(Screengrab from Bandai Namco Esports YouTube Channel)
The number one Pakistani TEKKEN player takes over. Atif “Atif” Ijaz, one of the Tekken players of Team Falcons, successfully defended his title after winning another TEKKEN 8 Tournament at the CEO 2025 Fighting Game Championships as part of the TEKKEN World Tour (TWT) 2025 Master Events, held at Rosen Shingle Creek in Orlando, Florida, on June 15.
Atif won his TEKKEN 8 Tournament title last year in the same TWT Master Event at CEO. He is currently the top TEKKEN player in Pakistan’s Regional Leaderboard, and he was also ranked 9th globally with 550 points.
In the top 8 elimination, Atif was the only player who was able to maintain his upper bracket spot throughout the final day.
He swiftly finished his first match, a best-of-three Winners Semifinal, against Team Vitality’s Jeondding (Jeon Sang-hyun) using his main character Anna to win the series, with a round sweep on Game 1 and a perfect round on Game 2. After five other matches, Atif then fought the Global Leaderboard Rank 7 DN Freec’s Ulsan (Lim Soo-hoon) in the best-of-five Winners Finals using Anna, whom he also swept despite his opponent switching from Lars to Dragunov.
On the other hand, Ulsan bounced back from the best-of-five Losers Final sweep victory against the 5-time Evolution (EVO) Championship Series and Global Leaderboard Rank 3 Arslan Ash (Arslan Siddique) to rematch against Atif later in the best-of-five Grand Final.
Atif showed a dominant round sweep in Game 1 and carried his hot streaked Anna to win the second game, tallying a 2-0 lead. Ulsan switched from Reina to Dragunov and managed to set the series 2 apiece, forcing a Game 5. After exchanging rage arts as their finisher moves in Rounds 3 and 4, Atif wasted no time in the Final Round to surprise Ulsan, dishing out massive damage to close out the series, nabbing the championship.
Bandai Namco Entertainment’s TEKKEN 8 is one of the main games featured in the 15th anniversary of CEO 2025, held for three consecutive days from June 13 – 15 and participated by over 650 registered competitors.
The next TWT 2025 Master Event will be The Mixup 2025 – Round 7 in France next month, while the Chain Shift 2025 for the Challenger category is scheduled on June 21 – 22 in the USA.