Meet Lichel (she/her/they/them).

What is your dream in gaming, esports, and/or content creation?

My dream has always been to show that girls can do it too.

Ever since I was a child, I was surrounded by video games because of my family. Holding my first DualShock 2 Controller opened up a world of things I will never regret in my life — and I will forever be thankful for that introduction to a world that I could escape to.

When I began playing competitively at 16, I faced tremendous obstacles, including gender prejudice in gaming. But to me, that never mattered. If we are winning, why would it matter? That is what I want the world to understand — that anyone can play a game and be the best; anyone can be in tournaments and win; anyone can get big on the internet — no matter who you are. My dream is to let everyone know that girls can do everything and anything. I also want to be that person to reassure that you should never be afraid to push forward and believe strongly in yourself.

Ever since I began watching esports tournaments, like Overwatch League and VCT Game Changers, I looked up to players such as Aspen and Roxi. This led to me realize that there weren’t enough female esports figures in the world — and now I want to be the one to change that. I want more women to skyrocket in gaming, esports, and content creation and show that anyone can do it.

If I can return to the moment I sat down in front of the TV to play my first video game at 5, I would tell her that we changed the game.

Please share how winning support from 1,000 Dreams Fund is important to your dream and what impact it will have on your career?

Winning support from 1DF is incredibly important to my dream and has impacted my career at the first instance of applying to the Cadetship.

I wanted to understand how the broadcasting industry worked, but most especially how the world of esports is shown to the human eye. Storytelling about the endurance, success, and failure of the best players in the world in Riot’s video game franchises will always have me in awe at how much emotion they can portray to their fans. This is something I want to learn and do in my career — to be able to visualize and tell a story to the world in the moment.

This opportunity to be able to learn how things operate in the Broadcasting Centre will surely be a once-in-a-lifetime event, and I have taken it to heart with sincere gratitude and acknowledgement that I will use it to the best of my abilities and will carry it forward as experience throughout my journey.

What advice do you have for women & femmes who want to work in gaming, esports, and/or content creation?

The advice I want to give for women and femmes is to make sure you have passion, creativity, and motive.

For example: Passion is something I rely on heavily for things to work out the way I want them to. In order for something to become successful from your labor and progress, you need to make sure that it is something that you will not forget about or lose interest in quickly.

My passion in this cadetship has to be Riot itself. Riot has been a huge part of my life, ever since I started my journey in video games and esports. I started playing League of Legends in 2015, and fell in love with the lore and its champions which led me to become more passionate about creating stories and character designs when it came to artwork and world-building. Without this passion for Riot’s lore in their video games, I would have never been inspired to want to work in this field — and it also wouldn’t have sparked my creativity.

You also do not need expensive equipment, software, or connections in the beginning, because you will get to the point where you will have these in your hands when you start with passion, creativity, and motive.