In the MOBA DOTA 2 (Steam), Valve has ensured that the prize money at the tournament “The International” is just a shadow of its former self. From $40 million (2021), the prize money is expected to fall to under $5 million. A YouTuber believes: This is intentional. Professional teams have annoyed Valve for too long and are now receiving a wake-up call.
This is the situation:
- The tournament “The International” is considered the most lucrative e-sports tournament in gaming. Whoever wins it becomes an overnight millionaire. But the prize pools are shrinking: In 2021 there was still a prize pool of $40 million, in 2022 at least $18.8 million, but in 2023 it is expected to shrink drastically, with the prize pool likely landing below $5 million.
- This is because the amount of the prize money depends on how much money comes from the sale of certain cosmetics. And in 2023, the offered cosmetics are much less attractive than in previous years. Therefore, Valve is now earning less money that is distributed to professionals through the tournament.
- A YouTuber now says: The shrinking prize money is a kind of punishment from Valve to show professionals where they stand.
Was regarded as a milestone in DOTA 2 and could be the reason why there is less time for cosmetics:
Professionals have made too many demands – This is Valve’s response now
This is the YouTuber’s thesis: The YouTuber Janne “Gorc” Stefanovski believes that Valve is making a clear statement to the professionals:
Valve doesn’t do things halfway. I believe professionals have been annoying. They came with demands, wanting this and that. And Valve said: Oh, you know what? Let’s see how much money they [the fans] give you if we don’t pump cosmetics into the game. Let’s see how much they really care about pro teams. Would they buy a trash compendium – just for the pros?
Then Valve would have produced a weak compendium with mediocre prizes to prove that they were right: People didn’t buy the items for the pro scene. It was generous to leave professionals 25% of the revenue at all.
According to the YouTuber, this is a big “Fuck You”.
What does Valve say? Valve’s explanation looks different: Here they say they have noticed that an extremely large amount of development time is spent creating the cosmetics that have caused the prize money to skyrocket.
They consciously decided to scale that back and invest more time and effort into improving the game.
Steam: DOTA 2 does without the Battle Pass – Now prefers to make the game better
