Maka: "When we heard MongolZ say it's easy to play against us, we took it personally"

After a series of near misses, 3DMAX hope to break through the playoffs barrier at PGL Bucharest.

In a continuation of their year-long rivalry, 3DMAX took their revenge on The MongolZ in the opening round of PGL Bucharest after three consecutive losses in the matchup.

The opening victory sets the Frenchmen up for success in their goal to break through to playoffs. The team had shown signs of competitiveness but have yet to make it deep into tournaments in 2025, and a Bucharest tournament that is missing some of the top teams could be the opportunity to do so.

That's what Bryan "⁠Maka⁠" Canda says in an interview with HLTV, in which the AWPer-IGL also talks about the rivalry with the Mongolians and the first victory in Bucharest, their upcoming four-tournament run up to the BLAST.tv Austin Major, and the evolution with latest addition Alexandre "⁠bodyy⁠" Pianaro.

You can listen to the interview here.

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You just beat The MongolZ, and it had been quite some time since you guys beat them, right? It seems it always happens on Ancient and Anubis, but you needed to throw in Inferno this time. You won the first two matches, then they won the next three. Tell me about this back-and-forth between The MongolZ and 3DMAX.

We played The MongolZ for the first time at Skyesports, and we played super relaxed. I can remember it because we didn't prepare for the match, and it was a special event. We won easily, I would say. I think coming into EPL, when we won the second time, they tried to figure out how to play against us, and I think they found a way to play against us.

I even heard them say that they know how we play, that it's pretty much easy to play against us, so when we heard that, we took it personally. We went deep during those three weeks when we prepared for this LAN, and when we found out we were playing The MongolZ, we prepared that match pretty well. It helped a lot.

You had several losses against them, and it looked like they had you figured out. This time, on Ancient, you were so close to taking it. It was in those last few rounds that they just got the best of you. What is it about those tight moments that you couldn't push through?

Ancient was pretty much clear on how we played and how we wanted to play, on both sides. wasiNk, our coach, did a good game plan, and we followed it almost 80% of the game. When we followed it, it was pretty much good, and I think that at the end we lost some composure and some cool, and I feel like it could be seen in the comms. We were lacking some utility to finish the rounds, we were losing the identity we must have on Ancient, and I think that's why we went from 11-8 to 11-13.

On Anubis you started off really strong, then The MongolZ were trying to bring it back on the T side, but this time you could push it through. Tell me a bit about keeping them at bay in those final few rounds and not allowing them to push it to overtime.

It wasn't as easy on Anubis as it was on Inferno or Ancient because we didn't prepare this map a lot, so we just followed the fundamentals we put on this map and what we think we had to do to win against them. To close this map, I think we kept what makes us strong, like having a clear intention to play some part of the map to kill them and we respected ourselves. We followed strictly what we think, and we did exactly what we wanted, and that worked pretty well to close the map.

One of the things I heard, listening to one of the broadcast interviews you did talking about bodyy coming into the team, is that it wasn't the players' call, it was management's, and how you didn't really know what to expect, but how he has been helping with his experience; being another voice in the team and helping your leadership. Tell me about how that relationship is growing now that you've had some time.

We understand each other pretty well outside of the game, and when it comes to the game, especially with years passing by when he played in fnatic and DBL PONEY and I played on different French teams, we have some different understandings of CS, especially since we're both IGLs. Being able to cook together in the same team is not hard, but we have to listen carefully to each other. I think listening is the most important part, and of course, he helped me improve my leadership and every aspect of being a good in-game leader.

There's also the aspect of him entrying. Djoko was a guy who had very good first bullet aim, but how has bodyy's way of opening rounds helped the team, and how would you say that differs from what you had before?

We can see a good improvement with bodyy. He can entry, and Djoko used to entry, too, but bodyy has his feeling of playing the game, and his way of playing the game, so we kind of try to build around [him] sometimes and sometimes he builds around us, so that's what makes it cool.

With Djoko, it was kind of like, I'd send Djoko and Graviti to go kill, and it was kind of like this. With bodyy, it's more deep thinking. Is it good? Is it appropriate to the game plan? Is it appropriate for the team we're playing against? And yeah, he's able to put numbers even though it's quite hard to play those roles. Especially when you're new in a roster, so yeah, he fits pretty well.

You're getting a lot of accolades for being a good tactical team, and NBK said that maybe the fact that you all speak French is helpful for having small variations on tactics and things like that. What do you make of being seen as a solid team on a tactical level, and what do you make of NBK-'s comments?

I think NBK- is kind of right. Being able to have deep conversations outside of the game, concerning the game, and being able to put some fast variations during freeze times because we're speaking our national language — it helps us a lot.

For the tactical part, it's cool to hear that we have a good understanding of the meta, actually. We work a lot with the coaching staff, both wasiNk and YouKnow, they work pretty well with me, and as I said, bodyy adds like 10 or 15 percent, but it helps a lot.

We tend to have a clear identity of how we want to play, although sometimes we switch up some little things before the match because we play some different opponent. But yeah, it's cool to know that people respect us in that way.

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Guys like Graviti and Ex3rcice, the newer generation, were they brought in to be built into star players or are they more fitting into a system? They aren't always standing out, and a lot of times when you see younger players come into a team it's like, 'Okay, you're going to be the big fraggers,' and the more experienced players bring the structure. Here maybe it's more of a systems thinking?

I'd say it's more of a systems thinking, and even though they fit pretty well, I think that, especially Ex3rcice, he's the kind of player that can fit in many systems. He can listen carefully to his teammates, their needs, and every role he plays he's worrying a lot. I feel like in the past three months, he grew into a top player.

Graviti, when he came into the team, we considered that he wasn't a rookie even if it felt like he was. Every time we said to him, 'You can be the second voice of the team, you have the fuel, the energy to help the team be better,' and now that we have bodyy, he helps him a lot because he takes some of that responsibility on his shoulder. I think that helps a lot because he feels more relaxed playing, and he's been growing really well this year in the few LANs we played.

You caught some flak from an interview with B1ad3, in which he said low-level trashtalk could be a reason to not shake hands. I saw you clown emojied it with a photo of jL giving the finger. What did you make of those comments and being thrown under the bus in that interview?

It was a Twitter thing, I like to have some banter, but I respect NAVI and jL a lot. I always respected jL, the way he was, but what I didn't like in B1ad3's interview was phrasing it like people shouldn't shake hands with 3DMAX.

We had a quick talk with B1ad3 and it will remain private, of course, but what I think is... It's a competition, we show some attitude and some competitiveness towards the enemy team. We respect the other guys a lot; I think it went bad once because Graviti went into deep trash talk and bad insults, it wasn't good, but we tend to talk a lot about it, and I think it's the fuel of the team, to be better we have to scream, we have to feel Graviti's energy. It's his identity as a player, so yeah...

In the end, not shaking hands for me is way worse than anything else because if you don't shake hands at the end, it's like opening some way of thinking that you're hating each other. Like for example, XANTARES and jL, maybe there wasn't clearly any hate between each other, and I think that not shaking hands was a way to open some way to hate each other. I think [not] shaking hands is the worst part of everything.

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You're in this position that I've seen called as the tier two gatekeepers, like you're above all of the tier two teams, but you don't quite make it into the top of the top teams. Where do you think you are on your journey as a team, and what will it take for a team like 3DMAX to take the next step?

It's been discussed a lot between the coaches and I. It's funny because we kind of expect to do better and play some playoff games. Of course, we want to make deep runs, but at the same time, it feels like in past events, we lacked something to make it that far.

I would say we're kind of the tier two gatekeepers, like you said, but it's hard to say now because we're only three months into the year. There's four events coming before the Major for us, so I'd say for now we're playoff contenders at most PGL events because there are no top, top teams, and at the other events we are able to make the playoffs, but it's 50-50. Like at Melbourne or Dallas, I'm pretty sure we can make it, but it's harder because there's Vitality, Spirit, and all of those top teams.

So how important is it — and also, it's a studio event, so it's more calm, although it has the money and other good teams are here — for a team like you to have a good showing here and to say 'Okay, when the super top teams aren't here, we can be the ones to step up?'

In some ways, it's very important, but in another way, we approach — especially me — this event like the first of four events before the Major. It's a long road because we're going to be going to three events in one month. It's going to be pretty exhausting, so we have the expectation of making it to playoffs in Bucharest, but not high expectations because I don't want us to be burnt out after this event.

There's YaLLa Compass coming up, there's also Melbourne, so we're going game by game. I said it to BanKs, we're going game by game, day by day, and just working on ourselves. If we make it to the playoffs, then we aim to go for the title, because once you get to the playoffs, for me, you're a contender to the title even though people don't expect you to. In CS history, there have been so many teams able to reach the finals when we didn't expect them to, from the Majors to bigger events...

As you said, we're only a couple of months into the year, but at the same time it feels like there's so much CS being played now compared to other years. How are you dealing with this amount of traveling and playing?

It was pretty exhausting for the first months because we went to Katowice, then to Cluj, then EPL with the addition of bodyy, and it was pretty exhausting to add him into the team because we had to work a lot. Now, since EPL, we've had time to rest and we come into this part of the season as if it's a new season.

We had three weeks of break to work a lot and rest a lot, and now, as I said, the two upcoming months up to the Major are going to be like a new season for us in our head. As you said, there's so much CS now, so it's hard to reset between every event, but for us, what we do with bodyy starts now; what happened before wasn't the real us because we didn't work a lot.

Do you feel reinvigorated now that bodyy came? As you get into this rhythm with travel and events, do you think the addition of a new player will help the team with some outside motivation, or kind of refreshing the team?

I don't know. I think the best way for us to be fresh and refresh between the coming events is to be able to cut between games and have some intimacy and time alone, and also have some time to share with the team, like some meetings to eat or walk, that helps us a lot.

In the end, as I said, we don't aim to win PGL Bucharest, we all agreed on that. We want to, but it's not what we aim for, and if it happens, then it's like, 'Oh, it's crazy it happened,' but if it doesn't happen we just keep working, we keep working on the path to the Major and it's like a process. We're a team that struggled to qualify for the Major in the past years, DBL PONY, or my teams. When we qualified last year, it was like a process.

Every time we went to an event, EPL, Skyesports, or Thunderpick in November, it was like, 'OK guys, it happens because it's a process. We have to make it work for the Major.' So now, the process for us is to keep beating the top 10 [teams], and to keep beating the top 10 we need be able to focus event by event.

I also heard someone making some comments, I think it was Dust [Mouret] before the match, he was giving you a little shoutout for calling well and being a good fragger, and you're also AWPing. What do you make of that recognition?

I'm pretty proud of it because I've been working a lot lately, especially the last year with the new additions of Graviti and the new coach, wasiNk. I worked a lot on every aspect of my game, on my attitude, my way of approaching the game, and everything else.

You can see stats and everything, but if you keep the eye test and just watch the games, I like to play for the team. For example, today I played a lot of MAC-10s on Inferno to show the way, the path to win to the team, and I think I can do pretty much everything and the team can rely on me on a lot of things besides calling.

I don't expect to be a big star player like other AWPers, but I try to keep in my mind that I'm still an AWPer and have to put up numbers. It's not my primary focus for now, and I'd love to put up better numbers, but the way the team is playing is fine for me, so if one day I'm struggling too much and I bring down the team, I'll think of it, but for now I'm pretty confident in every aspect of my game.

The AWPer-IGL is kind of out of the meta these days, right? It's a bit of a relic of the past, but there you are keeping that up. Is there some pride in that, as well?

Yeah, pretty much because I started playing CS in 2016 or 2017, and back in the day, it was FalleN with the Brazilian teams. I felt like I was a voice in my noob teams with my friends, I was always giving instructions, and even in my life, when I was playing sports, I was always giving a way to play together. Be it football or any other sport. It has always been a part of me, and when I saw FalleN doing this, I like the AWP, so I thought, 'it could be a good match, but it's gonna be hard.' I kept it up, and I think it works pretty well today.