Shroud (gamer)

Michael Grzesiek (born June 2, 1994), better known as Shroud (formerly mEclipse^[3]), is a Canadian streamer, YouTuber, professional Valorant player and former professional Counter-Strike: Global Offensive player. As of April 2022^[update], his Twitch channel has reached over 10 million followers, ranking as the seventh most-followed channel on the platform,^[4] and his YouTube channel has over 6.82 million subscribers.

Shroud
Grzesiek in 2018
Personal information
Name	Michael Grzesiek
Born	(1994-06-02) June 2, 1994 (age 28) Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Career information
Games	Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Valorant
Playing career	2013–2017, 2022–present
Team history
Counter-Strike: Global Offensive:
2013–2014	Slow Motion
2014	Exertus eSports
2014	Manajuma
2014	compLexity Gaming
2014–2017	Cloud9
Valorant:
2022	Sentinels
Career highlights and awards
EPL champion (2016)
Twitch information
Channel	shroud
Followers	10 million^[1]
Total views	556 million^[1]
YouTube information
Channel	Shroud
Years active	2014–present
Subscribers	6.8 million^[2]
Total views	1.01 billion^[2]
Creator Awards 100,000 subscribers 2017 1,000,000 subscribers 2018
Last updated: 21 December 2022

Early life

Grzesiek was born on June 2, 1994 in Toronto, Ontario, and is of Polish descent.^[5]

Career

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive

Grzesiek started his Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) career with several ESEA teams, particularly Exertus eSports and Manajuma. He was soon signed by compLexity Gaming as a stand-in, and later by Cloud9 in August 2014 when they acquired the roster of compLexity.^{[citation needed]} He helped lead Cloud9 to a first-place finish at ESL Pro League Season 4 in 2016.^[5] He stepped down from the starting roster in 2017 to move to full-time streaming for Cloud9.^[6]

Streaming and content creation

On April 18, 2018, Grzesiek left Cloud9 and officially retired from professional CS:GO.^[5]

On March 10, 2019, Grzesiek reached 100,000 Twitch subscribers, gaining another 14,000 the next day, making his subscriber count more than double streamer with the second most at the time—TimTheTatman.^[7] He continued to stream full-time on Twitch until October 2019, when he announced his move from Twitch to Microsoft streaming platform Mixer. He would be broadcasting exclusively on Mixer, following the steps of fellow streamer Tyler "Ninja" Blevins, who announced a similar deal earlier that year.^[8]

On June 22, 2020, Microsoft announced that it would be shutting down Mixer and instead partner with Facebook Gaming. It was alleged that Grzesiek received an offer from Facebook that would have financially exceeded that of Mixer. Grzesiek declined the offer and received the remainder of the current contract payout.^[9]

On August 11, 2020, Grzesiek announced that he would return to stream exclusively on Twitch.^[10] His first stream back the following day peaked at over 516,000 concurrent viewers.^[11][12]

Valorant

On July 8, 2022, Grzesiek signed with Sentinels as a player for their Valorant team.^[6]

Awards and nominations

Year	Award	Category	Result	Ref.
2017	The Game Awards	Trending Gamer	Nominated	^[13]
2019	Esports Awards	Streamer of the Year	Nominated	^[14]
	The Game Awards	Content Creator of the Year	Won	^[15]
2020	10th Streamy Awards	Live Streamer	Nominated	^[16]
2021	11th Streamy Awards	Live Streamer	Nominated	^[17]
2022	The Streamer Awards	Best FPS Streamer	Nominated	^[18]
		Gamer of the Year	Won

See also

• List of most-followed Twitch channels

References

1. "shroud - Statistics". Twitch Tracker. Archived from the original on February 1, 2022. Retrieved February 1, 2022.
2. "About Shroud". YouTube.
3. Livingston, Christopher (August 3, 2018). "Ninja becomes the first Twitch streamer to reach 10 million followers". PC Gamer. Retrieved July 9, 2022.
4. "Top 50 Twitch users sorted by Followers - Socialblade Twitch Stats …". March 26, 2021. Archived from the original on October 20, 2020. Retrieved August 13, 2020.
5. Tsiaoussidis, Alex. "Shroud officially retires from competitive CS:GO, leaves Cloud9". Dot Esports. Retrieved June 21, 2018.
6. Robertson, Scott (July 8, 2022). "He's back: Shroud joins Sentinels' VALORANT roster". Dot Esports. Retrieved July 8, 2022.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
7. "Shroud surpasses 100,000 Twitch subscribers". Dot Esports. March 10, 2019. Retrieved March 6, 2020.
8. "Twitch megastar Shroud is joining Ninja on Mixer as an exclusive streamer". The Verge. October 24, 2019. Retrieved October 24, 2019.
9. "Microsoft just released top streamers Ninja and Shroud from their contracts as it shutters Mixer, after spending millions on exclusive deals with them". Business Insider. Retrieved June 23, 2020.
10. Park, Gene (August 11, 2020). "Shroud is returning to Twitch". The Washington Post. Retrieved August 12, 2020.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
11. Lee, Julia (August 12, 2020). "Even Shroud is shocked at his Twitch viewer count after returning". Polygon. Retrieved August 12, 2020.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
12. Esguerra, Tyler (August 12, 2020). "Shroud's first stream back on Twitch watched by over 500,000 viewers". Dot Esports. Retrieved August 16, 2020.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
13. Alexander, Julia (December 7, 2017). "The Game Awards crowns The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild best game of 2017". Polygon. Archived from the original on December 8, 2017. Retrieved December 7, 2017.
14. "Esports Awards 2019". Esports Awards. April 26, 2021. Retrieved July 9, 2022.
15. Goslin, Austen (December 13, 2019). "All the winners from The Game Awards 2019". Polygon. from the original on December 13, 2019. Retrieved December 13, 2019.
16. "10TH ANNUAL NOMINEES & WINNERS". Streamy Awards. Retrieved December 12, 2020.
17. Spangler, Todd (October 20, 2021). "YouTube Streamy Awards 2021 Nominations Announced, MrBeast Leads With Seven Nods". Variety.
18. Miceli, Max (February 22, 2022). "All nominees for QTCinderella's Streamer Awards". Dot Esports. GAMURS Group.

External links

• Shroud on Twitch
• Shroud's channel on YouTube