Elon the gamer

Why does the world's richest man care so much about beating nobodies in digital caves?

Elon the gamer
Elon Musk has boasted he can blast “through the ‘toughest’ content, popping monsters like balloons." (Elena Lacey / Washington Post)

Full story: Elon Musk rose to the top of video game charts. Now he has confessed to cheating


The billionaire corporate colossus and friend of the president is very proud of his magic gaming avatars. But my serious investigation of his prowess in dungeon crawlers like "Diablo 4" and "Path of Exile 2" found that he'd actually paid to boost their digital might – a strange quirk of his personality that deceives but also reveals:

As scandals go, Musk’s drama isn’t exactly Watergate. But it has nevertheless baffled a community of gamers that once deified him as a celebrity geek and has raised questions among former fans about his need for online praise and domination. Why would a famous billionaire, at the peak of his real-world power, care so much about beating nobodies in a fantasy video game?

“Elon lost the trust of all gamers overnight,” Dan Nelson, a programmer in Philadelphia, said in an X post liked more than 100,000 times. “Boosting your account and lying about it is the worst offense. incredibly cringe, fragile ego on full display.”

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