OpTic Gaming have done it. After blowing up their Halo roster following the conclusion of the 2024 season, the team have become Major champions for the first time since HCS Major Fort Worth 2023. The sweet taste of glory is all theirs at HCS Major Arlington 2025, ending a horrendous curse that saw OpTic lose five consecutive Grand Finals since their last victory.
For OpTic, it’s validation that their move to drop Pznguin, Lucid, and Trippy in favor of Bound, Lqgend, and Renegade was the right one. It was always touted as a Halo superteam put together with the express purpose of winning trophies, and while their online results may have disappointed to start 2025, they were able to deliver when it mattered on the big stage at HCS Major Arlington.
OpTic complete miraculous Loser’s Bracket run to kickstart 2025 season
OpTic’s route back to honors was far from simple. After losing their first Winner’s Bracket match to Shopify Rebellion after Pool Play, it was perfection or nothing for OpTic Gaming. TSM, Infamous, Team Nemesis, Spacestation Gaming, FaZe Clan – all were swept aside as OpTic made their miraculous run to the Grand Final, with the team only dropping a total of three maps across all of those matches.
As far as Loser’s Bracket runs go, this might be one of the greatest in the history of competitive Halo. Team Nemesis were showing that European Halo can still be a threat, Spacestation Gaming had a point to prove after their victorious 2024, and FaZe Clan had shown up as dark horses throughout HCS Major Arlington 2025. The quality of the competition really gives important context to the achievement on display.
Then, it was Shopify Rebellion in the Grand Final, with OpTic managing to get their revenge for that first Winner’s Bracket defeat. Remember, coming from the Loser’s Bracket, OpTic had to win two best-of-seven series to bring this one back in the Grand Final, which included a nail-biting 4:3 that took the trophy win down to the wire. It’s not about how you start, but about how you finish, and it’s OpTic Gaming taking home the lion’s share of HCS Major Arlington 2025’s $250,000 prize pool.
OpTic’s Renegade puts on all-timer performance en route to glory
As with any Major victory, OpTic won HCS Major Arlington 2025 via team effort, with every player pulling their weight along the way. But I’d be failing to do my job correctly if I didn’t highlight Renegade’s form throughout this Major, standing out from the crowd with an individual performance rivalling anything we’ve seen in recent memory.
Plucked from a FaZe Clan roster with a single tournament win in 2024, Renegade has always been capable of having these pop-off moments, but didn’t quite have the full trophy cabinet to back it up. Here, he was determined as he helped drag OpTic back from the brink during their Loser’s Bracket run, averaging a tournament-high 1.37 Kill/Death ratio as well as 18.48 kills per game. There can be absolutely no doubt about who the MVP was at HCS Major Arlington 2025.
Now, the road to DreamHack Dallas begins. Do you think OpTic will continue to live up to their “superteam” identity, or will we see a more varied set of Halo champions throughout 2025?
