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OG, TNC, Keen gaming qualify for TI, one more spot still up for grabs Dota 2 OG, TNC, Keen gaming qualify for TI, one more spot still up for grabs By Fariha Bhatti ana carries OG past Team Secret, upsetting top Dota Pro Circuit team Dota 2 ana carries OG past Team Secret, upsetting top Dota Pro Circuit team By gabhernandez Battle Pass owners receive Dark Willow announcer pack, more content Dota 2 Battle Pass owners receive Dark Willow announcer pack, more content By Fariha Bhatti
OG upset Evil Geniuses at Epicenter Major despite N0tail absence Dota 2
OG upset Evil Geniuses at Epicenter Major despite N0tail absence Steven Rondina Evil Geniuses’ run at the Epicenter Major was a stunningly short one. Despite being one of the favorites to win the tournament, the boys in blue were among the first teams sent home. Playing in a best-of-one in the first round of the lower bracket, EG was dealt a surprising loss from a shorthanded OG. OG captain and support player Johan “N0tail” Sundstein was shelved for the team in Moscow …
Dota Underlords beta rockets to 170,000 players after one day Dota 2
Dota Underlords beta rockets to 170,000 players after one day gabhernandez Just 24 hours after the launch of the game’s open beta, Dota Underlords has hit more than 170,000 concurrent players. Dota Underlords is a standalone game inspired by the immense popularity of Dota Auto Chess. The game was initially released exclusively to Battle Pass owners. Battle Pass owners were also rewarded with three “friends beta keys” to share with others. Valve revealed the future of Auto Chess in a May …
Matumbaman lands with Chaos Esports Club after split from Team Liquid Dota 2
Matumbaman lands with Chaos Esports Club after split from Team Liquid Steven Rondina The qualifiers to The International 2019 are fast approaching and organizations are looking for a way to sneak into the event. Among that lot is Chaos Esports Club. The former South American staple’s move to Europe didn’t pay off with a spot in the Epicenter Major and that has the team making big changes ahead of TI9. The organization has announced the acquisition of former Team Liquid core player Lasse …
$1 million Auto Chess tournament announced by Drodo Studio Dota 2
$1 million Auto Chess tournament announced by Drodo Studio Steven Rondina Drodo Studio is taking a page out of Valve’s playbook. The original creator of Dota Auto Chess and designer of its Epic Games Store-exclusive standalone version has begun detailing its esports plans for the title. The first stop is a tournament for the game that features an eye-catching $1 million prize pool. “We are pleased to announce that Drodo Studio, Dragonest Network, and ImbaTV will bring you the Auto Chess …
Mineski cuts Ahjit after disappointing Dota Pro Circuit run Dota 2 Mineski cuts Ahjit after disappointing Dota Pro Circuit run By gabhernandez Fnatic Abed hits 10K MMR, setting record in new Dota 2 rankings Dota 2 Fnatic Abed hits 10K MMR, setting record in new Dota 2 rankings By gabhernandez W33 joins Team Liquid for Epicenter Major, replacing Matumbaman Dota 2 W33 joins Team Liquid for Epicenter Major, replacing Matumbaman By Steven Rondina
First Dota Underlords live event tournament announced by ESL Dota 2
First Dota Underlords live event tournament announced by ESL Steven Rondina Dota Underlords might just become a prominent esports title before long. One week after being officially announced by Valve, the first live event for the game has been announced by ESL. The competition will take place alongside the ESL One Hamburg 2019 Dota 2 tournament that kicks off on October 20. Few details on the tournament were announced by ESL outside of it featuring a 5,000 euro prize pool. No …
The International 2019 schedule announced, qualifier dates confirmed Dota 2
The International 2019 schedule announced, qualifier dates confirmed Steven Rondina The International 2019 starts long before the doors open to the Mercedes-Benz Arena in Shanghai. Valve has announced the dates for the qualifiers to TI9. The action begins with the open qualifiers, which kick off on July 3 and run through July 7. The regional qualifiers begin the next day on July 8 and close on July 15. All six regions will follow the same schedule and each only has …
Twitch suing trolls who streamed porn and gore in Artifact category Dota 2
Twitch suing trolls who streamed porn and gore in Artifact category Olivia Richman Still bothered by the inappropriate activity on Twitch’s Artifact category last month? Well, Twitch is looking to do something about it. The streaming platform is suing the spammers and trolls who bombarded the Artifact streaming category not only with copyrighted content, but also with disturbing pornography and grahic gore.  On June 14, Twitch filed a lawsuit in California against “John and Jane Does 1 through 100,” anonymous streamers who were …
NiP beat Alliance in StarLadder Minor to establish TI9 hopefuls Dota 2
NiP beat Alliance in StarLadder Minor to establish TI9 hopefuls Steven Rondina The competitive field for the Epicenter Major was rounded out at the StarLadder Minor. On paper, Ninjas in Pyjamas are the winners of the event after toppling Alliance in the grand finals. In reality, both teams are likely satisfied with the results as they each punch a ticket to Moscow for the final event of the Dota Pro Circuit season. The win didn’t come easily for NiP. Monster performances from …
Dota Underlords is new Dota Auto Chess standalone game from Valve Steven Rondina Dota 2 Details about Valve’s standalone Dota Auto Chess game have emerged. The company released a post on the official Dota 2 blog detailing the launch of a closed beta for Dota Underlords, the company’s own take on the wildly popular user-made game mode. In addition to finally confirming the game’s name and existence, Valve also gave out some details on its release and revenue structure. This comes at a time when …
Team Liquid kicks MATUMBAMAN from Dota 2 roster before Epicenter Major Steven Rondina Dota 2 With a spot in The International 2019 locked up, Team Liquid has made a big change to its Dota 2 roster. The organization has announced longtime core player Lasse “MATUMBAMAN” Urpalainen has been deactivated from the lineup after almost four years with the team. The news was revealed on Twitter, and was acknowledged by Matumbaman shortly thereafter. “We would like to announce that Lasse “MATUMBAMAN” Urpalainen has been moved out …
Auto Chess game on PC will be exclusive to Epic Games Store Steven Rondina Dota 2 Valve probably isn’t happy with Drodo Studio right now. The creators of the wildly popular Dota Auto Chess custom game mode split off from Valve earlier this year to create a mobile version of the game. That Dota-free version of Auto Chess is now set to be ported to PC and it will be exclusive to the Epic Games Store. The news was announced at PC Gamer’s E3 keynote alongside …
Dota 2 update 7.22c changes up favorite heroes of pro players Steven Rondina Dota 2 The latest Dota 2 update has arrived and a lot of heroes are reaping the benefits of it. After the 7.22b patch brought a handful of pointed nerfs, 7.22c has arrived and brings dozens of buffs. Though many of these changes will go unnoticed by most players, they give a little bit of help to some of the heroes that have been falling behind in the current meta. For the …
Team Secret beat Evil Geniuses for the title at ESL One Birmingham Steven Rondina Dota 2 Team Secret’s trophy mantel is quickly running out of space. The organization won its sixth tournament this season, taking the top prize at ESL One Birmingham. Secret hoisted the trophy after a long run through the lower bracket and closed things out by besting Evil Geniuses 3-2 in the grand finals. The different approaches the teams take to Dota 2 were immediately obvious in game one. Evil Geniuses focused all …
TI9 tickets sold out due to scalpers, being resold for $1,800 Olivia Richman Dota 2 Hopefully, true Dota 2 fans have already purchased their tickets for The International.  Prices for TI9 have spiked to an insane $1,800 since their May 24 release. Many Dota 2 fans are blaming the skyrocketing ticket prices on scalpers. Tickets for the major Dota 2 event were sold out within minutes.  The 26,804 tickets Valve had made available in the Chinese market were sold out the instant they became avaialable …
Evil Geniuses start to break third-place curse at ESL One Birmingham Steven Rondina News Evil Geniuses hasn’t won ESL One Birmingham yet, but the organization still scored a key victory. On day five of the event, the North American team managed to topple PSG.LGD 2-0 in the upper bracket finals. That would be a big win for the team under any circumstances, but it also helps EG break an unfortunate streak. The boys in blue have looked exceptional throughout ESL One Birmingham, and that …
Twitch now requires two-way authentication thanks to Artifact trolls Olivia Richman Dota 2 Disturbing and illegal streams under the Dota 2 card game Artifact’s category have caused Twitch to change the platform’s streaming requirements.  Twitch’s struggling Artifact section was recently taken over by trolls. At first the streams, filed under Artifact, were showing copywrighted movies and anime. That already violated Twitch’s terms of service, but the trolls decided to take it one step further. When the streams started showing beheadings, mass shootings, and more, …
EternalEnVy leaves Beastcoast after failing to qualify for major Steven Rondina Dota 2 Jacky “EternalEnVy” Mao’s world tour continues on. The controversial carry player is splitting off from his latest team, Beastcoast, alongside support player Timothy “tmt” Ong. The organization announced the news on its website. “When we signed Team Team at the beginning of May for the MDL Major we had the highest of hopes for our success,” Beastcoast said in a statement. “Unfortunately since then our performance hasn’t been at the …
Collector’s Cache voting exclusive to Battle Pass owners in new round gabhernandez Dota 2 Battle Pass owners can now vote for the sets to be featured in this year’s Collector’s Cache. In its blog post, Valve announced a change to the final selection process for The International 2019 Collector’s Cache. 83 unique and innovative sets made the cut on the final list. The International 2019 Battle Pass owners have the option to like or dislike 83 sets on the game’s loadout. The sets can …
Evil Geniuses acquired by PEAK6 Investments LLC, loses independence Fariha Bhatti News The Evil Geniuses organization has been acquired by Chicago-based technology and investment firm PEAK6 Investments LLC. No financial details have been released, but changes are already afoot at the organization, with Nicole LaPointe Jameson being appointed as CEO. Phillip Aram, who has been running EG since the departure of Peter “PPD” Dager as CEO, will be continuing on with EG as COO. PEAK6 co-founder Jenny Just offered that the organization’s …
Artifact devs discuss the launch, fate, and future of Artifact Steven Rondina Dota 2 Artifact was supposed to be a slam dunk. Bringing the collectible card game format to the Steam infrastructure, supported by themes and characters pulled from popular MOBA Dota 2,  seemed like an easy win. Valve is known for hitting home runs with its game releases. And with the creator of Magic: The Gathering at the helm, success would seem all but guaranteed Instead, Artifact has thus far shaken out to …

Few games have proven to have the resilient popularity enjoyed by Dota 2. The multiplayer online battle arena, or MOBA for short, has been among the biggest and most successful projects released by gaming giant Valve, and it continues to enjoy great popularity to this day.

That popularity has endured despite a great number of changes that have been made to both the game itself and to the communities surrounding it. The competitive title’s history reaches all the way back to another game created and published by another developer, but with Valve now leading the way, Dota 2 seems primed to last well into the future.

From Blizzard to Valve, Dota 2 continues to evolve

While know today as one of Valve’s key game properties, Dota 2 has its origins in a real-time strategy game developed and published by famed video game company Blizzard. One of the franchises that keyed Blizzard’s success and reputational growth in the games industry is WarCraft, which today is best-known for the popular massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) World of Warcraft.

But prior to the success of World of Warcraft, the high-fantasy franchise was experienced through a series of RTS games. The third main title in that series, WarCraft 3, provided players not only with a great experience right out of the box, but also with the opportunity to heavily modify the game and its functions, and to play modified versions of the experience as custom games online with other players.

The most popular of these custom game modes was arguably Defense of the Ancients, or DotA for short. This custom game mode saw two teams of players face off against each other with strong individual champion characters, as opposed to building out complex home bases and developing broad armies of diverse units.

It was an entirely different way to play the game, and it proved so popular that would eventually give birth to an entirely new genre of video games: the MOBA genre.

The continuation of the original DotA became Dota 2, a project developed under the guidance of famed developer and publisher Valve. Flush with success from online marketplace Steam and its own franchises including Half-Life and Portal, Valve was more than willing to invest in this new and innovative game type.

The International sets Dota 2 apart

While there have been many other competitive games created and released since, including other popular MOBAs such as Riot Games’ League of Legends, Dota 2 has stood apart for remaining true to its roots and for massive competitive events like The International. First held in 2011 for the purpose of bringing together disparate competitive teams from all around the world with more than $1 million on the line, the esports tournament quickly grew into the biggest such event of each calendar year.

One of the main drivers behind that immense growth was the upwards trajectory of the tournament’s prize pool. Partially funded by Dota 2 players and esports fans, the prize pool for The International began increasing in 2013 and eventually ballooned to a massive total of over $40 million by the time 2021 rolled around. For the groups of players and coaches who climbed this mountain and won its top prize, it was a truly life-changing event.

For varied reasons, Valve eventually soured on running the event itself and on the idea of having so much money filtered into one specific event. Prize winnings were dropped significantly in 2022, and even further for the 2023 and 2024 events. But despite the prizes on hand no longer being quite so astronomical, The International still boasts a prize in the low millions, and it remains the biggest event on the Dota 2 competitive calendar and arguably on the greater esports calendar across all games.