Smasher:Hax: Difference between revisions
(→Post perma ban appeals, mental health revelations, and stalking accusations: Add paragagh about hax's mental health, sources and qoutes from several treats, and general context how the community views the current situation.) |
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On 28th October 2023, Hax$ released a ban appeal and apology video on his YouTube channel,<ref>[https://youtu.be/4TGnw3W2FcM Oct '23 Ban Appeal]</ref> apologising to Leffen, tournament organisers, and more. He also discussed the progress he made in the 2 years since his ban. Despite breaking his unban agreement to not make public ban appeals the video was mostly positively received as Hax seemed to take accountability and showed remorse. Hax would later private this video. | On 28th October 2023, Hax$ released a ban appeal and apology video on his YouTube channel,<ref>[https://youtu.be/4TGnw3W2FcM Oct '23 Ban Appeal]</ref> apologising to Leffen, tournament organisers, and more. He also discussed the progress he made in the 2 years since his ban. Despite breaking his unban agreement to not make public ban appeals the video was mostly positively received as Hax seemed to take accountability and showed remorse. Hax would later private this video. | ||
===Relapse, perma bans, and further | ===Relapse, perma bans, and further apologies=== | ||
Hax$ would release another ban appeal on 21st January 2024, restating many of the same claims that originally got Hax banned years ago<ref>[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SR9A70YKxf4&ab_channel=Hax%24Archive Jan 2024 Unban Plea]</ref> wherein he also leaked the testimonies from the original 2013 [[Evidence.zip]]. The ban appeal was later unlisted and archived on a separate channel. A week later, Hax$ would release a video titled "The Truth",<ref>[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jn_J19CgFzo&t=476s&ab_channel=AzizAl-Yami "The Truth"]</ref> in which Hax makes further claims similar to what he has made in the past and continued to link the leaked Evidence.zip testimonies. This resulted on Jan 23, 2024 Hax being re-banned from the NYC Melee Community, as a result of breaking multiple clauses in the unban contract, including preventing public ban appeals, and violation of COC rules 2.2.2 & 2.2.3.<ref>[https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bM5Rhc2ZRePWEzWAdAu_iUwZpQgjvPIUG7MfF_Rv99w/edit Hax's Ban from NYC Melee]</ref> | Hax$ would release another ban appeal on 21st January 2024, restating many of the same claims that originally got Hax banned years ago<ref>[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SR9A70YKxf4&ab_channel=Hax%24Archive Jan 2024 Unban Plea]</ref> wherein he also leaked the testimonies from the original 2013 [[Evidence.zip]]. The ban appeal was later unlisted and archived on a separate channel. A week later, Hax$ would release a video titled "The Truth",<ref>[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jn_J19CgFzo&t=476s&ab_channel=AzizAl-Yami "The Truth"]</ref> in which Hax makes further claims similar to what he has made in the past and continued to link the leaked Evidence.zip testimonies. This resulted on Jan 23, 2024 Hax being re-banned from the NYC Melee Community, as a result of breaking multiple clauses in the unban contract, including preventing public ban appeals, and violation of COC rules 2.2.2 & 2.2.3.<ref>[https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bM5Rhc2ZRePWEzWAdAu_iUwZpQgjvPIUG7MfF_Rv99w/edit Hax's Ban from NYC Melee]</ref> |
Revision as of 22:55, September 3, 2024
Hax "Hax$" | |
---|---|
Character info | |
Melee main | Fox |
Retired Melee character | Captain Falcon |
Smash 4 main | Captain Falcon |
Project M mains | Fox, Captain Falcon |
Team info | |
Former sponsor(s) | CLASH Tournaments, VGBootCamp, Even Matchup Gaming |
Former crews | S.W.A.T. |
Rankings and results info | |
Most recent ranking | MPGR 2019: 19th |
Best historical ranking | SSBMRank 2013: 6th |
Winnings | ~$14,018.18 |
Personal and other info | |
Real name | Aziz Al-Yami |
Birth date | |
Location | New York City, New York |
Hax$ (pronounced "Hax Money"), informally known as Hax, is a banned Melee player based in Manhattan. He used to solo main Captain Falcon with the pink costume (commonly known as Captain Fabulous); however, in early 2014, he switched to solo maining Fox, and was widely regarded as the most technical Fox player when he was still active. In April 2016, he went on a indefinite hiatus due to having a calcified FCU tendon, which was left untreated because no surgeon was willing to remove it. During this hiatus, he began working on the B0XX, a controller designed in a similar vein to the Smash Box by Hitbox, after having tested the Smash Box and finding it unsatisfactory. He has also slowly made a return to competitive Melee as of March 2017, having finally been treated for his hand problems. He would attend various Melee events showcasing the potential of the B0XX, and spent a long time balancing it to be as fair to a GameCube controller as possible. By 2019, he was considered to be playing at a level similar to when he played on a GameCube controller.
Hax was formerly ranked 2nd on the New York City Melee Power Rankings and 19th on the 2019 MPGR.
He joined Even Matchup Gaming on January 29th, 2019.[1] He left the team on January 7th, 2021.[2]
On June 2021 Hax was indefinitely banned due to repeated and refusal to stop committing defamation deemed to constitute harassment violating sections 2.2.1 and 2.3.3 of the CoC.[3]
As of February 1, 2024, Hax$ has been made permanently banned from tournaments due to repeated slanderous and conspiratorial accusations made towards Leffen, and other community members, with Hax's persistent reinforcement of these statements, multiple instances of inciting harassment, failing to take sufficient accountability for his actions, and refusing to abide by the terms of his return to local events.[4]
Tournament History
Origin of the name
Hax used to be into competitive Pokémon. In the context of competitive Pokémon, "hax" is lingo for the uncontrollable RNG involved in battles, such as critical hits, that can sometimes undeservedly turn the tide of a match. The high number of angry players who would call "hax" after severe losses due to this prompted Hax to name himself after this term. When switching to competitive Melee, Hax wanted a fourth character in the space given for tags in-game, and decided to add the dollar sign to it, eventually giving birth to "Hax$" or "Hax Money".
2008-2009: Starting Off
Hax began his Melee career as an up-and-coming Captain Falcon main who quickly rose up the ranks in his region. At his first major tournament, Pound 3, he placed 9th; he lost to Mew2King in the first round of winners' bracket, then ran through losers' bracket and defeated LoZR, Silent Wolf, and Colbol in losers', then was eliminated by Azen. A year later, at Revival of Melee, Hax once again showed fantastic prowess with his Captain Falcon; he lost to Eggm in winners', but went on another mini-run through losers' bracket, taking out thumbswayup, HBK, and RaynEX. He then lost to Jman 0-2, with both games going down to the last stock, finishing at 13th in singles overall.
Hax's next major was Apex 2009, which was also his biggest breakthrough in the Melee scene to that day. At that tournament, he defeated ChuDat in winners' bracket before losing to Jman, but went on another run through losers', this time taking out big names such as Anther, Scar, and Kage before losing to ChuDat in a rematch, placing 4th overall. At GENESIS, he teamed with Hungrybox, where they were defeated by Armada and Aniolas in the winners' bracket. They rose through the losers' bracket, but only reached 13th place. He reached 7th place in Melee singles, besting many of the most talented players from North America and Europe.
2010-2011
Hax then reached 13th place at Pound 4, the second highest placed Captain Falcon at the tournament (behind SilentSpectre, who was considered the strongest Captain Falcon at the time). In doubles, he teamed with Darc and was rather successful, placing 4th. At Apex 2010, Hax once again lost in the first round of winners', this time to I.B from Canada. He then eliminated WarriorKnight, th0rn, Silent Wolf, and finally, ChuDat in a rematch from Apex 2009, before being stopped by Zhu's Falco, placing 9th overall in singles.
After a comparatively low placement of 13th at Revival of Melee 3 and a handful of tournaments where he failed to break the top 8, Hax once again placed within the top 8 at Pound V. There, he continued his trend of losing very early in winners' bracket, this time to Zhu. He then tore through losers' bracket, defeating tect, MacD, Kels, Amsah, and VaNz, before meeting and being defeated by Axe in losers' quarters, finishing 5th overall. He also placed 3rd in teams, teaming with Hungrybox. Hax then placed 9th at GENESIS 2, where he sent HomeMadeWaffles to losers' and eliminated Fuzzyness and Fly Amanita, but was defeated by Taj in winners' and PPMD (then known as Dr. PeePee) in losers'.
2012: Best Falcon in the world
Hax placed in top 8 at Apex 2012. Although he lost to Zhu 1-2 early in winners' bracket, he eliminated SFAT 2-1 and MacD 2-1 in losers' bracket before losing to JAVI 0-2 in losers' top 8. He continued to perform extremely well in tournaments later that year, with a 5th place finish at Zenith 2012 and Revival of Melee 5 and a 6th place finish at MELEE-FC10R Legacy. At the latter tournament, he made it into the final round-robin bracket, where he defeated Kels 3-1 and Darkrain 3-2, with the latter match solidifying his position as the best solo main Captain Falcon in the world. However, he lost to everyone else in the bracket, placing 6th overall.
2013: Turn to the Dark Side (20XX)
Hax placed in top 8 at Apex 2013, defeating JAVI 2-1 in a rematch in winners' bracket, as well as Kage 2-0, before losing to Dr. PeePee 0-2. In losers' bracket, he eliminated Axe 2-0, but then lost to Mango 0-2 for top 8. At EVO 2013, Hax defeated S2J 2-1 in the winners' quarters pool to make it into the semifinals pool. He lost to Dr. PeePee 1-2 in winners' bracket, and then to Ice 0-2 in losers' bracket, placing 9th overall.
At this point in his Melee career, Hax popularized the "20XX" joke, depicting a post-apocalyptic world where everyone played Fox to TAS levels of perfection. He also began claiming that Captain Falcon, as a character, was not strong enough to make him become the top Melee player in the community. Although many doubted that he would switch to Fox at first, Hax dropped Captain Falcon entirely after The Big House 3, much to the disappointment of many Captain Falcon fans. It seemed for a while that Hax would take his Fox to the top level at his next major after winning No Johns Monthly, defeating VaNz and The Moon in a dominating fashion.
2014: Rise of Fox in a summer of Smash
Hax underperformed in Melee singles at Apex 2014, placing 17th. He lost to s0ft in winners' finals of the first round of pools, and made it to losers' quarters in the second round of pools before losing to Ice 1-2. However, he managed to win Melee doubles with Mew2King. They lost to Mango and Lucky 2-3 in winners' semis, but once in losers' bracket, they managed to defeat Shroomed and S2J 2-0, Armada and Ice 3-2, and Hungrybox and Plup 3-1 to make it to grand finals against Mango and Lucky. They won the first and second sets 3-2 and 3-1, respectively.
Hax upset Mango 3-1 in winners' finals at WHOBO MLG, including two Fox ditto victories, but then lost two consecutive 0-3 sets in grand finals to his Falco. At SKTAR 3, Hax defeated players such as ZoSo and Nintendude in winners' bracket before losing to Armada 0-2. In losers' bracket, he eliminated ChuDat 2-0 and Zhu 2-0 before being eliminated by Mew2King 0-2 in losers' quarters, placing 5th overall. Due to Hax's strong placements at WHOBO MLG and SKTAR 3, he qualified for the MLG Anaheim 2014 championship bracket.
In his pool at MLG Anaheim 2014, Hax defeated Leffen 3-2, Colbol 3-1, s0ft 3-0, and Remen 3-0, but lost to PPMD 1-3, Mew2King 1-3, and Axe 1-3. He was seeded in losers' bracket in the championship bracket, where he eliminated S2J 3-2 and PewPewU 3-2 before being eliminated by Leffen 2-3, finishing off at 7th place.
At EVO 2014, the largest Melee tournament at the time, he placed 13th out of a massive number of 970 entrants. In the winners' quarters pool, he unexpectedly lost early to Zanguzen. However, he managed to sweep the losers' quarters pool, eliminating Lovage, Reason, DEHF, Hyprid, and Nintendude, before losing to Plup 0-2 in top 16, ending his run.
At Zenith 2014, Hax placed 2nd in Melee singles, defeating Fly Amanita 2-0 and Wizzrobe 3-1 in winners' bracket, making it to winners' finals against Mew2King. He won the first two games, including a win against Mew2King's Marth on Final Destination, though ended up losing the set 2-3. In losers' finals, he defeated Zhu 3-2. Hax then won the first set of grand finals against Mew2King 3-1, with another win on Final Destination, although he still lost the second set 0-3. Hax also won Melee doubles with Mew2King, defeating Axe and ZeRo in both winners' finals and grand finals.
2014: Post-summer of Smash and hiatus
Hax attended The Big House 4, the 4th largest Melee tournament of all time. In pools, he had a close set with Vro, where Hax won the set 2-1. In top 16, Hax faced off against Mango's Captain Falcon and Marth, losing 1-3, sending him to losers bracket. He then had a close set with Kalamazhu in losers, taking it 3-2 and advancing into top 8. After defeating Kels 3-0, he faced Armada in losers top 8, taking the first game convincingly, but ultimately ended up losing 1-3, placing 5th. In doubles, he teamed with fellow Fox main Leffen. They beat HugS and Lucky 2-0 and DJ Nintendo and The Moon 2-0 as well, before losing to Hungrybox and Plup 2-3. In losers, they defeated SFAT and Axe, and VaNz and MacD, both 3-1. In losers finals, they had a rematch with Hungrybox and Plup, but lost once again, this time 1-3, netting them 3rd.
Hax then attended the New York regional tournament Justice 4. In winners finals, he faced Armada, where he lost 1-3. After beating Zhu 3-0 in losers finals, he faced Armada once again in grand finals, which Armada won 3-2 in a much closer set. He also teamed with Armada in doubles, getting 1st without dropping a set.
On January 1, 2015, Hax announced that he would be taking an indefinite hiatus from Smash as a result of a hand injury and insomnia, forcing him out of Apex 2015.
2015: Return and second hiatus
Hax made his full return to Smash after recovering from his hand surgery at Super Nebulous 3 in late April 2015. He lost to Nintendude in winners semis 2-3, getting sent to losers. After beating Wizzrobe 3-1, he lost to Lucky in losers semis 2-3, placing 4th.
In July 2015, Hax announced another hiatus. In a blog post, he discussed his insomnia, which worsened whenever he was at a tournament. Hax surmised that his insomnia may be linked to his his perfectionist "20XX" mentality. Hax said he would still practice and attend some major tournaments, such as Apex and EVO, but would not attend as many tournaments until his insomnia was under control. Tafokints made a video detailing Hax's condition, saying that he, as of writing, was in a cast for his prior injury, but had been making progress, and would return in the near future.
2016: Second return and third hiatus
Hax has made a return at NYC Nebulous Prime Locals. He has defeated DJ Nintendo at these events, placing first in the ones he has attended. However, he has said in interview that he is not ready to return in full force just yet. His first huge tournament of 2016 was Shots Fired 2, where he placed 3rd, and used the money he got from the tournament to pay for his last surgery. His next big tournament was Pound 2016, where he went on a rampage through pools, making it to Winner's Ro32. There, he defeated smashers such as SFAT 2-1, Nintendude 3-0, and eventually defeated Mango in Winner's semis 3-2, in a nailbiter set where Mango missed a crucial edgeguard, giving Hax his ticket to Winner's finals against Hungrybox, where he was defeated 3-0. Sent to Loser's finals, Hax was pitted in a rematch against Mango, where again, he was defeated 3-0, ending Hax's run at 3rd place.
After initially making himself eligible for being voted to participate in Smash Summit 2, Hax drop out due to another hand injury. Its recurrence prompted another indefinite hiatus from Smash until he could fully recover.
2017-2018: Third return and the B0XX
Hax posted an update video on January 19th, 2017. In the video, he further detailed the complications with his hands and revealed that he had finally met a doctor that would treat most of his hand problems that arose, the incurable thumb joint arthritis that eventually developed on his left hand now prevented him from using a GameCube controller. Hax also discussed his experiences with the Smash Box arcade controller during his hiatus. While Hax had a relatively painless experience using the Smash Box even before the final hand surgery, he proposed several changes, most of which were shot down due to logistical issues with submitting them. Cactuar then approached Hax and told him about two Rutgers University engineering students, Arhum Siddiqi (also known as WatchingTime) and James Taylor, who were working on a Smash Box-based product called the "Icebox" that would work better for Ice Climbers players' desynching techniques. A controller design commissioned and approved by Frycook, Hax decided to contact them and contribute to improving the Icebox for use with Fox, slowly implementing the changes he initially submitted to the Smash Box team, and giving the product a new name: the "B0XX". Hax stated that the B0XX would be customizable, and additionally slated a return to competitive Melee for February 2017, though he would not attend a tournament until a month later at Smash Summit Spring 2017 as a commentator.
After a few months of attending locals on the B0XX, Hax won his first tournament with it, Nebulous Melee 85, in May 2017. Since he began using the B0XX, he has taken sets from ranked players such as Westballz, KJH, Crush, Fiction, Kage, Captain Smuckers, DJ Nintendo, and Qerb. He has also since made update videos defending his thinking on the legality of the B0XX and is still working on getting it legalized in the MIOM recommended tournament ruleset.
2019-2020: Partial resurgence
Hax had a rough start to 2019, placing 17th at GENESIS 6 and only winning some smaller tournaments. The Summer MPGR placed Hax at 25th in the world. Hax's results began to pick up in the summer when he got 9th at Shine 2019, he then went on to place 3rd at Mango's Birthday Bash beating Hungrybox in the process. This led to Hax's being ranked at 19th, 19 places better than in 2018. At the start of 2020, Hax attended GENESIS 7 where he was knocked into losers early by Leffen. He beat SFAT, Westballz, PewPewU and Shroomed for the opportunity to play Leffen again, in which Hax won 3-1. Hax placed 4th at GENESIS 7 after being reverse 3-0'd by Hungrybox. This placement also qualified him for one of the few invite spots to Smash Summit 9, where he placed 7th.
Playing style
Hax was arguably the strongest Captain Falcon player in the world, utilizing much of the same deadly combos as Falcon mains before him, but with a superior playstyle. Unlike other Captain Falcon players, who relied on what Hax saw as mindless aggression, Hax played very conservatively by utilizing camping and clever baits to get openings. This made him the strongest Captain Falcon against more defensive characters (such as Marth and Sheik), and eventually, in the world. He was also the most technical Captain Falcon player, as he had amazing reactions and spacing, and utilized difficult techniques such as the "Hax-dash", an invincible ledge-invincibility refresh that doubles as a visual mixup. As Fox, Hax continues pursuing a perfectionist mindset with fast reactions and extreme technical skill, but has become a lot swingier, notably using a lot of fadeback neutral airs and jittery close-range movement. Hax is known for going for nearly frame-perfect combos and theoretically unbreakable shine pressure, along with reaction tech-chases and a strong ledge-game, often retreating to the ledge to be able to invincibly ledgedash and regain a strong neutral position.
However, this perfectionism has also led to losses in certain matchups. For example, Hax will rush down and approach even defensive characters such as Jigglypuff and attack with drills and shines (the most "optimal" way to pressure), instead of playing more defensively with Blaster when the situation calls for it. This can lead to him overextending, which leaves him susceptible to Jigglypuff's lethal punishes. Additionally, Hax is susceptible to psychological pressure, as shown when Mango defeated him 3-1 with his secondaries at The Big House 4 using mostly hard reads. In addition, Hax's playstyle often is very strong at short-ranges where his execution is extremely consistant, but he is often hesitant to commit to longer range approaches, leading to difficulties vs some more conservative and campy players; an example of this would be Hax's set vs Mike Haze at Smash Summit 5, where Mike shifted to a more dash-dance campy style and reverse 3-0d Hax.
Tournament placings
Super Smash Bros. Melee
Tournament | Date | 1v1 placement | 2v2 placement | Partner | Earnings |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
MLG New York Playoffs 2006 | October 13th-14th, 2006 | 49th | — | — | |
Killa Fleet Biweekly 6/8 | June 8th, 2007 | 5th | 4th | Jman | |
Zenith 2007 | September 29th, 2007 | 2nd | — | — | |
Pound 3 | February 2nd-3rd, 2008 | 9th | 5th | Jman | |
Smashpocalypse V | March 22nd, 2008 | 9th | — | — | |
Smashpocalypse VI | December 13th, 2008 | 17th | 9th | Scar | |
Revival of Melee | March 7th-8th, 2009 | 13th | 13th | Pakman | |
Apex 2009 | May 9th-10th, 2009 | 4th | — | — | |
GENESIS | July 10th-12th, 2009 | 8th | 13th | Hungrybox | |
S.N.E.S. | August 21st-23rd, 2009 | 2nd | 3rd | Scar | |
The Tunes Monthlies # 4 | November 14th, 2009 | 7th | 2nd | Alukard | |
Revival of Melee 2 | November 21st-22nd, 2009 | 7th | 5th | Linguini | |
The Tunes Monthlies # 5 | December 27th, 2009 | 4th | 3rd | Lovage | |
Pound 4 | January 16th-18th, 2010 | 13th | 4th | Darc | |
Good Shit German | July 24th-25th, 2010 | 13th | 5th | Scar | |
The Tunes Monthlies #8 | July 30th, 2010 | 4th | 1st | Jman | |
Apex 2010 | August 6th-8th, 2010 | 9th | 4th | Hungrybox | |
Revival of Melee 3 | November 20th-21st, 2010 | 13th | 2nd | Hungrybox | |
Pound V | February 19th-21st, 2011 | 5th | 3rd | Hungrybox | |
Zenith 2011 | May 28th-29th, 2011 | 9th | 3rd | Mew2King | |
GENESIS 2 | July 15th-17th, 2011 | 9th | 2nd | Hungrybox | |
Revival of Melee 4 | November 19th-20th, 2011 | 5th | 3rd | Jman | |
Apex 2012 | January 6th-8th, 2012 | 7th | 5th | Jman | |
Zenith 2012 | May 26th-27th, 2012 | 5th | 3rd | Hungrybox | |
MELEE-FC10R Legacy | August 12th-14th, 2012 | 6th | 5th | The Moon | |
Revival of Melee 5 | November 17th-18th, 2012 | 5th | 2nd | Scar | |
Apex 2013 | January 11th-13th, 2013 | 7th | 9th | Westballz | |
Smashacre Rising | April 6th, 2013 | 2nd | 1st | Mew2King | |
Zenith 2013 | June 1st-2nd, 2013 | 6th | 1st | Mew2King | |
EVO 2013 | July 12th-14th, 2013 | 9th | 5th | Jman | |
The Big House 3 | October 12th-13th, 2013 | 5th | 3rd | Dr. PeePee | |
Sudden Death 14 | October 19th, 2013 | 1st | — | — | |
No Johns 1/4 | January 4th, 2014 | 1st | 1st | Alukard | |
Collision 8 | January 11th, 2014 | 1st | — | — | |
Apex 2014 | January 17th-19th, 2014 | 17th | 1st | Mew2King | |
Smash Mode Sundays # 2 | February 16th, 2014 | 2nd | 1st | Mew2King | |
Smash Mode Sundays # 3 | February 23rd, 2014 | 1st | — | — | |
Stony Brook Biweeklies #9 | March 1st, 2014 | 1st | 2nd | G$ | |
Smash Mode Sundays # 4 | March 2nd, 2014 | 1st | — | — | |
Revival of Melee 7 | March 8th-9th, 2014 | 5th | 1st | Mew2King | |
The Next Episode | March 22nd-23rd, 2014 | 7th | 2nd | SFAT | |
Smash Mode Sundays 3/30 | March 30th, 2014 | 1st | — | — | |
Civil War VI | April 12th-13th, 2014 | 3rd | — | — | |
Bar Wars: The Region Strikes Back | April 26th, 2014 | 9th | 2nd | ChuDat | |
WHOBO MLG | May 3rd-4th, 2014 | 2nd | 1st | Mango | |
Justice 3 | May 24th, 2014 | 1st | — | — | |
SKTAR 3 | May 31st-June 1st, 2014 | 5th | 5th | Westballz | |
Nebulous Saturday Melee 2 | June 14th, 2014 | 1st | 3rd | Slox | |
MLG Anaheim 2014 | June 20th-22nd, 2014 | 7th | 5th | Leffen | |
CEO 2014 | June 27th-29th, 2014 | — | 5th | Colbol | |
EVO 2014 | July 11th-13th, 2014 | 13th | 2nd | Mew2King | |
Zenith 2014 | August 2nd-3rd, 2014 | 2nd | 1st | Mew2King | |
Nebulous 9 | August 9th, 2014 | 1st | — | — | |
Nebulous 10 | August 16th, 2014 | 1st | — | — | |
Mass Madness CE | August 23rd, 2014 | 1st | 1st | ZeRo | |
GUTS 3 | September 19th-21st, 2014 | 1st | 1st | Mafia | |
The Big House 4 | October 4th-5th, 2014 | 5th | 3rd | Leffen | |
Justice 4 | October 11th, 2014 | 2nd | 1st | Armada | |
SmashLeague: New York | October 25th, 2014 | 1st | — | — | |
Do You Fox Wit It? | November 15th-16th, 2014 | 1st | 1st | Mew2King | |
KTAR XI | November 22nd, 2014 | 2nd (Split) | 1st | Mew2King | |
Super Nebulous | November 29th, 2014 | 1st | 2nd | DoH | |
Super Nebulous 2 | January 24th, 2015 | 2nd | — | — | |
Apex 2015 | January 30th-February 1st, 2015 | 33rd (DQ) | — | — | |
Super Nebulous 3 | April 25th-26th, 2015 | 4th | 2nd | Wizzrobe | |
Press Start | May 9th-10th, 2015 | 13th | — | — | |
Assault 3 – No Game No Waifu – Evolution | May 16th-17th, 2015 | 1st | 1st | Victra | |
Get On My Level 2015 | May 30th-31st, 2015 | 2nd | 1st | Hungrybox | |
EVO 2015 | July 17th-19th, 2015 | 17th | — | — | |
KTAR XVII | February 13th, 2016 | 1st | 1st | G$ | |
Shots Fired 2 | March 5th-6th, 2016 | 3rd | — | — | |
Do or DI | March 11th-13th, 2016 | 3rd | — | — | |
Super Nebulous 4 | March 26th, 2016 | 3rd | — | — | |
Pound 2016 | April 2nd-3rd, 2016 | 3rd | — | — | |
Collision XIII | April 16th, 2016 | 1st | — | — | |
Apollo III | March 11th, 2017 | 9th | — | — | |
Apollo IV | April 8th, 2017 | 17th | 5th | Just Jason | |
Nebulous Melee 82 | April 15th, 2017 | 2nd | — | — | |
Flatiron 2 | April 22nd, 2017 | 13th | 33rd (DQ) | Chillin | |
Nebulous Melee 85 | May 20th, 2017 | 1st | — | — | |
OMEGA | June 24th-25th, 2017 | 4th | 5th | JFlex | |
EVO 2017 | July 14th-16th, 2017 | 33rd | — | — | |
Get On My Level 2017 | July 28th-30th, 2017 | 17th | 9th | Crush | |
Apollo X | October 14th, 2017 | 33rd (DQ) | 1st | Hungrybox | |
Nebulous Melee 100! | October 21st, 2017 | 2nd | 1st | dizzkidboogie | |
Smash Summit 5 | November 2nd-6th, 2017 | 13th | 7th | Crush | |
Tipped Off 12 | November 11th-12th, 2017 | 7th | — | — | |
RISE Melee Regional | November 25th, 2017 | 2nd | Top 4 | Slox | |
Pat's House 3 | December 2nd-3rd, 2017 | 9th | — | — | |
Smash Valley: Lucky 7 | February 17th, 2018 | 5th | — | — | |
Nebulous Melee 115 | February 24th, 2018 | 9th | 1st | mayb | |
Nebulous Melee 116 | March 3rd, 2018 | 1st | 1st | mayb | |
Nebs After Dark 107 | March 6th, 2018 | 1st | — | — | |
Short Hops | July 21st, 2018 | 7th | 4th | Rhyme | |
Apollo XIV | July 29th, 2018 | 5th | — | — | |
The Big House 8 | October 5th-7th, 2018 | 33rd | — | — | |
The Script - Episode 1 | October 13th-14th, 2018 | 5th | 2nd | La Luna | |
Super AON 2018 | October 20th, 2018 | 2nd | 2nd | mayb | |
Canada Cup 2018 | October 26th-28th, 2018 | 5th | — | — | |
The Mang0: Homecoming | November 10th-11th, 2018 | 17th | 9th | Bladewise | |
DreamHack Atlanta 2018 | November 16th-18th, 2018 | 9th | 1st | 2Saint | |
Fireside Open 2018 | December 1st, 2018 | 9th | 4th | TheSWOOPER | |
The Parking Lot - Friday | December 14th, 2018 | 17th | — | — | |
Don't Park on the Grass 2018 | December 15th-16th, 2018 | 5th | — | — | |
NYXL Pop-Up! | December 22nd, 2018 | 3rd | — | — | |
Scorpius 2019 | January 12th, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
GIGA HOG: Era | January 26th, 2019 | 2nd | 4th | lint | |
GENESIS 6 | February 1st-3rd, 2019 | 17th | — | — | |
The Script 2 | February 16th-17th, 2019 | 17th (DQ) | 1st | AbsentPage | |
GIGA HOG 5 | February 23rd, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
House of Paign 20 | March 2nd, 2019 | 4th | 1st | AbsentPage | |
The Gang Steals The Script | March 9th, 2019 | 9th | — | — | |
NChi Ultra | March 16th-17th, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
CT GamerCon 3 | March 23rd-24th, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
Battle of BC 3 | March 30th-31st, 2019 | 4th | 4th | moky | |
The Scarlet Classic V | April 14th, 2019 | 3rd | — | — | |
Giga HOG: Reloaded | April 16th-17th, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
Get On My Level 2019 | May 17th-19th, 2019 | 13th | — | — | |
Major Flavor | May 25th, 2019 | 1st | 1st | Jflex | |
Concrete Throwdown #2 | May 26th, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
Omega III | June 8th-9th, 2019 | 2nd | 7th | Jflex | |
Cold Hard Smash 6 | June 15th, 2019 | 2nd | — | — | |
GIGA HOG: Reunion | June 22nd, 2019 | 5th | — | — | |
Spectrum #100 | July 8th, 2019 | 5th | — | — | |
Paradigm Shift 2019 | July 20th-21st, 2019 | 1st | 1st | Michael | |
GIGA HoG 8 | July 27th, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
Concrete Throwdown - Smash Edition 2 | July 28th, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
Spectrum #104 | August 5th, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
Super Smash Con 2019 | August 8th-11th, 2019 | 65th | — | — | |
Spectrum Smash #106 | August 19th, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
Shine 2019 | August 23rd-25th, 2019 | 9th | 5th | moky | |
Spectrum #108 | September 2nd, 2019 | 2nd | — | — | |
DreamHack Montreal 2019 | September 6th-8th, 2019 | — | 1st | moky | |
Mass Madness 29 | September 14th, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
The MMOM Memorial | November 9th-10th, 2019 | 3rd | — | — | |
Smash Hall: Melee at the Biergarten | November 16th, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
Mango's Birthday Bash | December 7th-8th, 2019 | 3rd | 5th | Swedish Delight | |
Garden State Smashdown | December 21st, 2019 | 1st | — | — | |
Scorpius 2020 | January 4th, 2020 | 4th | — | — | |
GIGA HoG: Era 2 | January 18th, 2020 | 1st | — | — | |
Hax's Nightclub S1E4 | January 22nd, 2020 | 1st | — | — | |
GENESIS 7 | January 24th-26th, 2020 | 4th | — | — | |
Smash Summit 9 | February 13th-16th, 2020 | 7th | — | — | |
Gucci Gang: Leap Year Edition | February 29th, 2020 | 1st | — | — | |
5 Days of Melee | December 15th-16th, 2020 | 1st | — | — | |
Ludwig Ahgren Championship Series 3 | December 19th-20th, 2020 | 17th | — | — | |
Galint Melee Open | January 9th-10th, 2021 | 3rd | — | — | |
Frame Perfect Series 4: ONLINE | January 16th, 2021 | 2nd | — | — | |
Four Loko Fight Night | March 6th-7th, 2021 | 65th | — | — | |
Galint Melee Open: Spring Edition | March 19th-21st, 2021 | 5th | — | — | |
MORBIUS POP TOURNAMENT | May 29th, 2022 | 1st | — | — | |
Serious Sunday #8 | May 30th, 2022 | 1st | — | — | |
Serious Sunday #9 | June 6th, 2022 | 1st | — | — | |
Melee Heaven #14 | September 5th, 2022 | 1st | — | — | |
The Nightclub S6E1 | January 4th, 2023 | 2nd | — | — | |
The Nightclub S6E2 | January 11th, 2023 | 1st | — | — | |
The Nightclub S6E3 | January 18th, 2023 | 2nd | — | — | |
The Nightclub S6E4 | January 25th, 2023 | 2nd | — | — | |
The Nightclub S6E5 | February 1st, 2023 | 1st | — | — | |
The Nightclub S6E7 | February 15th, 2023 | 2nd | — | — | |
LVL UP EXPO 2023 | February 17th-19th, 2023 | 4th | — | — | |
The Coinbox #50 | February 22nd, 2023 | 3rd | — | — | $517.50 |
The Nightclub S6E9 | March 1st, 2023 | 1st | — | — | |
The Coinbox #52 | March 7th, 2023 | 7th | — | — | $75 |
The Nightclub S6E10 | March 8th, 2023 | 3rd | — | — | |
The Nightclub S6E11 | March 15th, 2023 | 2nd | — | — | |
The Nightclub S6E12 | March 22nd, 2023 | 1st | — | — | |
Stage Select Final Destination | March 28th, 2023 | 1st | — | — | |
The Nightclub S6E13 | March 29th, 2023 | 4th | — | — | |
The Nightclub S7E1 | April 5th, 2023 | 1st | — | — | |
Short Hops! | April 8th, 2023 | 1st | — | — | |
The Coinbox #58 | April 18th, 2023 | 3rd | — | — | $450 |
The Come Up 2023 | April 22nd, 2023 | 4th | — | — | |
The Coinbox #61 | May 16th, 2023 | 3rd | — | — | $900 |
The Coinbox #63 | May 31th, 2023 | 7th | — | — | $75 |
Tipped Off 14: Resurgence | June 3rd-4th, 2023 | 17th / 344 | — | — | |
The Nightclub VIP 2 | June 24th, 2023 | 2nd / 161 | — | — | |
The Coinbox #66 | June 27th, 2023 | 2nd / 344 | — | — | $1,000 |
The Coinbox #68 | July 11th, 2023 | 1st / 296 | — | — | $1,200 |
Smash Factor X | July 28th-30th, 2023 | 2nd / 137 | — | — | |
The Off-Season 2 Open Bracket | September 23rd-24th, 2023 | Top 8 / 255 | — | — | |
The Off-Season 2 | September 23rd-24th, 2023 | 9th / 263 | 17th / 59 | Gahtzu | |
The Function 3 | November 11th, 2023 | 4th / 259 | — | — | |
DreamHack Atlanta 2023 | December 15th-17th, 2023 | 1st / 130 | — | — | |
S Factor 11 | July 13th-14th, 2024 | 2nd / 172 | — | — |
Project M
Tournament | Date | 1v1 placement | 2v2 placement | Partner |
---|---|---|---|---|
Sudden Death 14 | October 19th, 2013 | 1st | — | — |
Civil War VI | April 12th-13th, 2014 | 9th | — | — |
Bar Wars: The Region Strikes Back | April 26th, 2014 | 5th | — | — |
Zenith 2014 | August 2nd-3rd, 2014 | — | 7th | Wizzrobe |
KTAR XI | November 22nd, 2014 | 7th | — | — |
Super Smash Bros. for Wii U
Tournament | Date | 1v1 placement | 2v2 placement | Partner |
---|---|---|---|---|
KTAR XI | November 22nd, 2014 | 25th | — | — |
Super Smash Bros. Brawl
Tournament | Date | 1v1 placement | 2v2 placement | Partner |
---|---|---|---|---|
G.I.M.P.E.D. 1 | February 22nd, 2009 | 25th | 9th | Basic Sausage |
Controversies
Evidence.zip 2
On June 4th, 2021, Hax posted a two-and-a-half-hour YouTube video and accompanying 136-page PDF file titled "Evidence.zip 2",[5] [6] in a tweet that it would "decide the fate of the entire Smash community."[7][8] The video, named as a sequel to the archive file that was used to advocate a ban for Leffen back in 2013, alleges that Leffen has mentally abused several people in his quest to become the best player, having been leery about him ever since his first interactions with him on SmashBoards in 2011. He urged the community to reconsider whom they were following and alleged several claims, or "charges", against Leffen:
- Leffen has for several years attempted to systematically take control of the community by constantly pointing out others' flaws and downplaying his own to perpetually attempt to garner sympathy.
- Leffen has never been explicit about the truth of the archive or his initial forgiveness plea, citing incendiary comments he made after the archive was first posted and right before his initial plea, and that the initial plea was a dishonest apology.
- Leffen would deliberately attempt to organize events that coincided with other people's events and urged his followers to ignore them or castigated other events for poor time management.
- Leffen propagated misinformation about the game's mechanics and the B0XX, and banned anyone that disagreed with him.
- Leffen had gone through obsessive lengths to discredit the B0XX and its legitimacy as a competitive controller, posting a stream of what Hax$ calls "anti-B0XX propaganda" to his YouTube and twitter accounts.
- Leffen galvanized a "smear campaign" against Hungrybox amidst their longstanding feud, ultimately culminating in someone throwing a crab at Hungrybox at Pound 2019.
- Leffen immediately attempted to garner support from the newly formed Super Smash Bros. Ultimate community by painting Salem in a bad light, showing a hefty critique of his controversial "years of research" video.
- Leffen completely distorted an account of an altercation he had with another Smasher into a story of abuse and prejudice to further paint himself in a sympathetic light.
- Leffen used the fallout following the wave of harassment allegations back in July of 2020 to usurp the follower base of players that had been accused to present himself as a leader and safety net for people that had been mistreated by top players.
The video drew massive derision and backlash from the community, believing the accusations to be without merit or proof, with many in particular condemning Hax's choice to analogize Leffen to political figures such as Adolf Hitler and accuse him of trying to establish a "totalitarian regime". Nevertheless, there is also a small fringe group who claim that Hax's video has merit, if not tainted in overly dramatic language and comparisons, and they claim the community has a history of being overly forgiving of its best players as a reason to not entirely dismiss Hax's accusations. Leffen himself posted that he was unsure of his next course of action and would be speaking to a lawyer.[9] Hax would eventually private the video, which has since been reuploaded by multiple smaller channels.
Notably, PracticalTAS made a summary, analysis, and commentary of Hax's 136-page PDF file into a 12-page document, plus an 4-page addendum.[10]
In response to the video, on June 9th, Beyond the Smash banned Hax from attending Smash Summit 11 in any capacity,[11] citing safety concerns and believing the video promoted harassment and threats.
On June 11th, 2021, Hax published a revised version of the video,[12] which in contrast was an hour shorter and consisted solely of Hax talking in front of the camera. Hax would speak on the subject through Twitter, posting an apology for the presentation of "Evidence.zip 2"[13] and continuing to post comments about the "situation" of the Smash scene. The revised video would also be privated later on.
iBDW conflict
On June 21st, 2021, iBDW accused Hax for downplaying and making fun of iBDW's story of being sexually assaulted by his own mother.[14][15] iBDW also tweeted that he attempted to retrieve evidence to support his claims from Facebook messages, but that Hax had deleted the relevant messages.[16] Hax responded in a series of now-deleted Tweets, accusing iBDW for faking the story in order to gain Hax's sympathy as well as taking his comment out-of-context.[17]
Due to both the iBDW and Leffen controversies, on June 21st, Tiramisu announced that Hax was banned from the Melee Online Discord server.[18]
Following the accusation and ban, as well as the evidence.zip 2 controversy, Hax posted a TwitLonger on June 23rd, in which he apologized on how he handled both controversies and claimed to "exonerate" himself from iBDW's claims.[19] However, he refused to backtrack on any of the accusations made to both Leffen and iBDW. In particular, he reiterated how iBDW falsified many parts of his story in order to salvage their decaying friendship, and after that failed, iBDW went on to make several defamatory statements on Hax to try and ruin his reputation. Hax concluded the TwitLonger by once again apologizing for his behavior within the last few months and stating that he was willing to ban himself for 3 months due to how he initially handled iBDW's accusations. Hax then posted a second TwitLonger a few hours later, in which he further responded to iBDW's rebuttal, paragraph by paragraph.[20] Hax concluded this TwitLonger by asking iBDW to both contact him in private and dismiss his claims against him, lest he take legal action against him.
Within an hour of posting the second TwitLonger, Hax deleted his tweets that linked to both of the TwitLongers he had posted that day. He then tweeted that he would take a hiatus, saying he didn't find it possible to continue discussing the controversies.[21] In the tweet, he also apologized to the community and reiterated his request for iBDW to contact him. The next day, iBDW revealed in a Twitter thread that the two indeed talked in private and were now mostly on the same page, noting that Hax is "clearly not cool with sexual assault/incest."[22] Hax also returned to Twitter to post about the conversation, apologizing to iBDW, whom he called "a good man," and the community while also limiting his guilt to certain comments he made in his own Discord server.[23]
Ban from events
In June 2021, on the same day as iBDW's final announcement, several TOs from many US states signed a document that banned Hax from their tournaments, and his name was added to the Global Ban Database.[3] The ban was made using the previous SSB Code of Conduct Panel's 2.2.1 (Level 2) and 2.2.3 (Level 3) offences and was deemed indefinite.
The ban reasoning can be summarised as follows:
- The accusations were deemed baseless, particularly comparing Leffen's presence as a totalitarian regime, the belief that Leffen solely called out ZeRo for personal gain, and saying that Leffen would prefer ZeRo was dead following his suicide attempt.
- The calls to deplatform Leffen constituted incitement for harassment, and his fanbase response shows that this incitement has teeth to it.
- Hax$'s refusal to recant the statements and double down, only deeming the flaws as "tactical errors", show a lack of remorse for his actions and that these were fully intentional, not simply mistakes.
Under the rationale of the accusations being baseless, considering the 4 hours of content and the 136-page document, these remarks were deemed extremely severe and constituted an indefinite ban from events.
Notable events banning Hax$ include GENESIS, Shine, Phoenix Blue, Riptide, The Big House, and DreamHack. Outside of several US states, Hax$ is also banned from Austrian, British, Finnish, and Portuguese events, as well as Melee Online events.
As of February 1, 2024, Hax$ has been made permanently banned due to repeated infractions.[4]
Evidence.zip 3 & ban appeal
On August 14th, 2021, Hax released another revision to his video called Evidence.zip 3. In the video, which has since been privated and archived on a separate channel, he accuses Leffen of creating social engineering campaigns against multiple players, such as Hungrybox and Hax himself. The video also reiterates multiple allegations from "evidence.zip 2", such as character profiles from the original "evidence.zip" and alleged harassment levied towards Hax himself. Hax alleges that Leffen deleted 6 years worth of tweets in response to his evidence.zip 2 video, as well as being lawyer-bluffed. Hax also criticises his global ban from the scene, saying that his accusations had evidence and were not libelous or defamatory as his ban statement claimed, as well as claiming that his ban was hypocritical when doing nothing in regards to Leffen.
Building on some accusations from "evidence.zip 2", Hax points out Leffen's sudden tonal shift towards Hungrybox in 2017 and accuses him of social engineering against Hungrybox to usurp his followerbase. Hax discusses where he tried to talk Leffen out of this at Smash Summit 5, but failed to do so. Hax accuses Leffen of blackmailing Hungrybox during 2017, where he continually talked about "terrible things" Hungrybox was doing but never releasing them; Hax claims that this prompted Hungrybox to stay silent. Hax also claims that the then newly introduced Snowy was used by Leffen in his now-deleted "One of many reasons to dislike hbox" video to create "Hungrybox story" memes, which eventually culminated into Hungrybox being harassed in a Walmart store in April 2018. Hax also argues that Leffen later decided Snowy was of no use to him and began to openly slander him.
Hax once again accused Leffen of manipulating the #MeToo movement, pointing out that the victim testimony given in his video on the allegations in the Smash community on July 2nd contradicted C's statement in the original evidence.zip, which pinned Leffen himself as the abuser. He also accused Leffen of misrepresenting and even contradicting many claims in his videos on the topic, as well as making insincere tweets to "gain clout". Hax further criticised Leffen for circulating the rumour about Mew2King masturbating on a Smash player, which was proven to be false after Mew2King addressed the allegations. Earlier in the video but relevant to this topic, Hax built upon Technicals' video on Sky Williams and also accused Leffen of conspiring with Jisu, whom he claimed was manipulative when they were dating, to defame ZeRo with baseless allegations, before verifiable accusations against him had emerged. He restated Technicals' claims that Leffen's allegations of ZeRo sharing pornographic images with other Smashers were moot, for not only were they of age, but they also testified that they were looking at normal images of anime girls instead of porn. Hax also pointed out that, prior to Jisu's allegations against ZeRo, Jisu contacted Leffen, and made her tweet statement only minutes after Leffen tweeted that he would log out of Twitter to gather his thoughts. Hax claimed that this was strategic and part of the conspiracy, accusing Leffen of drawing attention to the allegations for personal gain and trying to become the most popular Smasher on Twitter by forcing ZeRo into retirement, allegedly in a similar manner to the way Leffen treated Hungrybox. Hax also believes that Leffen's wish to expel Technicals from the community in response to their challenges to the allegations is an attempt to further manipulate the situation.
Hax criticised Leffen for his response to Samox's Metagame documentary, claiming he lied about his old controversies and pressured Samox to "censor" victim testimonies and other information regarding them. Hax also expressed concern about the revised version of the documentary, particularly regarding the narrative about the original evidence.zip and the portrayal of Leffen as a "hero", as well as how Leffen now had a theme song deriding the evidence.zip archive. He alleged that this set a precedent for top players to lie and control the narrative, and argued that Samox had not only become one of Leffen's "victims" by giving into Leffen's manipulations, but broke his "integrity" as a purveyor of facts by underrepresenting the accusations in evidence.zip. Later Samox would explain the change was unrelated to Leffen with it being changed due to an unnamed person who was interviewed threatening to sue if the clip of himself was used, with only a total of twenty seconds being changed.[24]
Hax's final accusations targeted Leffen's social media behavior, particularly the alleged dishonesty of his profile bio's and him blocking anyone attempting to discuss the allegations on either Twitter or his Twitch stream. He restated a claim from evidence.zip 2 that this behavior exhibited a degree of narcissism and psychopathy indicative of the dark triad, something he believes those who testified in evidence.zip were worried would eventually "erode" the Smash scene. Hax also condemned Leffen for allegedly letting this behavior rub off on people like Jisu, who went silent on social media for several days after Technicals' video on Sky Williams and never offered a proper response to it, whilst blocking anyone that attempted to discuss it. Hax concluded the video by admitting that accusing Leffen of creating a "regime" is extreme, but alleged that there was no better way to describe Leffen's actions.
The video was criticised primarily for the same reasons as "evidence.zip 2", with onlookers expressing skepticism for a myriad of Hax's claims. Many argued that Hax's videos were indeed defamatory, with them believing that the claims and motives are out of character or even extreme. Others have criticised Hax for repeatedly using the original evidence.zip, believing that Leffen has changed and the antiquated nature of the document makes it questionable to cite. Finally, the video was criticised for comparing Leffen to Donald Trump as an allegory to paint the former as "totalitarian". Nevertheless, a fringe group has chosen to believe Hax, particularly those who are fans of Technicals who believe that there is precedent for Leffen manipulating situations for his own benefit, as well as believing that Hax should not have been punished at all for his videos and public statements.
Continued ban appeals, apologies, & partial unban
On August 29th 2021, Hax released another video contesting his ban from the scene,[25] which directly addresses a document by Mikey outlining the reasons for his ban.[26] He criticized the statement for saying there was no evidence to back his allegations and for being overly generous to Leffen overall, and argues that the very logic used to justify his ban could be used to justify banning Leffen for his interactions with Hungrybox alone. The ban appeal was later unlisted and archived on a separate channel.
On September 24th 2021, Hax released a video[27] where he apologised for his conduct throughout his conflict with Leffen, claiming it to come from an argument over the revision of the Metagame Documentary that he took too far. This also came with an apology tweet on Twitter.[28]
On July 25th 2022, Hax issued a public apology to Leffen, Jisu, and others affected by his conduct resulting from evidence.zip 2.[29] In the video, he revealed that he was suffering from alcoholism as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to a bout of psychosis. He also apologised for his comments on the #MeToo movement, citing his black and white thinking as a contributing factor. He revealed that since these events, he had been sober for 9 months and has been working on his personal issues. Hax would later private this video.
On January 1st, 2023 Hax was probationally unbanned from NYC Melee after agreeing to only appeal to be unbanned in private with TOs, among other clauses.[30] Outside of NYC Melee Hax would be unbanned on the discretion of the individual TOs and Organizations, in which Hax would attend several majors and regionals outside of NYC Melee.
On 28th October 2023, Hax$ released a ban appeal and apology video on his YouTube channel,[31] apologising to Leffen, tournament organisers, and more. He also discussed the progress he made in the 2 years since his ban. Despite breaking his unban agreement to not make public ban appeals the video was mostly positively received as Hax seemed to take accountability and showed remorse. Hax would later private this video.
Relapse, perma bans, and further apologies
Hax$ would release another ban appeal on 21st January 2024, restating many of the same claims that originally got Hax banned years ago[32] wherein he also leaked the testimonies from the original 2013 Evidence.zip. The ban appeal was later unlisted and archived on a separate channel. A week later, Hax$ would release a video titled "The Truth",[33] in which Hax makes further claims similar to what he has made in the past and continued to link the leaked Evidence.zip testimonies. This resulted on Jan 23, 2024 Hax being re-banned from the NYC Melee Community, as a result of breaking multiple clauses in the unban contract, including preventing public ban appeals, and violation of COC rules 2.2.2 & 2.2.3.[34]
On Jan 27, 2024 Willy P, the Head TO of NYC melee, made a personal statement regarding the Hax NYC Melee ban decision.[35] Willy P explains why they ignored the first ban appeal video, which violated the unban agreement, even know many parties hax showed the video before release tried to convince Hax to not post the video publically and speak with TO's privately, they choose to ignore it as a violation as it seemed to show Hax improving and accepting responsibility. But then the next showed a backslide from his previous one, with the vast majority of the video focusing on restating claims about Leffen, and also showed unsealed private documents, plus revealing full legal names of the people who wrote the transcripts, doxxing them. He released these testimonies without permission, and also unlisted or deleted previous videos where he had apologized to Leffen. Willy P states states this showed Hax losing the progress they had hoped he made. Furthermore, the document states: "I do not believe Hax himself encouraged the threats or harassment against others, but whether intentional or not, when your consistent actions have consistent consequences, it is up to you to correct that, or to plain stop those actions", further stating "At the end of the day, if NYC Melee doesn't act on its word in enforcing the rules we set into place, we are arguably enabling this type of behavior. He would constantly use our unban as a sign of his progress, but when he starts violating the clauses we set into place that just doesn't make sense anymore." With Hax showing no sign of significant growth over the period of several years, and no reason to believe Hax would get better after the x number infraction, Hax was voted to be unanimously banned by NYC Melee.
On Feb 1, 2024 a new ban statement was made that permanently banned Hax.[4] The cited reason for the indefinite ban to become a permanent ban was in the new ban statement "In the period of Hax’s indefinite ban, the onus was on him to demonstrate that he wouldn’t repeat his offense, take accountability for his actions, and demonstrate sufficient change. He has instead repeated his offense, not adequately taken accountability, and ignored the recommendations of those who he seeks to appeal to. This includes violation of the provisional unban requirements outlined by his local tournament organizers, as described by NYC Melee" and further stating "Hax’s lack of sufficient remorse for his actions, incitement of harassment campaigns targeting other people, and his pattern of doubling down when confronted, even by tournament organizers who have tried working with him for years, makes his presence fundamentally toxic to the scene’s health".[4]
Post perma ban appeals, mental health revelations, and stalking accusations
On 7th March 2024, Hax$ released another apology video[36] where he apologises to Leffen and deemed his past behaviour "self-destructive" and discusses his previous relapses and decision-making, believing that none of what he did was honourable and was arguably an orchestrated harassment campaign. Mew2King notably comments requesting an unban of Hax$ on the basis of his own harassers not being banned at all, and in June 2024, went on to make a video on the matter.[37] On May 13, 2024, Hax would make another video "Regarding My Ban" where Hax asks to be unbanned someday.[38] This video would later be unlisted.
On 30th May 2024, DarkGenex released a statement regarding Hax's ban, detailing, among other things, a bipolar disorder diagnosis, hospitalisation, and suicide attempts, coming from his failed ban appeals. Additionally, DarkGenex recounted private handlings of Hax's ban, where Hax is shown to have harassed multiple TOs, including going to a post-venue bar to try and appeal his ban.[39][40] The document would be made private in response to Hax's mother threatening a lawsuit.
The general consensus in the community with the revelation of just how severe Hax's mental health issues are is Hax participating in the community, beyond Hax's infractions to others, was and is not good for Hax's own mental health. With a notable example of this is from Zain tweeting "Personally, I believe that a movement like FreeHax is damaging and plays into Hax’s idea that his ability to play Melee is a matter of life and death. In my opinion, unbanning him serves as a bandaid for a much larger problem"[41], said quote taken from a larger statement. With Hax making extreme statements after this on X, such as "I’m genuinely fucked in life at this point, as I made all of my lifelong friends through it and so it’s impossible to rebuild"[42], and other statements just as "For the past 6 months, my mother and I have been completely stranded from society", and from the same tweet "I’ve been hospitalized 4 times due to the stress I’m under causing me to repeatedly faint"[43] with further statements from the same tweet, "Every passing day is worse than the last. I lose friends, I lose my sanity, and I lose income", and another "Please understand that a permanent ban effectively removes me from society and leaves me with no future"[44], and another "The situation I'm in is akin to death, and it can only be salvaged with a "reset" on the ban situation. I beg for mercy in this time of need."[45] These statement shows someone with mental issues beyond what is reasonable for someone being banned, and most believe that Hax being unbanned would not fix Hax's mental issues, with the mental health issues themselves being a good reason for Hax to not be unbanned, beyond Hax's many infractions. Hax has also shown no attempted at therapy or improving his situation, claiming his only possible source of revenue is through Melee, and it's impossible to have social interactions outside of competitive Melee.
On 30th July 2024, Hax$ released a ban appeal video, specifically regarding his perma-ban in January 2024.[46] He brought up a claimed issue with getting private responses from TOs regarding how long his indefinite ban would be, due to ambiguity between the 2 year ban and indefinite clause. Due to an inability to get responses, he argued that, despite agreeing to only make ban appeals in private with TOs as per his probational partial unban agreement, his public ban appeals were justified, and that a 6 month ban would have been more justified. Given these factors, Hax deems the ban as "cruel" and that, in spite of his own faults, there were mistakes on both sides. In the video, when Hax makes his argument Hax cites his old ban statement instead of Hax's current ban statement, ignoring his relapse repeating some of his original claims, which was the main reason he was permanently banned, for being a repeat offender, not for making another ban appeal video.[3]Furthermore, there was no ambiguity between the two-year ban and indefinite ban, as the original ban statement[3] clearly states the ban to be indefinite, not a two-year ban, as the case was so extreme with Hax's refusing to apologize or even stop doing his defamation even after a month of negative backlash. This is also a moot point as again Hax is under a new ban statement, making the old ban statement irrelevant to him being unbanned, as hax is under his new perma ban statement.[4]
On 31th July 2024, a day after the previous video, Following criticisms from Radar[47] [48], which to summarize is that Hax is two-faced still believing in private his original claims while also saying something else publically[49], that Hax deflects responsibility to TOs instead of taking accountability, and no mention of his behaviour behind the scenes, such as ongoing stalking and harassing of TOs and community members[50] [39], Hax released a follow-up video clarifying points raised, including stating Hax feels he is not a true repeat offender. Furthermore, Hax explicitly condemns Technicals, Dramatubers, the FreeHax# movement, and the harassment his videos incited. Hax then asks to be put on final probation. [51] Both of these videos were unlisted within three weeks after posting.
Trivia
- Hax popularized the "20XX" meme in the Melee community. 20XX is an allusion to the introduction of Mega Man, that announced that "The year is 20XX". 20XX describes a futuristic, potentially post-apocalyptic setting, where the metagame and technical skill of players have reached a point where they can no longer continue to improve. Accordingly, only Fox is viable, and as players can perfectly capitalise on every situation, matches are determined by a rock-paper-scissors match for port priority. The joke is often referenced in Fox mirror matches and particularly impressive displays of tech skill by players. An example of this occurred at Apex 2014, when during Melee doubles there was a match during grand finals where all four players were playing Fox. The commentator, Prog, said "Are you aware of the year..." before his partner, D1, interrupts with "20XX. Here we go!". Toph had previously elaborated on the joke at The Big House 3:
Hax's thing is like, "The year is 20XX. Everyone plays Fox." And there's this whole post-apocalyptic universe that is built off of Fox being the only viable character left. Humanity has reached its pinnacle. The peasants are living in poverty. And there are these monasteries where these Fox monks just levitate and TAS Fox with one controller in one hand, and win a tournament with the other. And the tournament metagame has gotten to this point where everything is played out to theoretical perfection, so they Rock-Paper-Scissors for port priority, and that's the set. And everyone gets really excited about the port priority RPS, so RPS's metagame has really evolved to where it's really just like RPS tournaments are now. And then we have warriors like Kevin Toy and Europhoria desperately trying to prevent the apocalypse, the Fox Apocalypse, from happening with their Marths.
- When interviewed at Super Nebulous 4, Hax mentioned that both the 20XX meme and his usage of Fox were partially attributable to Mango and PPMD.
- Similar to the 20XX meme, Hax also coined the term 666XX, about Hungrybox's American dominance in early 2016 with Jigglypuff.
- Since his switch to Fox, Hax commonly expresses his dislike for Captain Falcon as an inferior character in Melee, to the point where he claims the optimal strategy for using Captain Falcon is to "L R A Start Fox"-- or quitting out of the match to select Fox on the character select screen. Hax even created a B0XX with only those buttons available on the "Falcon Design".
- Hax is known for starting a copypasta within the Smash community. After he lost to Mango at The Big House 4, where Mango was using Captain Falcon and Marth instead of his mains Fox and Falco, Hax tweeted about Mango's "disrespectful" gameplay, accusing Mango of being "a straight up jerk" and "so BM [bad-mannered]" because he picked "joke characters" in a serious tournament match. The exaggerated language in this tweet has since led to its parroting on reddit and other online communities.
- Almost two years later at Pound 2016, after Mango played Marth against Hax again and lost, Hax tweeted the same message as a humorous nod to the original post.
- In addition to Super Smash Bros. Melee, Hax has played a variety of games competitively:
- Hax placed 2nd in the 12 and under Nationals for the 2006 Pokemon Journey Across America Tournament.
- Hax used to attend tournaments for the Pokémon Trading Card Game. He notably made it to the quarterfinals of the 2008 World Championships Senior Division, after finishing the Swiss rounds in 1st place.
- In the game League of Legends, Hax was one of the best Twisted Fate players in North America, attaining the Challenger rank (the highest in the game) two seasons in a row.
- Hax was the first player to reach 3000 elo on the Slippi Leaderboards, achieving an elo of 3000.7 on March 3rd, 2023.
References
- ^ Hax joins EMG
- ^ Hax leaves EMG
- ^ a b c d Hax's indefinite ban.
- ^ a b c d e Hax's Permanent ban.
- ^ Hax's evidence.zip 2 PDF
- ^ Hax's Evidence.zip 2.pdf archived
- ^ Initial Tweet.
- ^ Evidence.zip 2 reuploaded.
- ^ Leffen on Hax's post.
- ^ PracticalTAS summary, analysis, and commentary of Evidence.zip 2.pdf
- ^ BTS's ban on Hax.
- ^ The second video.
- ^ TwitLonger — @ssbmhax: Why I created Evidence.zip 2 / My closing thoughts for the time being.
- ^ iBDW's initial post.
- ^ TwitLonger — @iBDWSSBM: Hax's Rebuttal.
- ^ iBDW saying Hax deleted Facebook messages.
- ^ Hax's response, archived.
- ^ Hax's online ban.
- ^ TwitLonger — @ssbmhax: Apology, self-imposed hiatus, and exoneration from @iBDWSSBM's claims. Archived from the original on 2021-06-23. Retrieved on 2021-06-23.
- ^ TwitLonger — @ssbmhax: Response to @iBDWSSBM's TwitLonger. Archived from the original on 2021-06-23. Retrieved on 2021-06-23.
- ^ Hax beginning a hiatus.
- ^ iBDW's thread addressing his private conversation with Hax.
- ^ Hax's statement on his conversation with iBDW.
- ^ Samox statement
- ^ Hax - Public Appeal to My Ban from SSBM Tournaments
- ^ Mikey's document explaining the reasons for Hax's ban
- ^ Apology video
- ^ Apology tweet
- ^ Apology to Leffen
- ^ Hax's Probationary partial Unban
- ^ Oct '23 Ban Appeal
- ^ Jan 2024 Unban Plea
- ^ "The Truth"
- ^ Hax's Ban from NYC Melee
- ^ Willy P Personal statement
- ^ Apology to Leffen, My Friends, and the Melee Community
- ^ Mew2King video
- ^ Regarding My Ban
- ^ a b DarkGenex Re: Hax & Mental Health Document.
- ^ Further corroboration of DarkGenex document and added details
- ^ Zain statement
- ^ https://twitter.com/ssbmhax/status/1823363722615611812 Hax Quote Tweet 1]
- ^ https://twitter.com/ssbmhax/status/1822164920990941587 Hax Quote Tweet 2]
- ^ Quote Tweet 3
- ^ Hax Quote Tweet 4
- ^ Melee Community Permanent Ban Appeal
- ^ Radar Statement
- ^ Radar Statement Addendum
- ^ Hax private statement different from his public statement
- ^ Hax Stalking Statement
- ^ Permanent Ban Appeal Part 2