Ronald Kim

Ronald "Rambo" Kim is an electronic sports player who competed in Counter-Strike professionally for Team 3D. Rambo represents a small minority of professional gamers that play with an inverted mouse setting.

Playing career

Teams

Kim started computer gaming in the early days of Quake2 and Quake. His first team, [rs], riot squad, was composed of a tight knit group of high school friends. Kim quickly became one of best FPS gamers in the Dallas, TX area and consistently placed well in many FPS game events.

Kim began competing in Counter-Strike (CS) from the age of 15 onwards when he would attend various Local Area Network (LAN) parties with his friends that included [rs], PAG (Plano Asian Gang), TRU, and various other Texas gaming teams. Kim quickly became the star of [rs] and was a popular figure in the early days of competitive cs. Kim and [rs] competed in, and won, most of the early and unofficial [cs] competitions put on by Frank Nuccio during QuakeCon events and Quake based CPL events, usually competing against other Texas based [cs] teams such as CK3, DoP, and TRU. In the year 2000, [rs] merged with rival team TRU to form syn. (Syndicate) to attend the Babbage's event organized by the Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL) in 2000. Syn disbanded shortly after the 2000 CPL event and both [rs] and TRU reformed.

Kim's next team would be Clan Killers 3, [CK3], an Austin, TX based gaming team that was known for dominating the 6v6 era of competitive Counter-Strike. [CK3] was led by older, middle aged gamers Big_V, Valeyard, Hardryv, and Dorn. During his tenure with [CK3], Kim met a number of players who became long-time teammates of his, including Kyle "Ksharp" Miller, Sean "Bullseye" Morgan, and David "Moto" Geffen . When [CK3] retired from CS, the tag was retired and those who wished to continue playing renamed themselves Xtreme3 "X3" who established themselves as North America's best team for almost the entirety of their existence.^[1]

After X3's disbandment Kim briefly played with a restarted riot squad [rs] team, this time led by Bobby "Sickness" Moyini, before forming Team3D (3D) in 2002 with Kyle "Ksharp" Miller. He would remain with 3D until January 2007 when he joined rivals Complexity^[2] who would be renamed Los Angeles Complexity after becoming a franchise of the Championship Gaming Series. After the CGS' first season Kim was selected as a protected player by the franchise.^[3]

Accomplishments

World championships

Placing	Event	Year	Team	Winnings
1st	Speakeasy CPL	2001	X3	$10,000
1st	CPL Winter	2002	3D	$30,000
1st	WCG	2004	3D	$50,000 + Gold medal
1st	WCG	2005	3D	$50,000 + Gold medal
1st	CGS CS:S World finals	2007	coL	$5,000

Other

Placing	Event	Year	Team	Winnings
5th	Babbage's CPL	2000	syn	$700
1st	CAL Invite	2001	X3	Prototype Intel processors
1st	CPL 4-year anniversary	2001	X3	$1,200
2nd	CPL Winter	2001	X3	$25,000
7th	WCG	2002	3D	-
3rd	WCG Continent vs. Continent	2002	America	Bronze medal
2nd	KillerLAN	2003	3D	$1,500
3rd	CPL Summer	2003	3D	$28,000
2nd	WCG	2003	3D	$20,000 + Silver medal
13th	CPL Winter	2003	3D	$1,000
13th	CPL Summer	2004	3D	$1,000
8th	CPL Winter	2004	3D	$2,000
1st	WCG qualifier	2005	3D	$5,000
2nd	Acon5 qualifier	2005	3D	-
1st	GGL Americup	2005	3D	$4,000
1st	Digital Life	2005	3D	$10,000
9th	CPL Winter	2005	3D	$900
3rd	Transatlantic showdown	2006	3D	$5,250
1st	EverLAN	2006	3D	$10,000
1st	WSVG LANwar	2006	3D	$12,500
4th	ESWC	2006	3D	$16,000
2nd	CGI	2006	3D	$15,000
9th	WSVG ISC	2006	3D	$2,250
2nd	WSVG Finals	2006	3D	$25,000
1st	WCG qualifier	2006	3D	$17,500
5th	WCG	2006	3D	-
2nd	WCG Pan-Am	2006	3D	$2,300 + Silver medal
1st	PNY Finals	2007	coL	$2,000
1st	Digital Life	2007	coL	$10,000
1st	Newegg LANfest	2007	coL	$5,000

Total

• Over $385,000 in prize winnings
• 5 time WCG medalist (2 gold, 2 silver, 1 bronze)
• Named MVP of CPL Winter 2002
• #1 pick in the 2002 CAL season 1 draft

Business ventures

ESEA

While a member of Team3D Kim expressed an interest in having an organized system for providing Counter-Strike lessons for the public. 3D's manager, Craig Levine, accordingly formed the ESEA League where Kim has been an instructor for over four years.

TAO-CS

Kim is co-author of a competitive guide to Counter-Strike titled 'The Art Of Counter-Strike' (TAO-CS) along with ex-teammate Ognian "steel" Gueorguiev and electronic sports journalist Duncan "Thorin" Shields. The guide, which is sold digitally as an ebook, contains over 200 pages and 50 minutes of video footage.^[4]

References and footnotes