Gaules
Alexandre Borba Chiqueta, known as Gaules, is a Brazilian Counter-Strike streamer, YouTuber, philanthropist, and former professional player.
Overview
He started his professional career at g3nerationX in 2001 when the team went to the World Cyber Games final. In 2007, the team migrated to Made in Brazil, initially with Gaules as the leader, and later as team manager. That year they won DreamHack Winter 2007, an achievement that "helped shape the role of the coach in esports in Brazil".In 2008, during his degree in Marketing, he left his esports career to work at Samsung, being responsible for the IT sector and obtaining partnerships. Around 2010, he decided to leave the company and return to esports, creating several projects such as the Brazilian National Game Team and the Brazil Gaming League. However, Gaules began to pull away from the companies, and "found himself with nothing"; being diagnosed with depression, and attempting suicide in December 2017. Then, he began to "transform the situation"; asking old friends at g3x for help and starting to do live streams on Twitch to afford his rent and medication.
As of 2018, Gaules became recognized as a streamer. ESPN stated he was "the biggest Brazilian Twitch phenomenon" of the year. In 2020, he won the eSports Brazil Awards for best streamer and personality of the year. In the same year, he was the second most-watched streamer in the world on Twitch and recognized as a standout in esports by TechTudo and Globo Esporte. He also got attention for his philanthropic work, which included participation in projects against COVID-19 and for environmental protection.
Career
2000–2006: NaN Tatuapé and creation of g3nerationX
At the age of 17, in the early 2000s, Gaules used to frequent the gaming center Monkey Tatuapé. According to him, his dream was to join the Counter-Strike team there; he asked daily to be part of it, but his proposal was always rejected. Gaules wanted to join the team because: "I couldn't afford to pay , and the players' sponsorship was to play for free while there were no clients. Also, because I wanted to be on the best team in the LAN gaming center I frequented." He believed that he was fit to join the team, because, according to him, "I studied the game. I watched the best in the gaming center play because I didn't have money to pay for the time spent there. I was going to the championship because I wanted to be in that environment every day to get my shot."Tired of Gaules' insistence in asking to join the team, Monkey Tatuapé decided to put him as the leader of a junior team. Although this left Gaules discouraged, he realized that there were two ways to face the situation: "either as a bad thing or as an opportunity to join the main team. I set up the team with other very young players and we started training against them." In 2001, he had the opportunity to travel with the main team to Rio de Janeiro and compete in the first selection of the Cyberathlete Professional League in Brazil. One of the players on the team was playing badly, and Gaules, who was called to replace him, recalls: "I didn't even change equipment or anything, I just sat at the computer and we turned the match around. Then I never left the team again."
However, Gaules was only on the first team for a short period of time. The LAN center franchise decided to make a selection, picking the top players to form one lineup, and Gaules was left out. Thus, he decided to create his team, g3nerationX, on July 27, 2001, with Igor "VIP" Melro, Rodrigo "crash" Rodrigues, Mee, and Feijaum, who also frequented the gaming center. The team's first championship was at the inauguration of another Monkey's, the Monkey's Santa Cruz, where the local team would also play. G3x defeated the Santa Cruz team, and Gaules recalls: "Everyone kept asking where we had come from. All the spotlight was on the team and we got a lot of visibility ."
After the victory, Gaules, VIP, and crash remained in g3x, but Mee and Feijaum left, giving way to Rafael "BlooD" Frid, Raphael "cogu" Camargo, and Carlos Henrique "Kiko" Segal. With this line-up, g3x took its first international flight and won the Brazilian leg of the World Cyber Games. They managed a spot in the world final of the tournament, in Seoul, South Korea. With Guilherme "Carva" Carvalhaes substituting Kiko, g3x managed to place 7–8th in the championship. After that, g3x had a "hegemonic" period, according to ESPN. Gaules reports that the team went from the end of 2001 until 2003 "without losing a match". In this period, there was a breakup, and Kiko and cogu went to other teams. Between 2004 and 2006, g3x won championships such as the LatinCup, World Cyber Games Brazil, and CPL World Season 2006: Brazil. In 2006, the team's partnership with Intel ended, which made their situation difficult.
2007: migration to MIBR and DreamHack Winter
In 2007, with the approaching of the esports league Championship Gaming Series, Gaules talked to Paulo "pvell" Velloso about the possibility of a partnership with the MIBR team, which, until then, was a rival.At the time, the team was formed by Gaules, Thiago "btt" Monteiro, Norberto "Lance" Lage, Lincoln "fnx" Lau, and Wellington "ton" Caruso. According to Gaules, most members decided to go to MIBR because of the structure. He started playing and managing the team. Later, "pvell" sought out Gaules to remind him that Bruno "bit" Lima, the only remnant of the team that went to CGS, deserved a spot among MIBR's starters. However, there were only five spots for six players, so Gaules chose to give up his spot. He said: "I suggested that I become the coach, and "pvell" liked the idea very much My dream was to play, but I was the leader and I couldn't abandon anyone. It was with this that we created one of the strongest teams, if not the strongest, that we have ever had." In November 2007, Lance and Olavo "chucky" Napoleon switched places, and Gaules returned to play alongside his former g3x teammates.
The MIBR team went to DreamHack Winter 2007, and despite having a guaranteed spot in the tournament, Gaules opted to play the BYOC tryout:
Despite these complications, MIBR beat SoA, and went on to participate in the main competition. The team was undefeated and, according to Gaules, the achievement "helped shape the role of the coach in esports in Brazil I felt like I was part of the team, I just didn't have a mouse and keyboard in my hand. Everyone was talking about how we won with six players."
2008–2016: Samsung, return to esports and the Brazilian National Team
In mid-2008, Gaules was finishing his degree in Marketing and got an internship at Samsung. He made the decision to leave his career in esports to work in a formal job, "earning a lot less and working a lot more." Gaules took care of the IT department and obtained good partnerships for tournaments, teams and players, such as a Samsung sponsorship for MIBR. Expecting to be hired as a permanent employee before 2010, Gaules was warned: "You will only be hired after you graduate," but he states that "after about 6 or 7 months of training, I told them that either they would have to hire me or I would leave. It ended up that I was the first employee to be hired without a degree."According to Gaules, Samsung gave awards "every six months or a year to people who made a difference in the company" and Gaules was one of them. He was invited by the company to go to World Cyber Games 2010 to accompany the Brazilian delegation, which included Gabriel "FalleN" Toledo and others from Complexity Gaming. There, Gaules saw that Brazil "was still too far behind the other countries", so he decided to leave the company and return to esports.
Gaules then started a production company intending to create videos for teams and brands in the Brazilian market. He ran the project for Mandic and started the Brazilian Game Team in 2011. This managed to "professionalize the teams," and according to him:
Other Gaules projects also started to emerge, such as the Brazil Gaming League, X5 Agency, and X5 Mega Arena.
2017–2018: depression, suicide attempt and recovery
In 2017, Gaules began to move away from companies, as he no longer wanted to "be dependent on other people." He chose to do a project at an agency to advise teams, events, and players, but as he couldn't find himself within the agency, matters were made worse. Gaules was diagnosed with severe depression, and he "found himself with nothing": "That's when I broke down. I ended up making bad choices in terms of investment. I was broke I invested in things that didn't work out." This culminated in a suicide attempt in December 2017:Gaules rented an apartment with no collateral and, with his computer and webcam, turned to his friends in the old esports days for help. He said that only the players Mee, Apoka, vip and Crash helped him. Gaules "needed help to eat, live, and have a 2 or 3 months' peace of mind to back on his feet."
In 2018, with the support of the old g3x team, Gaules began streaming on Twitch, deciding to "stream like someone who is going to die the next day." Gaules "reinvented himself and was reborn alongside new and old fans," who are called "tribe" by him. He was already making videos for YouTube, but decided to do broadcasts as "it was the only thing I could see in my mind that I could do." He mentions that following this path was "natural."
Gaules started broadcasting to a few people, "with no partnership, no verified account, with nothing." He mentions that even with the help of his fans, it was not enough. Gaules asked for "help to go to the psychiatrist, to pay the rent, to buy medicine, to pay for the internet " and says he was always honest about what he was doing with the money he received. He doubled the amount of money the following month, but this was still not enough. Gaules questioned whether to "give up there" or to "see that on the bright side," and decided to continue.
With the slow growth of his channel, Gaules was criticized by some. He recounts that one person said that Gaules was "embarrassing himself" and "mending on the Internet," but Gaules said that "these people who were laughing at me would laugh with me."
By October 25, 2018, the date of publication of an interview with Gaules on ESPN, he was still treating depression, but also reported that he no longer had symptoms. He said the cure was "the tribe".