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How did Defense of the Ancients (DotA) become so popular?

  • It's probably one of the most user UNfriendly games I've ever played. Last hits, denying, the push-pull mechanic, massive lists of recipes and items, 97 heroes, hero roles (carry,ganker, support etc.). To get to a level where you're even remotely having fun, you need to read forums and guides. The whole competitive scene is another story completely. How on earth did it get to be so popular? If it was released in this generation, would it stand a chance?

  • Answer:

    I'll take a stab at this. I think it's a very interesting question; I know a few friends who tried to pick up DOTA, but none of them ever got into it for reasons you listed above. I think DOTA is unique and successful because: It requires a near-ideal amount of teamwork. Enough teamwork that a team of poor individual players playing as a team well (ganking/pushing together with good communication etc) can beat a team of good individual players who don't work as a team. On the other hand, not so much teamwork that an individually poor player won't absolutely sink you (although it can happen) or an individually excellent player won't make much of a difference. It's a pretty easy/relaxing game to play. This may sound odd to a newbie having to learn all that stuff, but once you get a working knowledge of the game it isn't much work at all. You can play decently and have lots of fun without really making a serious effort on last hitting/denying. The length adds to the fun. DOTA games are long: 30 minutes would be pretty short. This means there is a lot of room for back-and-forth action and a win feels very satisfying. Not that you can't get that feeling in other games, but the feeling is either rarer (my experience in FPS games), or requires much more individual effort (my experience in RTS games). The complication of it actually helps the user-base in some ways. DOTA is definitely one of the least beginner-friendly games around, but one of the side-effects of that is that new players either quit early or are fairly determined, and learn quickly. Most of the older players have basically been grandfathered through. That is, they learned on an earlier (read: simpler) version and it's not too hard to keep up with the version-to-version changes. I do think the game in its current incarnation would have a hard time  getting starting now. Lots of players have been playing DOTA since it was  much simpler (and therefore easier to learn), and have kept up with all  the additions over time. Not to mention, Warcraft 3 (which DOTA  piggybacked its success off of), has been on the downturn for a while. I  wouldn't be surprised to see a simple version of DOTA on SC II become  fairly popular, however. I think the point about effort required to play competitively is a red herring: every game I've seen requires ridiculous amounts of play time/research to be remotely competitive at a high level, and DOTA is hardly unique here.

Jackson Davis at Quora Visit the source

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You would have had to have been there... DotA evolved out of an entire class of custom maps dating back to the first Starcraft (and perhaps earlier). The wonderful thing about the Custom Maps community in Starcraft and Warcraft 3 is that any map can be opened in the editor and edited, by anyone. In addition, once a map is played, you can host games using that map. Very successful maps had multiple authors and versions. Different versions would often compete and steal ideas and mechanics from one another. (My copy of SC included 150+ custom maps which I had played online) One early class of custom maps featured a wide selection of characters which could be pitted against one another. Often these arenas were individual matches, later they involved teams. In Starcraft days, the more sophisticated arenas included special powers that could be purchased and heroes which could level up. When Warcraft 3 hit the scene, many of the original custom maps were quickly ported into WC3 to take advantage of updated graphics and a more sophisticated level design tool. Warcraft 3 already included many of the aspects which made the arena games so popular (heroes, levels, items). An additional mechanic had worked its way in around this time: creeps (computer controlled monsters which could be also be killed). Parallel to arena maps, there was another set of custom maps which were very popular: tower defense. Tower defense involved creeps (read: monsters) starting on one side of a playing field and attempting to make it to the other side. The player's objective was to prevent the creeps from getting across by placing various barriers. DotA was a combination tower defense and heroes' arena, where teams of players competed to repel attackers using heroes. This combination was unique and a lot of fun! The first versions of DotA were very simple, involved few heroes and few items, and were quick to learn (nobody knew how to really play anyways). Once the map caught on, multiple authors worked in parallel to refine the maps and mechanics. The rest is history. If the DotA community is too hard for you to break into, I recommend the stand-alone and Free* game League of Legends. It's a easier to get into for new players and uses very similar mechanics to DotA.

Andrew Ballinger

I have been trying to wonder what got me hooked to this absolute waste of a time game :D , with people ready to kill you and do you physical harm because you are a noob or feeder or xyz reason. I got hooked to dota after getting saturated with FPS and Car racing,City building,Simulation games,GTA,AOE. The only other game i played while being hooked to dota was civilization 5,that also probably because either my internet died or the rat ate my lan cable. The game itself isnt very vast as compared to GTA for example but the learning,initially it seems huge and daunting but then you begin to enjoy it and even when you have played hours and hours there is always something new to learn or to try out and playing with 9 other people it is just too addictive .

Allen Richard Kerketta

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