Elon Musk admits cheating in video game where he claimed world-class skills

Elon Musk has long boasted about his love for video games, calling them his “primary recreational activity.” “I’m 52 years old, my reflexes aren’t what they used to be, but I’ve been playing video games all my life,” he said in November 2023. He’s frequently mentioned that he uses video games as a form of relaxation and mental recalibration: “It calms my mind. Killing the demons in a video game calms the demons in my mind. If you play a tough video game, you can get into a state of flow which is very enjoyable.”

In November of this year Musk started bragging more. He said in a podcast that he was one of the top 20 players in the world at Diablo IV, a recently released action role-playing game set in a fictional realm where players advance by slaying demons. Weeks later, he flaunted his progress in another new game, Path of Exile 2.

With his unstoppable empire building as the owner of X, CEO of five other well-known companies, his successful entry into politics and so much praise as a gamer, more video game streamers and YouTubers began paying closer attention to Musk’s behavior while playing games in videos he posted. The buzz spread from X to Reddit, YouTube, and Twitch. In January, several viral videos emerged with titles like “Elon Musk is lying about being good at video games.”

The tension came to a head on Monday with a surprise twist: YouTuber NikoWrex, who has about 3,000 followers on both X and YouTube and describes himself as a “friend” of Musk, revealed a private conversation with the tycoon on X, with Musk’s permission.

In the conversation, Musk admitted to using two forms of cheating: one, having others play on his account to boost his level, and two, paying real money on external websites for weapons and services that can only be earned through significant in-game effort (a cheat known as RMT, or real money trading). To put these cheats into context, it’s like Musk boasting about running 10 kilometers in under 35 minutes, showing the time on his running app as proof, and recording himself sprinting the last 300 meters. In reality, though, the watch used to track his performance would almost always be worn by a professional runner. When it was handed over to Musk, he would run for a short distance while otherwise relying on an electric scooter.

The reasons Musk provides to NikoWrex are, basically, that everyone does it: “It’s impossible to beat players, especially from Asia, if you don’t do it [cheat], just like they do.” He then clarifies that whenever he has posted a video of him playing, it was actually him and not someone else. The point of all this, as NikoWrex — who admits to having helped Musk on occasion — makes clear, is that he plays well, he plays many, many hours, but not so many as to achieve those levels in overall game rankings. This type of cheating in complex games is a widespread but not accepted practice.

A close community

The video game community’s irritation with Musk is relevant because it has been a group traditionally aligned to the tech magnate and Donald Trump. Their passion for raw, even nasty, honesty and their anger at some progressive speeches gives them common ground. But now Musk has generated double frustration for, firstly, cheating, and then for not admitting it when he got caught. Some of the most highly rated comments in the videos revealing Musk’s shenanigans are sharp criticisms: “Imagine being the richest man in the world, having direct access to the next president, and still being one of the internet’s biggest losers.” “The richest man in the world is arguing (and losing) with a guy who used a dead rat as an alarm clock [Asmongold, whose other great feat is having done a live feed with a cockroach walking across his shirt].” “I’m starting to think these billionaires with great political ambitions are not really the people they publicly claim to be.”

There are two pillars to these complaints against Musk: one, if perhaps the most successful person in the world, who runs six of the most powerful companies on the planet, finds the time to also be one of the best at a random video game, how dumb and lazy are the rest of them? And two, if he really isn’t, as he has now admitted, what need did he have to take them for suckers and brag about it? If he does this with something as banal as video games, what else will he do it with?

The standard-bearer in this battle has above all been Zach Asmon, a streamer known as Asmongold, who dedicated several videos to Musk before the truth came out. In response, and in retaliation, Musk published an old private conversation with him, a message that he ended up deleting because it violated X’s policies. Asmon even accuses Musk of having withdrawn (and then returned) the blue verification check and of having taken away a gaming label that X grants to important accounts in its field.

In his latest video, Asmon illustratively summarizes the underlying problem with Musk’s position from within the community: “You can’t do this in front of everyone and expect people to say that the emperor is wearing a new suit, you can’t do it because you make everyone complicit in an obvious lie and [Musk] bought Twitter because the world was forced to be complicit in so many lies. Don’t see my criticism as a virus, it’s the vaccine, I say this so as not to have the same biases, double standards and nonsense that he and I have complained about for years. I’m not saying he’s the worst, or that he’s a terrible guy, but come on, if someone has played for you, then that’s fine, but don’t pretend that you did it.”

While all of this may seem like it’s only related to video games, it has a lot more to it. Musk has shown time and again that he seeks and accepts absurd praise whenever he can. In December, actor Duncan Trussell was interviewed by Joe Rogan, the world’s most popular podcaster. Trussell praised Musk: “Elon Musk is the top Diablo player in the world. Unless you’ve played Diablo IV you can’t understand what that means. It’s insane. When you realize this guy that’s shooting rockets into space, making EVs, starting a new department of the government, is also the top Diablo player, it’s the one time I let myself think maybe he actually is an alien.”

Rogan responds: “It seems so unlikely that if it was in a movie I’d go, ‘Shut up! He’s not the number one Diablo player. I don’t care how smart he is with rockets, electric cars, satellites, tunneling under the earth, owns X, and he’s tweeting 48 times an hour.‘”

Now that Musk himself has admitted that he is not actually the best Diablo player, all these grandiloquent statements (there are hundreds on the internet, especially on X), should be better explained. There are supposed fans with viral messages explaining their disappointment: “I have always been a fan of Elon, and I think that much of what the media says against him has been unfair or misleading. He has done many good things for society. But this story that he lied saying he was a ‘top 20′ gamer while having someone raise his account is really affecting me.” Musk took advantage of Trump’s inauguration and his confusing gesture of celebration to ignore this question, for now.

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