Despite having a genuinely good year, zekken's aura still completely and utterly pales in comparison to other duelists like Demon1, aspas, KangKang, and even yay still if we're being brutally honest. I think there's a structured reasoning behind all of this, which is what I'll be breaking down in this completely serious thread:
- zekken is NOT the main character
This point is probably the strongest out of any other. zekken is seen by the vast majority as the "right hand man" of another player on his team, which is of course TenZ. Despite zekken being the individually better player compared to TenZ and has proven that too many times to count, TenZ is still THE star on Sentinels, you know it and the org knows it, so there's a perception to many that TenZ should also be the best player on the team, which is a massive blow to zekken here. This point goes back to even his XSET days where he had to completely live in the shadow of Cryo. zekken at no point in his Tier 1 career got be the MC of his own team.
- zekken's talent does NOT stand out
zekken at no point in his career has truly been a standout individual in his own role. His playstyle too structured which causes his gameplay to feel too much like that of a very serious team-player. He chooses to sacrifice individuality in his gameplay to be a cog, whereas like LEV aspas, OPTIC yay, even C9 OXY who hasn't even qualified for an international yet, have rejected such a mid mindset. He's never been the best at what he does, he's always that guy in the conversation who's always being put below 1st in a ranking. yay even after the shitfest slop that was 2023 and 2024, still has more aura than zekken because of his days on ENVY/OPTIC and the fact that he was actually at some point in Valorant, the best. Even after Madrid, zekken's best event which also happens to be written off as less serious to many because of the 8 teams format and the horrendous qualifications to it, still wasn't the best duelist in the world. His talent compared to the peaks we've seen from someone like Demon1, is simply mediocre.
- zekken doesn't even BELIEVE that he's the best
When SEN won Madrid and some people were suddenly calling him the best duelist in the world, even his own org on Twitter, he immediately shutdown the praise by saying he doesn't believe that he's the best and that he just wants to be the ideal duelist for his team, this is an awful move to maintain aura here people. zekken at no point in his career has ever truly been the best duelist in the world, and the one moment where his fans have been crowning him that title, he rejects it himself. It's a very humbling move to do of course, but sometimes too much humbleness makes you look weak, which is just bad for the aura.
- zekken is TOO short
He's just way too short, that's it. It's hard to take discussions about his aura seriously when IRL he's just too short. The body perception of players with aura is very important, and zekken's happens to be a detriment. Demon1 has a great face with a good figure and had that sick black jacket on during the Champions run which pretty much screams that he's the main character, aspas has a great face good figure and that sick tornado at the back of his jersey, yay straight up just looks menacing I mean I would personally speed up my pace if I had to walk by him at night, meanwhile zekken is just, short? He just looks too much like a kid still, I mean he still has that baby face going on even, like cmon that's just bad for the aura, like TenZ literally looks like he could be his father whenever they stand next to each other.
Ok this is getting too long and even though I still have some other stuff to say, I'm gonna call it off here.
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