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#dota Like it's done with Team Fortress 2, Valve recently reached out to members of the Polycount forums to see who could make the best gear for its DOTA 2 game. More »

#dota Valve is pretty popular. So too are MOBA games like League of Legends. So I guess that explains why there's now over 150,000 people playing Valve's DOTA 2 at any given time before the game's even technically out. More »

Valve tested the Dota 2 experience on current-gen tablets and came away with a bad taste in its mouth, studio founder Gabe Newell told Kotaku. Today's tablets just weren't fast enough, apparently:

"We were working on getting Dota 2 running on some tablets," Newell said. "That ended up being kind of a disappointment. But the good news is that tablets are getting faster very quickly, so I think we'll get the kind of performance we want and other game developers want in the near future."

Dota 2 will come to PC and Mac at a future date that is sooner than originally planned, but still unannounced.

#dota Dota 2 on your iPad? It could happen. More »

Valve – little-known Washington-based developers of Richochet and Alien Swarm – have been working on another project for the past couple of years. It’s a remake of an obscure mod called “Defense Of The Ancients”. This unlikely sequel has been a surprise hit, with “computer gamers” from all over the world saying that it’s “quite good” and “maybe I’ll play just a bit more”. This rash streak of acceptance has recently culminated in a championship of some kind, mysteriously dubbed “The International 2012″.

Valve took their camcorders and video-phones along to capture the event – which took place in some kind of space center – as you can see below.(more…)

Online game publisher Nexon has announced that it's teaming up with Valve to bring the free-to-play Dota 2 to the Japanese and Korean markets. Dota 2 is of course based on a Warcraft 3 mod named Defense of the Ancients, and the multiplayer online battle arena style of gameplay, inspired by real-time strategy games, will likely appeal very much to those overseas markets. Valve's Gabe Newell says, according to the press release, that "partnering with Nexon will allow us to deliver Dota 2 to a massive audience of Asian gamers via a premium service."

Dota 2's competitor League of Legends has already been enormously popular in Korea, with a South Korean team nabbing the world title at the last championships. So Valve is likely expecting a lot from Nexon, in terms of delivering the game to these new markets. Dota 2 is currently in closed beta and heading toward a free-to-play launch soon.

DOTA 2 is Valve's updated version of the classic WarCraft 3 custom map Defense of the Ancients, known colloquially as DotA. Though the game is currently in development and still carries the beta label, DOTA 2 has become an addiction for some for nearly a year, including myself.

The original DotA mod is credited with launching the multiplayer online battle arena genre (MOBA), spawning multiple titles, including League of Legends, Heroes of Newerth, Bloodline Champions, Awesomenauts, and even the shooter Super Monday Night Combat. After a legal battle over the DOTA name, Blizzard and Valve have settled. Blizzard's own MOBA title - now named Blizzard All-Stars - remains in development and has been playable at a number of events.

Although League of Legends was created by two of the original curators of the Defense of the Ancients mod, it was a man known "IceFrog" that helped bring DotA into the height of its popularity as a mod. Now working at Valve, Abdul "Icefrog" Ismail and a team of developers have been tasked with injecting the classic mod into the malleable Source Engine with hopes to deliver a new experience with fresh artwork, effects, and features not originally possible within WarCraft 3.

The highly competitive game gets swarms of new beta users on a regular basis and its pending official launch will pile more into Valve's latest game. For those new users to Valve's free-to-play MOBA experience, we offer this breakdown of what the game is about and what strategies you should employ to be successful.

By my estimate, there are 327 billion videogame Halloween events, but they all tend to share a couple commonalities between them: 1) they do the bulk of their grim work before or on Halloween, and 2) many of them sorta aren’t very interesting. DOTA 2, though, has dumped out its pumpkin pale to reveal an entire new mode, complete with its own mysteeeeeerious metagame. Meanwhile, it’s keeping the festivities going until… well, nobody’s really sure. That said, the new items expire on November 12th, so draw your own conclusions. For now, though, let us not worry about that. Instead, let’s turn our doting gazes on poor, malnourished ancient terror Roshan. He lurks beneath the break, million-year-old maw glistening with unquenchable candy lust. Awwww. I kind of want to give him a hug.

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After League of Legends and DOTA, Cara brings us her take on S2′s lane-pushing rival Heroes of Newerth.

“I AM DRUNK,” [I am Jack's complete lack of surprise - Ed] I announce on our Mumble voicechat server at ten thirty on a Friday night. “Let’s play Heroes of Newerth.”

“Ugh, I haven’t played it in years,” Airhorse grumbles, though he once paid for an account back when it wasn’t free to play. He has been trying to avoid playing it because it will be the world’s longest patch.

“Well I created a new account specially so I could give my character a joke name,” I say. (They make you pay $10 to change your name, erk.) “And FRAPS is running. So let’s go.”(more…)

DOTA 2 isn't even really available for real yet, but there are already massive competitions in it, which strikes us as insane.

The Grand Final of the International 2012 tournament took place over the weekend, awarding Chinese team Invictus Gaming (above) $1,000,000 for successfully defeating Natus Vincere in a first-to-five-wins battle. NaVi gets $250k, which seems like a pretty good compensation for being good at a game.

The video is not available yet, but soon you'll be able to go here to watch all the matches, to prepare yourself for when DOTA 2 is out of beta.

#dota The crowd roars. Again. It's thrilling. So are the gasps of disbelief, the sudden outbursts of raucous applause whenever someone does something extraordinary. Even when I can't tell why they're on their feet, I want to join in. The energy is infectious. More »

The International Dota 2 Championships begin today with preliminary rounds, running through August 28. The preliminary rounds don't eliminate any teams, but they decide the seed for the main competition starting Friday, August 31, at PAX Prime. The International runs through September 2, offering a first-place prize of $1 million.

The preliminary rounds begin at 9 a.m. PDT each day from August 26 - 28, while the main event will begin at 10 a.m. PDT August 31 - September 2. Watch all the action of the preliminary rounds here, with main event streams to be posted as those games start.

Quinns has lost himself in Dota 2 as if it were a Minecraft cave system. Surfacing 90 hours later, we asked him what Dota 2 means. This is what he sent us.(more…)

A Valve film crew spent the lead up to last year’s debut Dota 2 tournament, The International, following some of the participants as they prepared for the biggest e-sports tournament ever. The result: a documentary about how they managed to overcome the odds and make games their livelihood. You know, I think they deliberately chose those with a slightly tough background to make it interesting. It’s like Rocky, but with games. Now we all know the best Rocky is Rocky 3, because it has Mr T and Hulk Hogan. Rocky 3. Thu-ree. And what game are we all really waiting for? That’s right, Half-Life 3. So we can take from this that somewhere in the trailer for the Dota 2 is the reveal of HL3. Get pausing.(more…)

During tonight's Valve-centric episode of GTTV, head honcho Gabe Newell revealed information on an upcoming documentary that Valve is producing. This documentary will focus on Dota 2 and several players on the pro circuit as they attempt to win The International tournament going on later this month during PAX Prime.

The teaser trailer above focuses on three different individuals from different parts of the world, and not only what it takes for them to pursue excellence in competition, but also their families and how they're dealing with it all.

#dota Here's the documentary trailer for the upcoming DOTA documentary, which follows the players who are trying to go pro and compete in a million dollar tourney. It premiered tonight on GTTV and is "coming soon". More »

Cara returns with the second instalment of her guide to/dissection of the army of Dotalikes that have lately taken over PC gaming. This time, it’s League of Legends – and you should catch up on the last column, which covered DOTA itself, if you missed it. Both contain profanity and sexy-parts references, naturally.

“CARARARARARARA” the lone Skype message read. “I heard a rumour that you’re going to play LoL with us.”

I could almost hear the anticipation at our reunion vibrating down my wifi connection. It had been five years since me and Col last played Defense of the Ancients together.

“Yes,” I said, with a needlessly dramatic pause. “I AM BACK.”(more…)

Well, this is something of a nice surprise. Once upon a time, Heroes of Newerth – a pretty solid MOBA that can’t shout quite as loudly as genre giants like League of Legends – cast off its price tag and went free-to-play. Now, though, it’s taking things one rather large step further. Following in DOTA 2′s footsteps, HoN’s sending all of its Newerthian heroes into battle with no strings attached. In other words, starting today, every last one’s totally, completely free.

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Valve is adding new tournament-focused features to the DOTA 2 beta, intended to make the game more attractive and user-friendly for competitive players (and open up a new source of revenue from spectators).

In addition to improved support for teams, including additional stats, team matchmaking, and logos, the new update adds a "Tournament View" feature that allows fans to pay to watch current and past tournaments from within the game. "For the tournaments you've purchased," the Dota Team explains, "you'll find a complete breakdown of the tournament's matches, and be able to quickly jump in and watch them in your game client (whether it's a live match, or a replay)."

DOTA 2 is now officially the weirdest free-to-play game ever. It's free to play, but you can buy into the beta before launch, and you can now pay to watch other people play it.

PC gaming and UI customization go together like chocolate and peanut butter, or Nutella and literally anything else on the planet. It makes sense, then, that Valve would introduce the ability to completely customize DOTA 2's grid interface. Once created, players can export and share interface configurations they're especially proud of.

The mouse-over text of the image above was originally "don't do this," so we assume that Valve's example isn't necessarily a paragon of intuitive interface design from which to extrapolate ideas. A complete list of the other, much more esoteric changes included with this patch can be found here.

Remember when Valve said it was looking to hire all sorts of people from every walk of life – from lowly programmers to the giant-bow-tie-wearingest of fungineers? Well, one bit in there stood out: “And if you’re a first-class economist,” Michael Abrash wrote, ”please check us out. You’ll have a sandbox with 40 million users, and I promise you’ll never be bored.” Well, apologies to RPS’ substantial audience of budding TF2 hat economists. That position, you see, has officially been filled.

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Valve have posted some details about DOTA 2′s (previously revealed) free-to-play status, over on the the DOTA 2 blog. They’re pretty upfront about two points: “Dota 2 will not be a pay-to-win game. All the items in the store are cosmetic, and don’t affect gameplay.” But also: “All of the heroes will be available free of charge. We believe restricting player access to heroes could be destructive to game design, so it’s something we plan to avoid.”

Perhaps more interesting still – and something I hadn’t realised – DOTA 2 is already part of the Steam Workshop, meaning folks can submit items just as the have for Team Fortress 2: “If you’re a Dota 2 fan with some artistic skills, here’s your chance to get in on the ground floor of what’s sure to be a vibrant community for years to come, and be able to contribute directly to the game you’re already playing non-stop.”

Valve confirmed tonight that DOTA 2, its upcoming MOBA and guaranteed Basshunter reminder, will be free to play. But don't worry, you'll still spend plenty of money on it, as Valve simultaneously announced an in-game DOTA Store, which will sell items created both by Valve staff and by users in the Steam Workshop. The store will sell items, but not heroes - "We believe restricting player access to heroes could be destructive to game design, so it's something we plan to avoid," the team said on the official site.

The store opened tonight, and offers a $39.99 "Early Access Bundle" of in-game items that also lets the buyer into the ongoing beta. It'll be free to play when the game officially launches this year, but you can buy access to it now. That's something to think about tonight.

#dota It's been sort of known for a while now, but today Valve came out and specifically stated that DOTA 2 will be free-to-play. And just like Team Fortress 2 these days, the company will make its money back not from game sales, but from hats. More »

#dota Toby "Tobi Wan" Dawson is a professional commentator for esports site JoinDOTA. He covers DOTA and now DOTA 2 matches and tournaments, and is considered to be quite entertaining. Unfortunately, the commentary he was caught making while playing in a live-streamed public match over the weekend is not so much entertaining as it is inexplicably racist. More »

#dota Two of gaming's best and most beloved video game studios are no longer squabbling about the word DoTA. The makers of World of Warcraft and the creators of Half-Life jointly announced in a blast to the press today that they have reached "a mutual agreement regarding concerns over names of upcoming products." More »

Blizzard has dropped a short-and-sweet press release (reprinted below) informing us that it has landed on a "mutual agreement" with Valve regarding the contested "DOTA" trademark. DOTA, of course, stands for "Defense of the Ancients," which is a fanmade map and mode for Blizzard's Warcraft 3, originally based on a Starcraft map. Developer "IceFrog," who's overseen the DOTA map since 2005, has gone to work for Valve on DOTA 2, while Blizzard has been working on its official variation of the game, previously called Blizzard DOTA.

The mutual agreement means that Valve will get the rights to use the "DOTA" trademark commercially, so DOTA 2's name won't change. Blizzard reserves the right for fans to use the trademark noncommercially, but will give up the DOTA name for its official variant. That game will instead be called Blizzard All-Stars, "which ultimately better reflects the design of our game," said Blizzard executive VP Rob Pardo. "We look forward to going into more detail on that at a later date."

Valve's Gabe Newell also gave comment, saying that Valve is "pleased that we could come to an agreement with Blizzard without drawing things out in a way that would benefit no one." Blizzard All-Stars doesn't have a release date yet, while DOTA 2 is due out next year.

A couple of bits of DOTA 2 news turned up. The first is that Valve have announced that The International Dota 2 Championships 2012 will be held at PAX Prime in Seattle, which takes place from August 31st to September 2nd. Valve report that the event will entail “16 of the most elite Dota teams competing in a group stage, double elimination playoff format for a grand prize of $1 million.”

The second bit is that PCG noticed the game is now moving ahead of Counter-Strike: Source, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, and Skyrim on Steam’s player stats. And it’s still just in beta. Huge it is going to be. Yes.

Valve's International Dota 2 Championships 2012 will be held at PAX Prime in Seattle, running August 31 through September 2. The International kicked off last year at Gamescom in Cologne, Germany, with the winning team, Ukraine's Na'vi, walking away with $1 million.

Na'vi has received an invitation to defend its title, along with Chinese team DK; 16 teams will compete overall. The International will be broadcast for free in multiple languages, and Valve will release information about obtaining tickets in the coming weeks.

#valve Reader Adam has an idea. An idea for old-timey bottles of rum, bottled by Valve Corporation, and named for Admiral Kunkka, a hero from the DOTA series. It is a wonderful idea. More »