The MOBA game DotA 2 is one of the largest competitive games on Steam, but it is a cooperative event that is currently impressing players. In the Aghanim’s Labyrinth mode, you can prove yourself against AI opponents with friends. It’s so much fun that many players wish for the mode to be permanent.
What is Aghanim’s Labyrinth? The game mode Aghanim’s Labyrinth first came to the MOBA DotA 2 in the summer of 2020. It was about up to 4 players fighting through AI opponents and tricky maps together.
At the end, they faced the titular magician Aghanim, whom they had to defeat. The mode last returned in December 2021, this time with more maps and opponents.
The core of the game mode, besides the cooperative fights, is the upgrading and customization of your chosen hero.
A round in the labyrinth lasts between 40 and 60 minutes. The game is compared by fans to a very popular indie roguelite – the mode is described as a slower “Hades” with co-op.
Players want a permanent co-op mode, ideally for the team deck
What are the reactions of the players? In a large thread on reddit, user “Season2WasBetter” raves about Aghanim’s Labyrinth.
He wanted to just play it briefly and had no great knowledge of MOBAs. But exactly because of that, the co-op mode captivated him, and he has been playing nothing else for weeks. Therefore, he recommends it to all players who are up for a fun PVE co-op experience.
He is not alone in this. In the thread, numerous players reported similarly enjoying Aghanim’s Labyrinth:
- CritKillNick: “I love the fundamentals of MOBAs, it’s so much fun to play them, but I’m not good enough or don’t want to engage with competitive multiplayer, so it’s great to hear about PvE content. I will download it and try it out tonight.”
- Pomerily: “I can’t touch regular Dota anymore, but I have to reinstall it over and over to play aghs lab, and I even end up buying a battle pass. A standalone game would be absolutely fantastic.”
- Togedude: “I agree that it’s a lot of fun. There are definitely a few balance issues (which probably won’t be really addressed since it’s a one-time event), but if those are smoothed out and the game itself is expanded, it would be an amazingly good standalone game.”
DotA 2 is one of the largest and most lucrative PvP games on the market. Apparently, many fans are also keen on light-hearted co-op rounds instead of sweaty PvP battles.
What is it with the controller support? As can be seen from various posts on reddit, many players actually want their own version of Aghanim’s Labyrinth as a standalone game.
This desire is further fueled by the fact that coinciding with the current version of the labyrinth, controller support was also introduced as an experimental feature in DotA 2 for the first time. Rumors on reddit suggest that Valve might actually bring a standalone version of Aghanim’s Labyrinth to the upcoming Steam Deck.
No official confirmation has yet been given by the developers at Valve.
