15-Year Old Bocchi Bullied Following Victory Over Pro Player

It hasn’t been a great two weeks for Smash. Following the passing last week of YouTuber and Smash player Etika, many thought that the community would work to eradicate social media attacks or at least work to be more supportive of each other. Sadly, not even a week has gone by and trouble has already started to rumble.

Bocchi, a local Smash player in New York renowned for her Isabelle play, recently defeated top-ten pro Ally in a local weekly tournament hosted by AON Gaming. The major upset shocked the community, especially considering how young Bocchi is (15-years of age) and her usage of what many consider an arguably weaker character in the game, with many rightfully congratulating her on upsetting a player often considered one of the best in the world.

The Bocchi Story Evolves

However, after several days social media attention quickly turned sour, and fans of Ally began to quickly attack Bocchi, mocking her gender and age while dismissing her win against Ally. The attacks hit such an extreme that Bocchi was forced to release a statement on Twitter (now deleted) in which she states she’s leaving behind both her account and the name Bocchi, along with the shocking announcement she may be giving up Smash citing, “All this stress, all this torture just because people like me and its a game.”

The announcement sent shockwaves throughout the Smash community, with many shocked that such a close-knit community could do such a thing so shortly after the events leading up to Etika’s death. The sentiment was made worse after many pros expressed their disappointment and sadness over Ally’s announced retirement, a whole other controversy of its own, than supporting Bocchi, and especially over Ally’s failure to even attempt to reign in his fanbase over the attacks.

While drama has always been the lifeblood of Smash, these past few weeks will hopefully see the Smash community finally doing some soul searching and reflect on what kind of people they allow into their scene.

Many online have come out and said that these attacks are carried out by a vocal minority, but if it keeps happening time and time again, is it really a small minority anymore? And what does that say about the community that this keeps being allowed to happen? Whether or not it really is a minuscule group attacking others, it’s up to the community to police its actions, and see to it that problems like this never happen again.