DOTA 2 ‘The International’ Invited Teams and Regional Qualifiers Announced
Yesterday on the DOTA 2 website, Valve revealed the twelve teams that have received direct invites to The International 2014 tournament taking place on July 18-21 at Key Arena in Seattle. This year’s International is the fourth iteration of the 1+ million dollar DOTA 2 tournament hosted by Valve. Last year’s International 2013 set the current record as the single esport event with the largest prize pool ever at 2.8 million dollars made possible by partial contributions of in-game purchases of The Compendium, a virtual fan book containing event information and a fantasy league. Only the best DOTA 2 teams are selected to compete based on their past tournament performance and roster stability. As such, each International is beloved by DOTA 2 players and esports enthusiasts as the pinnacle of competitive DOTA 2.
The 12 team invitation announcement this year is different from previous years. The International 2 in 2012 had 16 teams directly invited to fill the 16 slots, but visa troubles by team TongFu forced them to drop out right before the event. A day before the group stages, two invited backup teams at the event played against each other for a livestreamed Wildcard Qualifier set which drew several hundred thousand online viewers. The unexpected success of the impromptu wildcard brought a change to the invitation format the following year and The International 2013 saw a reduction in the number of direct invites to 13 and the creation of three qualifier slots, two of which were Western and Eastern online qualifier tournaments held two months before the main event. The International 2014 has now experienced another expanded qualifier process with four regional tournaments and therefore a longer build up towards the main event.
The Americas Regional Qualifier will be held May 12-15, the Southeast Asia Regional Qualifier on May 16-19, the China Regional Qualifier on May 20-21, and the Europe Qualifier on May 24-27. The lists of invited teams for the qualifier round, times, and tournament formats are detailed on the announcement page. As with all past and upcoming International events, the qualifiers are free to watch from online livestreams, VODs, and in-client via DOTA TV and replays.
DOTA 2 is the standalone Source engine title to the Warcraft III: Frozen Throne mod ‘Defense of the Ancients’, often abbreviated to DotA. The gameplay is difficult to describe concisely and no genre name can be properly attributed to DOTA 2 as gameplay doesn’t remotely follow the design of conventional strategy games despite the isometric viewing angle and complex real-time decision making involved. The International serves not only entertain DOTA 2 fans, but also to demonstrate the larger-than-life energy of the scene to new players, non-players, and non-gamers alike.