The Story of DotA 2 and Its Impact on the Present

MOBA games are one of the most preferred eSports games today. How did this type of game, which we hadn't even heard of until a few years ago, become so popular?

MOBA games can be thought of as a mixture of RTS (Real Time Strategy) and RPG (Role Playing Game). The foundations of this genre were laid with Aeon of Strife, the StarCraft: Brood War mode, which we can call the first MOBA. In this mode, there was no unit printing or army management. Each player managed a character of their choice and played with their abilities. Mod makers created armies led by artificial intelligence. These armies moved along a certain route, creating what we call 'Creep' or more commonly 'Minion' units. These armies were trying to move through 3 different corridors defended by towers. The aim of the game was to destroy the towers and destroy the opponent's main base.

In 2003, Warcraft 3 was released. A mod maker named Eul started working on a game similar to Aeon of Strife. He called his game DotA (Defense of the Ancients). Thanks to Warcraft 3's innovations and game engine, DotA developed quickly. The number of characters and the items they could get increased dramatically. AI-generated minions started to give gold and experience points.


Eul stopped working on DotA some time after it was released. After that, many mod makers started making their own versions. Guinsoo was the most successful among these versions.

In his version, Guinsoo took the ideas of other mod makers and added neutral monsters and more items to the forest. He called this version DotA: All Stars. Guinsoo started working with a new modder, Pendragon. Pendragon first created a forum site. All DotA players started to write their ideas and opinions here. With this forum, DotA made a huge progress. The bugs of the game and the imbalances of the characters started to be fixed in a short time.

2 years later Guinsoo handed over the game to 'IceFrog' who was still developing the game. IceFrog listened to the players more than anyone else. He brought the balance of the game to a perfect level. Other mod makers started experimenting with different maps. But IceFrog continued and improved the DotA map. The game was now very fun and the balance was as good as it could be. In this process, the forum founded by Pendragon reached 1.5 million members and DotA became one of the most played games.


In 2009, 2 DotA-like games came out. One was Demigod by Gas Powered Games and the other was League of Legends by Riot Games. Demigod received a lot of criticism from players. Because the game was very unbalanced, it failed before it could last much longer. But League of Legends was a huge success. LoL was called the heir to DotA. Guinsoo and Pendragon, the main developers of DotA, joined Riot Games. But they almost didn't use DotA mechanics in LoL. Guides were written to attract players, game tutorial videos were shot, and innovations were used in matchmaking. Meanwhile, LoL became the most played game in the MOBA genre.

In 2010, S2 Games released a MOBA game called Heroes of Newerth. The game did its best to dethrone LoL. HoN was exactly the same as DotA, with better graphics and support for players like Riot Games. But they didn't succeed.

In October 2010, Valve announced DotA 2. They started working with IceFrog. IceFrog started making maps in Warcraft 3 and released DotA 2 with Valve's Source engine. Valve promised a $1.6 million dollar tournament to celebrate the game's release. DotA 2 has been a successful game with Steam and marketing behind it. As the only MOBA that can rival Riot Games, it continues to be one of the most played games today.