2024 Americas Kickoff, TenZ has made a big decision to step away from pro play.
After his retirement from Valorant, TenZ will become a full-time content creator.
Although TenZ has hung up his mouse, fans will be relieved to know that he’s not leaving the gaming scene entirely. TenZ will stay under Sentinels’ banner as a content creator and streamer. His success as a creator is one of the main reasons that drove him to drop pro play. According to TenZ, being a top-tier pro player requires a tremendous amount of effort and dedication. With his YouTube content doing well, he opted to retire from esports to focus on streaming and content creation.
That being said, TenZ hasn’t sworn off competitive Valorant. He’s open to substituting for Sentinels when needed. He’s also going to stream watch parties for upcoming VCT events, which means his fans will still get to see him involved in the Valorant scene, just in a different way.
Currently, TenZ has 2.27 million subscribers on YouTube, whereas his highlight clips of aces frequently go viral on social media platforms. On Twitch, he enjoys a following of 4.1 million.
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