Former Overwatch pro begs Marvel Rivals players to let him ‘move on’ with that C9 meme

Marvel Rivals has brought back the joy of Overwatch in its heyday: crazy hero interactions, legendary plays and of course critical mistakes that cost the entire game. Overwatch’s The infamous “C9” meme has made a comeback, and one of the former esports players responsible for it wishes it hadn’t.

“The growing popularity of Marvel Rivals means a lot of new players are learning what a ‘C9’ (IS) is and that I created it. PLEASE LET ME CONTINUE,” wrote Lucas “Mendo” Håkansson on X (formerly Twitter).

Håkansson played on Cloud9’s Overwatch team in 2017 and was partially responsible for popularizing a term that is still used in the community today. The C9 meme was born in during a match Overwatch Apex Season 2 where Håkansson’s team failed to hit the target and lost the round despite winning the fight decisively. And then they made the same mistake three more times, causing people to spam “C9 LUL” in the Twitch chat. Håkansson happened to be the obvious culprit in the third round when he ignored the point to earn an ultimate victory over Soldier:76, but the meme was a team effort.

C9 is the first thing you see in the chat anytime Overwatch players are too distracted by getting kills to complete the goal, and it starts to appear Marvel Rivals now too. It doesn’t help that loads are coming in Marvel Rivals keep moving based on which team last touched them, which is surprisingly common for C9s. It’s the curse of team-based games, where there’s so much else going on that it’s easy to assume someone else will handle the objective for you. It’s ten times more embarrassing when you’re on a professional team and no one takes responsibility.

Even if the exact definition is still debated Reddit threads (does it count if the point is too dangerous to step on?), Marvel Rivals proves that as long as there is a purpose to ignore, there will be a C9.