One man,
six expensive
obsessions.
Michael is the kind of person who turns a hobby into a spreadsheet, the spreadsheet into a ranking, and the ranking into a personality. He grinds Pokemon GO at a level most people don't know exists, drives fire roads to erase fog off a map, can name a thousand US cities faster than you can find your keys, rates restaurants to the tenth of a point, once deadlifted a refrigerator on a competition platform, and built a 1.4 million subscriber audience along the way. This dossier is mostly affectionate.
The Ultimate Level 76 Grinder
Level 76 is not a number you reach by accident. It is a number you reach by treating a children's phone game like a second job, complete with unpaid overtime and a small fleet of alternate accounts whose only purpose in life is to feed the main. There are auto-catchers humming on a windowsill right now. Somewhere, a Zygarde Cell is being hunted with the intensity of a missing persons case.
- Alt account fleet
- Auto-catchers
- Zygarde Cells
- Excuse to leave the house
Clearing fog that does not exist
The map starts gray. The map is the enemy. To a normal person, a fog-of-war exploration app is a fun way to see where you've been. To Michael it is a to-do list, and the to-do list says everywhere. He has hiked 17.7 miles in a single day for the sole crime of leaving a tile uncleared. He has driven obscure fire roads deep into the San Fernando Valley, in a real car, burning real gas, to erase pixels that only he can see.
The talking-globe origin story
Before the algorithms, before the platform, there was a talking LeapFrog globe and a child who would not stop spinning it. That child placed 2nd and 3rd in the Florida State Geography Bee, which is two more podiums than most of us will ever see for knowing where things are. Hand him a stopwatch and he will name a thousand-plus US cities in an hour, unprompted, like a party trick that became a personality.
A rating system nobody asked for
Most people say a meal was "good." Michael says it was a 8.7, and then tells you why it lost the other 1.3 points. The man rates restaurants to a single decimal place with the conviction of a Supreme Court ruling. His grocery standards begin at Erewhon and grudgingly tolerate Whole Foods. If an ingredient cannot explain where it came from, it does not make the cut.
- Crema9.0
- Uoichiba8.7
- Erewhon hot bar8.4
- That place you liked6.8
Former high school world champion
Long before the spreadsheets, this man was a former high school world champion in the 165 lb class. The numbers below were moved by a teenager. Read them again, slowly, and then reconsider every soft thing you have ever said about your own gym progress.
1.4 million subscribers later
ExxotikGaming grew to 1.4 million subscribers, which is 1.4 million more than the average person who says they "should start a channel." With that comes the full creator starter pack: the algorithm that giveth and taketh, the thumbnail that took longer than the video, the comments section that is somehow both adoring and feral, and the quiet understanding that no view count is ever quite enough.
- Survived the thumbnail wars
- Personally betrayed by the algorithm, repeatedly
- Read every comment. Regrets some of them.
- Still uploads. Still grinds. Of course he does.
That's the whole guy.
Six obsessions, one decimal point at a time. If you made it this far, you either know Michael or you are Michael checking that the deadlift number is right. It is. It always is.