Kenya’s first female professional gamer fights to define herself on her terms

NAIROBI, July 22 (Reuters) – As the primary Kenyan to be signed by high e-sports firms XiT Woundz and UYU, Sylvia Gathoni is used to vanquishing opponents with a mixture of frenzied kicks and punches within the male-dominated online game match circuit.

However the 24-year-old regulation graduate, now one of many first e-sports athletes to make the Forbes record of world trailblazers, is as dedicated to flooring adversaries with phrases in her quest to be outlined on her personal phrases.

“I insist on being recognised as an e-sport athlete, not a feminine e-sport athlete,” she mentioned at a gaming parlour in Kenya’s capital Nairobi.

“I convey my psychological strengths to the desk, not my bodily strengths, and that approach it should not be segregated (by) gender.”

QueenArrow, as Gathoni is thought within the gaming world, discovered early success preventing because the character Ling Xiaoyu, a pig-tailed Chinese language teen, within the hand-to-hand fight recreation Tekken, profitable her first main competitors in 2019.

She has continued to rise by way of the ranks, incomes cash, fame and affect.

For Mary Wanjiku, a supervisor on the Tric Gaming Cafe in Nairobi, Gathoni has helped kicked down the door for different younger ladies in an overwhelmingly male enviornment.

“QueenArrow is likely one of the most influential avid gamers,” Wanjiku mentioned.

Her success has helped assuage her dad and mom’ considerations in a rustic the place gaming retains social stigma.

“They have been reluctant for me to get into e-sports as a result of they did not totally perceive what e-sports was all about… however they’ve been extra accommodating, particularly with latest accolades and achievements,” she mentioned.

Freshly graduated, Gathoni mentioned her regulation diploma is greater than sideline. She desires to make use of it to vary laws to enhance the status of the gaming business.

“The legal guidelines and the insurance policies do not assist issues, as a result of it additionally (feeds) the notion that, , gaming is playing.”

Reporting by Jefferson Kahinju
Writing by Hereward Holland
Enhancing by Raissa Kasolowsky

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