Faker as Religious Experience

I've been playing League since 2012 (at the suitable age of eleven) and have watched Faker, probably the most famous video game professional of all time, for more than half my life. This is my little parody, obviously riffing off David Foster Wallace's 'Roger Federer as Religious Experience'.

I started playing & watching again more regularly since last year and been trying to unpack his figure: his celebrity & political power over the West & China, Riot Games' failed experiments.. there is my watching: Filipino fans claiming & projecting unto him (maybe because we also dream that our 'play' could be invested in), the flattening of athletic beauty onto a screen when the screen is the only version.

Faker has a commemorative stamp being developed after him by the Korean postal service. He has met with the Korean Prime Minister. He is one of the most notable celebrities in all of Korea, right next to BTS. People who have never touched a video game know his name. Entire fan bases external to gaming—K-pop stans, sports commentators, politicians—orbit him. He brought a seriousness to e-sports that I deeply admire: a gravity, a devotion to craft, a commitment to the game as something worth taking seriously at the scale of nations. What does it mean that a person playing a video game can hold this much weight? What is his influence on how the world understands play—and what play can be worth?

I will finish this after I see him in the flesh at LoL Park or at Barclays later this year..

WIPs

A version about myself & Faker:

December 19, 2025
Word by Todd Anderson, with Eva Decker and Mark Kleeb

A version more on Faker:

March 12, 2026
ALL CHAT, tiat, San Francisco
with Hatim Benhsain, mut/moochi, Jackie Liu, Everest Pipkin, shm garanganao almeda, Kaloyan Kolev, Liz Ryerson