From the Gamescom show floor Valve is running a Dota 2 tournament with a huge prize, which you can find live streamed on the official site. As Valve's watched the skilled competitors beat up on each other, it's been a reminder of the work that's left to do before Dota 2 is ready for launch. According to co-founder Gabe Newell, "We've already learned, even though this event has only been going on for a couple hours now, a tremendous amount about what we have left to do to take the next step with the game. These types of players are awesome when it comes to refining and testing your decisions. The game that gets released to customers is going to be a whole lot better because we've taken this step along the way."
Having the scrutiny of the eSports community bearing down upon a game still in development has, according to Newell, proved to be a challenge. "It makes everybody really nervous [laughs]," said Newell. "The anxiety level around the office the last eight weeks has been incredibly high. Given how good these guys are, we have to make sure to raise our game on the development side so we're giving these guys what they really deserve and ought to have based on how skillful they are."
"We put it out to a larger [number of customers] and then once they're satisfied and once you've addressed all their issues," said Newell, "you keep growing and find new sets of issues. [The beta] will get as big as fast as it needs to help us get the product done."
The popular pricing model for MOBA games like League of Legends and, more recently, Heroes of Newerth is a free-to-play, microtransaction system. Valve isn't yet set on exactly what it will use for Dota 2. "The big focus is getting the game right," said Newell. "It's much more important to figure out why people are going to like the game and then we'll worry about monetization after. I think the first thing we need to do is built a game that fulfills what IceFrog wanted to do with the sequel to a game being played by tens of millions of people. If we can do that I'm sure Valve will end up being ok."
Valve previously said it was targeting late 2011 for Dota 2's launch, but as most know, Valve tends to be a little slippery with release dates. "I'd be incredibly surprised if we're not out a lot sooner than the end of 2012," said Newell. Well that's at least good news.
From what you've seen of Dota 2 so far, are you looking forward to playing?
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