The Eternal KRIMZ: Sweden’s Longest Lasting Superstar
By Stephen “stuchiu” Chiu
Freddy “KRIMZ” Johansson has a unique path among the superstars of Counter-Strike. Most superstar players have their peak during the first act of their career. This has been the case with the rest of Sweden’s great superstars. Olof “olofmeister” Kajbjer’s peak was in 2014–2016 Fnatic. Patrik “f0rest” Lindberg and Christopher “GeT_RiGhT” Alesund had their CS:GO peaks in 2013–2014. In contrast KRIMZ’s peak has been in the second act of his career. While he was a brilliant player in the 2014–2016 Fnatic, it is the second act of KRIMZ’s career, from late 2017 to 2020 where KRIMZ has staked his legacy as one of Sweden’s greatest CS:GO players.
The Opening Act: LGB eSports
KRIMZ’s career is all the more surprising when put into historical context. The origins of CS:GO started in the NiP era and their rivalry with VeryGames. In the background of that duel, the superstars of tomorrow were rising up. Among the various teams at the time, the ones that looked to hold the keys to the kingdom was LGB eSports. They had three big star names that everyone looked at: olofmeister, Dennis “dennis” Edman, and Simon “twist” Eliasson. They looked to become the next wave of superstars that could dominate the scene. Behind those three big names, KRIMZ was largely overshadowed as a supportive element in the team.
KRIMZ wasn’t on anyone’s radar at the time and in 2014, when Fnatic made the move to recruit olofmeister, they weren’t thinking of getting KRIMZ at all. However when Fnatic was deciding on a fifth, olofmeister brought up KRIMZ’s name. Robin “Flusha” Ronnquist did an interview with Tomi “lurppis” Kovanen where he recalled, “olofmeister said KRIMZ was the best team player he had ever played with.”
The First Act: The Olofmeister Partnership
That fateful meeting created one of the greatest pairings in Counter-Strike history. Aesthetically at least, I still believe that the olofmeister-KRIMZ pairing was the most pleasing to spectate. That particular pair of players complemented each other in ways that no other duo could match. They were the Yin and Yang of CS:GO. On an individual level, they played polarized styles. Olofmeister the aggressive duel heavy entry player who could break open entire maps. He was the point of the spear for Fnatic’s offense. Someone who could attack and break any team in the world.
Where olofmeister was the spear, KRIMZ was the shield. A rock solid pillar that could hold up the roof of the world. There was nothing flashy about KRIMZ’s play. He had good mechanics, but what made KRIMZ stand out was his consistent decision making and positioning. KRIMZ could read the map, rotate correctly and then place his cross-hair in the perfect place.
These disparate individual aspects created a synthesis of play that elevated them to another plane of existence. It was a perfect composite of aggressive and passive play, of irresistible aggressive skill and calculated rational decision making. What’s more the two of them had a chemistry nearly unmatched that allowed them to perfectly play off of each other in any given situation, whether that was an early play, a mid-round cross map rotation, or a post-plant/retake scenario.
This pairing was a microcosm of the whole Fnatic line-up. The entire lineup included: olofmeister, KRIMZ, Markus “pronax” Wallsten, Jesper “JW” Wecksell, and flusha. JW and Flusha were more extreme levels of aggression and passivity compared to either olofmeister or KRIMZ. This all came together under pronax’s leadership as his loose style complemented their team play and skill perfectly.
This lineup then went on to become the greatest CS:GO team in history until Astralis finally superseded them in 2018–2019. During this period of play, KRIMZ was a team player, a brilliant anchor, and a consistently great clutcher. At times he was so good, he could be the secondary star of the team. Despite all of that greatness, no one could have predicted what came next as it flew in the face of all recognized paths of the CS Superstar.
Intermission: Understanding the Movement of the Stars
I opened this article saying that KRIMZ had a unique path among superstars. To understand why, we need to look at the general career trajectories of the star players. Most superstars hit a peak level of play that they reach for a sustained amount of time (most usually three to nine months, some prodigious talents for years). After a superstar falls from those heights, three things usually happen. They can go the way of the pyramids. Standing obelisks that decay and degrade in the dust, refusing to change. As the seasons go by, their grandeur and luster fade with time. Vincent “Happy” Schopenhauer is the best example of this as he could still be a good player today, but his inability to change has turned him into an ossified figure from a Shelley poem.
The second type of superstar waxes or wanes depending on the season, though the reasons for why are a bit more mysterious than the first. Sometimes they fall along the first path as they struggle with adjusting their style to the current meta. JW falls along this path as he struggled for years trying to adapt his aggressive wildcard style in a meta that moved the AWP into a more rigid structure of play.
The third type of superstar undergoes a transformation. They change their role from a star player and take on more supportive and/or ancillary roles to free up room for the next batch of skilled players. Filip “NEO” Kubski and Wiktor “TaZ” Wojtas both did this when they transitioned from CS 1.6 to CS:GO. NEO in particular is a good example as he had a brief resurgence as a star player in the last quarter of 2016. This period of play is worth noting as it’s similar to KRIMZ’s time on the 2014–2015 Fnatic. While not a star player or a polarizing player that defined his team’s play style, his decision making, positioning, and game sense propelled him into star status.
While every superstar player is unique (the unique characteristics of an individual player is often the defining factor of whether one becomes a superstar or not), all superstars follow these three archetypal paths. Well, almost all of them as KRIMZ’s path to superstar status is the exception.
Fnatic and KRIMZ were in a transition period from 2016–2017. The old Fnatic lineup had run its course and the players shuffled trying to create something new or recreate something old (hence we got the Swedish schism and the first reunion). During this period, it looked like KRIMZ was following the path of NEO, though Andreas “Xyp9x” Hojsleth is probably the better analogy. Early on in his career, Xyp9x could have been a star player, but instead transitioned into a supportive element for his team. Like KRIMZ, he relied on his game sense, decision making, and positioning to impact the game.
From 2016–2017, it looked like KRIMZ was going to go down a similar path where he would emphasize his supportive elements more to make room for new talent coming into his team. Fnatic did bring in new talent with Maikil “Golden” Selim and Jonas “Lekr0” Olofsson. However instead of putting KRIMZ in a supportive role, KRIMZ became a superstar.
The Second Act: Sweden’s Best
In the first act of KRIMZ’s career, it’s hard to disentangle KRIMZ’s play from olofmeister’s. Their differing styles complimented each other. They covered flaws in each other’s play styles and reached a synthesis that exceeded their individual skills. When they separated, it was like watching a starfish be split apart.
In this second act though, KRIMZ regrew those lost limbs and took up the space that olofmeister left behind. It’s hard to figure out what the exact trigger was for the evolution in play. It helped that he was still playing alongside Flusha and JW and their core team play was still as immaculate as ever, but the same could be said for the disastrous period when he played with them during GODSENT.
Perhaps having Golden as an in-game leader helped. If you look at the results in the last few years, KRIMZ has played his best with the Fnatic lineups where Golden was the in-game leader. This theory makes sense on a tactical level as Golden’s loose style alongside his space-creation entry gave KRIMZ more room to work. While there is something to it, KRIMZ was still an incredible player even when Golden wasn’t part of the team, so it’s hard to parse the amount of impact involved.
Whatever the case may be, KRIMZ’s play evolved and he became the best player in Sweden. His game sense, decision making, and positioning was still pristine and was still the fundamental foundation of his play. What changed was KRIMZ’s roles and variations. KRIMZ in Fnatic 2014–2015 was mostly a mid-late round player. Someone who helped the rest of the team get to their spots, facilitate their plays, and then make reactive rotations to cover holes in the game (whether as an anchor or as a 1vX player). In that sense, the parallels to Xyp9x were well-founded.
From late 2017 onward, those comparisons became impossible to make. KRIMZ’s game is all encompassing. His overall versatility and impact makes his all-around game one of the best in the world. KRIMZ could be the aggressive olofmeister esque entry-player or duelist. He could run with the pack as a trade fragger like how Vitality played with Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut, a mid-round lurker ala Richard “shox” Papillon, or a playmaker like Nikola “NiKo” Kovac. The only thing outside of KRIMZ’s wheel house was AWPing and wildcard play, both aspects that JW covered in the Fnatic lineup anyway.
Not only did KRIMZ expand his game, he also kept his old style at an equally high level so he could give as much space as he wanted to other players like JW or Ludvig “Brollan” Brolin. KRIMZ’s resounding success in his transition from a supportive element to superstar is all the more mystifying when you consider other superstar transitions.
In Virtus.pro, the entire team broke apart when they tried to swap around star and leadership roles. NEO failed to became a star player for the team and Janusz “Snax” Pogorzelski ended his career as a superstar player. GeT_RiGhT tried to transition to a supportive element in his team multiple times with diminishing results. Olofmeister was successful when Finn “karrigan” Andersen was leading FaZe, but after the kick he continued to decline and slump for the rest of his career.
Outside of KRIMZ, there are no other examples of players who transitioned from being a highly successful supportive player and becoming a polarizing superstar player of their team.
The Eternal KRIMZ
In 2013, KRIMZ was an after thought in the Swedish scene. GeT_RiGhT and f0rest ruled the world in NiP. The next wave of Swedish stars looked to be olofmeister, dennis, and twist. Yet here we are seven years later and the impossible has happened. Among all of Sweden’s talent from back then, the longest lasting of all of them has been KRIMZ.
Consider those seven years for a moment. In that time, we’ve had about four generations of superstars cycle through. The NiP-VeryGames era came first, then the Fnatic-TSM/EnVyUs period. After them came the LG/SK and the generation of miracles (Marcelo “Coldzera” David, Oleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev, and NiKo). Now we are in the fourth as young players like ZywOo, Jonathan “EliGE” Jablownowski, and Robin “ropz” Kool are taking up the top spots in the world.
The wheel of time has continued to grind down the titans of the past as the gods of the new age take their place. KRIMZ is one of the few players to have survived that crush of time. Not only has he survived the generational shifts, he has thrived. KRIMZ has become the best Swedish player in the last few years. He doesn’t have the peaks of olofmeister or GeT_RiGhT, but in consistency, longevity, and prolonged excellence, no one can match his resume in CS:GO.
What’s more, unlike the rest of the Swedish greats, KRIMZ is still at the top of his game and is the only Swedish veteran from ages past that can push his legacy to even greater heights.
Author: Stephen “stuchiu” Chiu. Follow him on Twitter at https://twitter.com/stuchiuWriter
