It All Started with Blizzard
Dota was born from the Aeon of Strife mod in StarCraft: Brood War, a hack created by fans in 1998, quickly becoming very popular to integrate, a few years later, to Warcraft 3. This is how MOBA was born, a new type of game, reinventing the cooperative mode, although limited to four players per team (at the time). Not to mention fights that are sometimes a little too simple, mainly focused on standard attacks.
In the end, Aeon of Strife is a kind of distant cousin of DOTA, since another mod, designed in Warcraft 3, was born in the 2000s: Defence of the Ancients, or Dota. Kyle “Eul” Sommer is the creator of Dota, whose game is very similar to Dota 2, but with fewer features. Five players compete on a three-way map in an attempt to destroy the opposing base: Dota’s foundations are laid. The problem is that Eul didn’t realize that it was designing a new kind of video game (and one of the most profitable), to the point of abandoning the development of Dota shortly after launching it. He tried to make up a lack of intuition by trying to create a sequel, without success, before ceding his property to Valve Dota 2.
Parallel versions to Dota 2 also include Dota Allstars, designed by Steve “Guinsoo” Feak. The latter, associated with Steve ” Pendragon ” Mescon, has built most of the hubs of the Dota community. A fact of arms that leads him directly to the gates of Riot Games, where he participates in the development of League Of Legends. After ceding his position to a mysterious developer named IceFrog, who has since become one of Dota’s most powerful designers and managers. With the launch of League of Legends and Heroes of Newerth, the MOBA genre quickly became a very lucrative business. And to get the best out of it, Dota’s developers realized that it was necessary to stand out while remaining relevant. Both in terms of supply and content, for that matter. That’s when Valve arrived.
The First Out of the Ordinary Tournaments
In 2009, Ice Frog announced that it was joining Valve, before officially unveiling Dota 2 in2010. In 2011, a beta version was released online, which was enthusiastically received by the international press.
Public stunned at International 2
The same year, The International 2 took place in Seattle with an outstanding prize pool of $1.6 million. The event – broadcast live worldwide – brings together an even broader base of players, facing a whole new version, featuring a much larger pool of heroes. In just a few years, Dota 2 has grown massively, allowing the game to reach Steam’s top sales during 2013. Valve also relied on crowdfunding, which added more than $1 million to the final prize pool. Thus, the TI3 turned out to be an epic tournament for Dota, closed with an epic finale between Natus and Vincere. Since then, Dota 2 has built a solid reputation through its tournaments, pulverizing crowdfunding revenue (more than $20 million raised at TI6) donated entirely to the prize pool.