Which DOTA to Dote on?

2 Nov, 2011

It’s a funny old industry. The very same industry that finds Bethesda taking indie developer Mojang to court over the use of the word ‘Scrolls’ in their upcoming follow-up to the immensely popular Minecraft, now sees two huge developers working on essentially the same game with essentially the same working title.

Blizzard recently revealed ‘Blizzard DOTA’ at Blizzcon in the wake of the already announced Valve project, DOTA 2. While there has been no hint at the possibility of legal action, who’s to say the two companies wont lock horns over the naming rights to Defense of the Ancients in the future?

Let’s not get too bogged down with that, however. Let’s instead focus on the games at hand. There are two DOTA games on the horizon, but which one should you play?

Perhaps for you it’s a question of heritage. The original DOTA was, of course, a mod of the hugely successful Warcraft 3 real-time strategy game developed by Blizzard and released in 2002. Valve has a storied history of taking modders of its own games under its wing and pushing them into the limelight, so it’s unsurprising Blizzard would attempt the same. However, Blizzard never got the chance to take anyone under its behemoth wings; the longest serving developer of the original DOTA mod, Icefrog, has already been hired by — you guessed it: Valve.

With such a pivotal figure lending his pedigree to Valve’s version of the ‘MOBA’ — That’s to say, multiplayer online battle arena, if you agree with League of Legends developer Riot Game’s definition of the genre. Valve’s own Gabe Newell stated he prefers ‘ARTS’, standing for action RTS in an interview with Gamasutra, but the exact name of the genre is a topic of some contention — surely Blizzard’s take on the game will be left feeling lacklustre?

Well, not necessarily. Blizzard has the advantage of owning the rights to the majority of DOTA’s traditional heroes; as a mod of Warcraft 3, the original version inevitably used characters from the game as its own playable heroes. The Blizzard DOTA trailer shown at Blizzcon revealed a roster of recognizable heroes from the Warcraft, Diablo and Starcraft universe, showing the developers intention of winning over players comfortable with the familiar characters. Valve’s DOTA 2, on the other hand, will have to make use of new heroes who have yet to obtain that ‘celebrity’ status.

While DOTA 2 may have its work cut out in the hero department, the two games are set to meet head to head on the pricing front. If Valve’s recent foray into the murky depths of free-to-play demonstrated in the popular Team Fortress 2 is anything to go by, it might be a safe bet to assume that DOTA 2 will also be utilising a free-to-play with micro-transaction model. Blizzard, too, have confirmed that Blizzard DOTA will be bundled with the free ‘Starcraft 2 Starter Edition’ available through the online Battle.Net service.

Personally, I’m not sure how I feel about Blizzard DOTA, particularly with how it is tied into Starcraft 2. The fact that it is not stand alone, but rather bolted onto an existing title gives Blizzard DOTA the air of, well, a mod. Valve’s DOTA 2 will exist as its own entity, while Blizzard DOTA will be simply shoved into Starcraft 2, making the whole affair feel like a knee-jerk reaction to Valve’s announcement which came on October 13th of last year.

While it’s possible the two games with co-exist peacefully, it remains to be seen which (if any) of the two the hardened DOTA community will take to. It hopefully wont be long until we find out, with DOTA 2 scheduled for a 2012 release and Blizzard DOTA aiming to appear ‘around the time’ of Starcraft 2′s Heart of the Swarm expansion.