British Call of Duty pro, Charlie “Hicksy” Hicks, has announced his retirement. Tributes have been paid to the Brit both as a teammate and a friend by his fellow Call of Duty professionals.
The Englishman’s announcement came suddenly, just weeks after Hicksy’s last competitive performance with the CDC team, FiveFears (5F), who finished 5-8th in the Esports World Cup CoD Bo6 tournament.
A long road to CDL, with a big payoff
The decision brings to an end a seven-and-a-half-year career in Call of Duty, which saw Hicksy compete largely at the Challenger level before finally breaking through to the CDL in 2022 with Toronto Ultra, initially as a substitute while part of Ultra Academy NA.
Upon promotion to the main roster, Hicksy won his first-ever professional LAN tournament, winning Call of Duty League 2023 Major 3 with Toronto Ultra, putting him in company with OpTic Legend Seth ‘Scump’ Abner.
The Brit went on to finish runner-up at CDL Championship 2023. Despite losing to NY Subliners in the Grand Final, the second-place finish bagged the roster $660,000, the highest tournament earnings of Hicksy’s career.
Despite the strong finish, with the CDL being a brutal and volatile environment for players, Toronto Ultra opted not to extend Hicksy’s contract and the Brit was released just days after that career high watermark.
The Brit would not return to a CDL event until 2025, playing with Vancouver Surge for the Major 1 split, but was replaced by Travis ‘Neptune’ McCloud soon after.
Faced with the brutal reality of the Call of Duty scene, perhaps fighting for months simply to get another chance at CDL is not worth it for the Brit, who has earned a reported $300,000 in career prize money alone.
The Call of Duty scene is currently going through a historic offseason, with dozens of players in Free Agency. The emergence of Mason ‘Mercules’ Ramsey and OpTic’s re-found form has led to the majority of teams making drastic changes to upend the esports betting sites favourites for CDL League 2026.
Tributes paid to Hicksy upon retirement announcement
Fellow Brit Ben ‘Beans’ McMellon was one of the first to celebrate Hicksy’s career, posting a photo of them at LAN together.
Byron ‘Nastie’ Plumridge, currently a free agent following his time at Vancouver Surge, also paid tribute to his fellow Englishman:
!00T’s Scrap, who Hicksy notably came up with at Toronto Ultra, posted “My dawg for life”
His old organisation, Toronto Ultra, also wished him the best.
Darragh Harbinson is an esports writer specialising in Counter-Strike. He has written for Esports News UK, Esports Insider, UKCSGO, Dexerto, and Rush B Media.