Johan Sundstein, who was born on October 8, 1993, is better known as N0tail. He is a professional Dota 2 player from Denmark and the Faroe Islands who plays for the team OG. As a member of OG, he has competed in four versions of The International tournament, winning it in 2018 and 2019. He has also won four Major championships.

Early years

Sundstein was born on October 8, 1993. He grew up in Denmark with Faroese parents. His grandfather was Jógvan Sundstein, a former prime minister of the Faroe Islands. Sundstein started playing video games at age two, starting with Mario on the Nintendo Game Boy and Pokémon. He left high school early to focus on esports. Sundstein became one of the youngest professional Heroes of Newerth players at age 15, playing the solo middle role. He began by playing casual games on HoN servers. Later, he joined forces with Jascha "NoVa" Markuse and Tal "Fly" Aizik. The manager of Fnatic noticed them and supported their efforts as an unofficial project. This marked the start of Johan's professional esports career.

Professional career

At the age of 15, N0tail met Jascha "NoVa" Markuse and Tal "Fly" Aizik while playing a video game. They decided to play together as a team. The group became part of a project managed by Danijel "StreeT" Remus from Fnatic. Later, after changes in Fnatic's Heroes of Newerth team and strong performances by N0tail and his friends, they joined Fnatic's original players, Henrik "FreshPro" Hansen and Kalle "Trixi" Saarinen. The team began winning online tournaments and earned their first live event victory at DreamHack Winter 2011. With his team, Johan won first place in four consecutive DreamHack events.

Because professional Heroes of Newerth competitions became less active, N0tail and his teammates, Jascha Markuse, Tal Aizik, and Adrian Kryeziu, moved to Fnatic's European Dota 2 team on March 30, 2012. After a difficult start in Dota 2, N0tail and Fnatic.EU won the Thor Open LAN on December 9, 2012, defeating No Tidehunter, now known as Alliance. Following this win, Fnatic.EU dominated the professional scene until The International 2013, where they placed 7–8th after losing to team Orange, which later became the Fnatic squad.

After not winning any major tournaments and placing 13–14th in The International 2014, N0tail left Fnatic with Fly to form Team Secret, inviting Puppey, s4, and Kuroky to join. After several strong performances in five tournaments, Puppey asked N0tail to leave and brought in Arteezy for the Dota 2 Asia Championships. N0tail then joined Cloud9, replacing Aui 2000. However, after many disappointing results and finishing 9–12th in The International 2015, Cloud9 released its team. On August 28, 2015, N0tail and Fly, who had also left Team Secret, formed a new team called (monkey) Business, which included Miracle-, MoonMeander, Cr1t-, Fly, and N0tail.

Following strong performances, (monkey) Business became the team known as OG. They became the first team to win a Major title twice in Dota 2 history after winning the Autumn Major in 2016. Despite a slow start in The International 2018, OG finished fourth and advanced to the main event. Considered underdogs throughout the tournament, OG and Sundstein reached the grand finals and won The International 2018 by defeating PSG.LGD in a best-of-five series 3–2. The next year, OG won The International 2019, making N0tail and his team the first to win the tournament twice. N0tail was named to Forbes' 30 Under 30 list at age 25. He is the highest-earning esports player in history, having earned over $7 million in prize money throughout his career.