Photo: Robert Paul

Tekken is a cruel and unforgiving game. Not unlike boxing or MMA, the nature of the game is built around precise mechanical skill, tightly controlled movement and above all else, timing. High-level Tekken matches are performed at breakneck speeds and require mental fortitude and resiliency. In combat sports and e-sports alike, composure is essential. The momentum of a match ebbs and flows within seconds and can even shift completely from a single move. Players need to know when to be the aggressor, and when to patiently wait for an opponent to make an error.

Competitive Tekken has been on the e-sports scene for 25 years, and while a majority of its top players hail from Eastern countries like Japan and the e-sports empire, South Korea, a spectacular feat occurred last year on perhaps fighting games’ biggest stage that shook up the community and put some respect on the United States’ name in Tekken.

Enter: Terrelle Jackson, a.k.a. “Lil Majin”

Photo: Helloitsli

An easy-going, mild-mannered player from Tennessee. Aside from Tekken, Lil Majin also has a passion for professional wrestling, reflected in his main fighter of choice, King, a character whose model design and fighting style closely resembles that of a classic bright-lights WWE star. Lil Majin’s 2018 started off with a thrilling hometown championship win at the Kumite in Tennessee 18, followed by an impressive 4th place finish at CEO 2018 on the Tekken 7 World Tour, losing in an exciting match to the tournament’s eventual winner, South Korea’s “Jeondding”.

CEO 2018 would finish as most Tekken 7 tournaments do, with South Korean players overpopulating the top. The country currently has a stranglehold on e-sports as a whole, from first-person shooters, to MOBAs, to fighting games and everything in between. Every significant Tekken tournament open to global registration usually succumbs to the Korean swarm that eliminates players in a systematic manner, and no one “downloads” their opponents quite like EVO 2017 champion, Kim Hyunjin, a.k.a. “JDCR”.

JDCR on the Left. Photo: Robert Paul

The name “JDCR” itself loosely translates to a “master of all characters” in Korean, a fitting name for one of the game’s most talented and dedicated players. Judging by his soft-spoken, stoic demeanor and Harry Potter-esque appearance, one might assume JDCR is quite harmless, though any Tekken fan knows much better.

JDCR, like any professional Tekken player worth his or her salt, is technically sound, with almost every aspect of his game carefully polished and refined. It is his adaptive, AI-like play style, however, that allows him to deconstruct his opponent’s strategy down to each move with computer-like accuracy that haunts every challenger. His main character, Dragunov, was widely considered to be one of the top-tier characters in Tekken at the time, given his slick movement, strong pokes and simple move list. A safe and methodical choice for a player of JDCR’s merit and rudimentary style.

Photo: Robert Paul

Going up against JDCR in Tekken is like playing Magnus Carlsen in chess, or fighting the evil robot from The Incredibles; the more time you spend trying to beat him, the more time you allow him to gather data on your habits, your tendencies and your reactions until he reads you like a book and finishes you off with surgical precision. To most of his opponents, fighting JDCR is treated less like a duel and more like a race; you have to figure out a way to surprise him, before he figures you out completely.

At the time, JDCR was Tekken’s big, bad, robotic wolf.