Dota 2 - A Passion or A Brand
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Dota 2, A Passion or A Brand Brand Analysis Yunus Emre AKAN 11332064
Istanbul Bilgi University Communication Faculty Advertising 351 Brand Management Barış Ursavaş .2015. 1
Table of Content Table of Content…………………………………………………………………………….....2 Introduction …………………………………………………………………………………...3 eSports, The biggest sport you’ve never heard of …………………………………………….3 Structure ………………………………………………………………………………………4 Dota 2; The Definition and History …………………………………………………...4 Valve; History and Products ………………………………………………………......4 A Gamer’s Hero, Gabe Newell ……………………………………………………….5 Valve; Games …………………………………………………………………………6 Valve; Competitors ……………………………………………………………………6 Dota 2; As a passion …………………………………………………………………..7 Dota 2; Crowdsourcing and Organizations …………………………………………...9 Target Audience ……………………………………………………………………………..10 eSports; Target Audience ……………………………………………………………10 Dota 2; Target Audience …………………………………………………………….10 eSports; Future Target Audience ……………………………………………………11 Brand Analysis ………………………………………………………………………………12 Dota 2; As a Brand …………………………………………………………………..12 Dota 2; Brand Awareness ……………………………………………………….......13 Competitors of Dota 2; LoL and HotS …………………………………………….. 13 Suggestions ………………………………………………………………………………….14 Conclusions ………………………………………………………………………………….16 2
Introduction Marketers had been strenuous days in nowadays because of ambitious, highly engaged target audience. I am talking about ‘ Generation Z’ . They are not like others. They connected their brands with enthusiasm. Nerds, geniuses, highly social peoples that each of them different from each others. On this document we are going to made a trip that goes on deep downs of those enthusiastic world of Generation Z’s new toy, eSports. But this is not a sectoral eSports reports. This document is about a videogame that called, Dota 2. eSports is a strange topic for lots of people. For many of people eSports is the biggest sport that they never heard. But that new generation community grows fastly and step into marketer’s radar. For a twenty years old gamer, digital marketing professional and an advertising and communication undergrad, I tried to understand the dynamics of Dota 2 players, playgrounds and itself as a brand. I talked lots of people who has and has not connections with eSports and Dota 2 itself. Also I did some questionnaire with parents to understand their perspectives for video games. I will try to explain results and meanings of those surveys in light of marketing and branding. Also I will try to find brand identity and imaginary of Dota 2 from the perspectives of developers itself. Needles to say that I will give suggestions about how we increase brand awareness of Dota 2. Nevertheless I need to explain history of eSports to put its foot down for document itself. I will mention differences of eSports and sports. Additionally I will give the numbers of organizations of eSports for understand how big is it. After that I will mention Valve , the developer company of Dota 2, Steam , online gaming community platform, and eventually every angles and aspects of Dota 2 itself. For those who knows what is eSports, online video gamers since 2000’s and enthusiastic Dota 2 players who know everything about their games can skip with contentment to the part of Dota 2 Brand Image. For those who do not have that identities, I will promise a mysterious, informational and highly interesting journey. Now buckle your seat belts, I will take you to a journey one of the biggest next big thing of our century, the eSports. 3
eSports, The biggest sport you’ve never heard of ‘‘ Electronic sports (also known as eSports, esports or competitive gaming) is a term for organized multiplayer video game competitions. ’’ that is how Wikipedia define eSports. Dictonary.com define it as competitive tournament of video games . Unfortunately there is no such official dictionary meaning of eSports. If we try to define it we just need three keywords; competitive, multiplayer and video game . If you have three of them it is a definitely an eSport. The first known video game competition was in 1972 at Stanford University for the game that called Spacewar. That competition reorganized by Atari, one of the first video game platform brand, in 1980 and 10,000 participant all around the U.S. joined it. And that how competitive gaming a.k.a eSports born.1 Till 2000’s 10 tournaments organized by video game brands in U.S. After 2000 with big increase of both viewers and prize pools more than 250 tournaments organized till 2010. In those years Steam comes alive and online streaming services born. Stem makes new connection between gamers in all around the world and Twitch live streaming games to the gamers without any charge. None of the above those developments in gaming changed the fate of eSports. In 2011, Dota 2 beta version released with an official international tournament called The International. That tournament had the biggest prize pool in eSports with 1.6 million $ up to that time. More 1,5 million enthusiastic fans watched it from live stream channels and thousand of them watched it lively in Gamescom 2011 in Germany. Numbers of fans drew the attention of the both video game and gaming technology brands. After 2011 thousand of tournaments held by that brands including the world’s biggest ones like; Blizzard Entertainments, Riot Games, Intel and Coca Cola. Today more than 70 million fans follows eSports on live stream channels. More than $25 million prize awarded by sponsors and crowdsourcing in 2013. Last year, 2014, more than $100 million sponshipment deals done between teams, brands and organizations. The biggest video game live stream website, twicth.tv sold to Amazon for $1 billion. The U.S government recognizes the eSports gamers as professional athletes and make visa privileges for them. Scholarships and lot more comes with that privileges. More than 30.000 final 1
Owen Good (19 Oct 2012). "Today is the 40th Anniversary of the World's First Known Video Gaming Tournament" . Kotaku. Retrieved 1 Aug 2013.
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tickets of The International 2014 sold out in a couple minutes. Last year League of the Legends 2014 Championship Final watch live by 32 millions fans which is more than NHL Final and almost the same number of viewers in NBA 2014 Finals. And that is how eSports become the biggest sport you've never heard of.2 Structure Dota 2; The Definition and History It all start with the man who called himself Icefrog. Dota was born a mod for Blizzard’s Warcraft III and raised by gamers itself. The first version of Dota was the first opensource, crowdsourcing game that we have ever been. But somewhere in the history Iceforg, the developer of the Dota, and Blizzard Entertainments authorities couldn’t agree about the future of Dota. After that disagreement Valve and Icefrog made a new agreement about Dota. Valve bought the some of the rights of Dota from Blizzard Entertainments. Those who couldn’t buy redesigned by Icefrog and his team under Valve and game itself renamed Dota 2. Lots of changes happened in that period and Dota 2 become an unique and indispensable video game that Valve ever made. We are going to go deeper about Dota 2 but first we should look Valve itself. The history of Valve, competitors, developments and Valve’s products are important for the better understand Dota 2. Valve; History, Products and Competitors Valve founded by two former Microsoft employees Gabe Newell and Mike Harrington as Valve Software. That two genius develop the acclaimed best known fps video game series HalfLife, Portal and Left 4 Dead. Company has also developed and maintains the Source engine for which most of its games run on. But those are not the biggest thing they done for gamer. It is Steam, the software distribution and gamers community platform. Steam announced by Valve in 2002 for its games patch process and rights managements. Little later,It integrated with World Opponent Network service and become a digital distribution channel. Thanks to Steam; Valve itself, freelance developers and gamers community comes together in a digital platform. New maps, game modes, additional weapons, new achievements and additional game play mechanics added by Valve to their games on Steam. Some of those developments stored in Steam provided great amounts of 2
Sparks & Honey (01 Dec 2014). " eSports: The biggest sport you’ve probably never heard of it "
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budgets to Valve. Most of the game developing company step into Steam and Steam itself become the biggest online game community with more than 4,500 game and 125 million active user in February, 2015.3 Steam works perfectly on Microsoft’s Windows, Linux, OS X, PlayStation 3, iOS, Android and Steam Machine that its own hardware platform. Steam had a 70% share from $4 billion market for downloaded video games. Valve released Broadcast Streaming, Steam VR and HTC Vive, the virtual gaming set, in the later 2014. Steam VR and HTC Vive already called as the future of gaming and next big thing, but that is a subject for another document. Valve have the world’s biggest video game distribution channel through Steam. That makes a huge impact on their game releases. The biggest part of Dota 2’s success belong that distribution power. Other part belong to Gaben and Icefrog. A Gamer’s Hero, Gabe Newell In 2010 Forbes named a man as ’’A Name You Should Know’’.4 Gabe Newell or Gaben as his fans called him, is the biggest inspirational man for gamers. His own life style, the way he approach his fans, the value given to his fans made him a hero in gamer’s world. Other than this glory image of him there is one more important thing about him. That is his own Pr power. Pr is one of the most important thing in marketing strategy. Gaben’s lifestyle, speeches, tweets almost every moves follows by gamers. In that growing sector, eSports, every news reach the target audience by their own words of mouth. That target audience is highly engaged and very emotional. They want to talk with Gaben, hug him and care his words. Of course expecting the same reaction from him. In all this circle, Gabe Newell become the most important weapon for Valve Marketing Strategy. Icefrog has the same characteristic features with Gaben. He defined as Legend by his fans too. But he lives in shadows. No official name, picture or anything about him released for now. He is the hero that we deserve. 3
Smith, Ryan (February 23, 2015). "Valve to Showcase SteamVR Hardware, Steam Machines, & More at GDC 2015" . Anandtech . Retrieved February 24,2015. 4 Chiang, Oliver (13 November 2010). "Names You Need to Know in 2011: Gabe Newell" . Forbes . Retrieved 8 March 2013.
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Valve; Games Valve has twelve major video games. Ten of them are singleplayer and multiplayer fps(FirstPerson Shooter). HalfLife, HalfLife 2, CS:GO, Left 4 Dead and Team Fortress had been huge impact in fps category. All of them also have very innovative screen plays and playability. For those who never heard this games, Valve dominating and give directions to fps category for almost a decade and have top of mind video games in this category with these games. But most valuable game products of Valve are the Portal and Dota 2. That two games have the most innovative game engine in their own catalog. Portal itself has been called most innovative game of the decade, with a hybrid of fps style and a new genre of spatial brain teasers. Dota 2 was not created by Valve. It redesign in Valve with its own developer team and become a member of Valve Portfolio. But that has not change the fact that creating a whole new level of competitive game platform called MOBA with Dota 2. Valve; Competitors Valve is in the competition with more than one company in video game sector. One of the biggest and wellknow game developers, Blizzard Entertainments is the biggest competitor of the Valve both in fps and moba (multiplayer online battle arena) category. In recent decade Valve sued by both Blizzard Entertainments and Activision Blizzard Inc. which is a partner company of Blizzard Entertainments with gaming rights and legal issues.
Table 1: Company Map 7
Valve competition in Electronic Arts, Crytech, Infinity Ward,Treyarch, Midway Games and a list of game developers in fps category. For gamers that lines has not been clear as marketers. For them every game series has different reasons to buy and play it. That is why those games cannot separate from each others with huge differentiations. Also %90 of the new developing fps games comes up with Steam compatibility. (Table 1) In Dota 2’s category moba, things are little bit different than fps. This category grows itself fastly and become the majority of eSports. Valve competition in Heroes of the Newerth from S2 Games, Smite from HiRez Studios, the new beta game of Blizzard Entertainment’s Heroes of the Storm and with the biggest fan crowd in this category Riot Games League of Legends. All of those five games in moba category, have high brand awareness and wellknow by the online video gamers. And that makes more complicated to competition of games and marketing strategy. Dota was originally born as Blizzard’s Warcraft III specialized map scenario. But the with a huge marketing mistake of Blizzard and the legal disagreements between developers, it moved in to Valve. After resign of Dota and two years after releasing full version of Dota 2, Blizzard announced its own moba game Heroes of Storm. Ironically Blizzard had to come back moba category which is leading by Blizzard original game in first place, as a new competitor. Before the criticism of Dota 2 marketing strategy, we need to know all the details in its historical journey for better understanding the moba category and the target audience. So I am going to mention about how Dota and the competition born and develops. Because this is not a Snicker’s this a eSport and both products and target audience are more complicated than others. Dota 2; As a passion Almost half of the players(%44) of Dota 2 play it since the first version and gives a huge meaning to that. Only ten in one player of Dota 2 started it because of marketing events. What make the first version of Dota so important for its own players? Well the answer lies in history itself and the under the nickname Icefrog. Dota 2 is a multiplayer online battle arena a.k.a moba video game in a threedimensional environment, presented from an highangle perspective . Two team with five players tries to occupies the strongholds called Ancient at a both corners of the map. The 8
team which destroy the opposite team’s ancient first, win the game. Every player in the teams controls a character as called Hero and focuses on leveling up , collecting gold, acquiring items and fighting against the other team to achieve victory. With 110 hero and dozens of items that changes the in game strategy instantly, Dota 2 defined as a complicated chess game by their fans. In those knowledge of, what does Dota 2 look like, we can come back to first version of itself. First version developed by Steve Feak a.k.a Guinsoo in 2003 and named Defence of the Ancients: Allstars. Feak also created a gamers community with his namesake friend Steve Mescon’s advice called dotaallstars.com In 2005 Feak retired from developing Dota and his friend Iceforg tooks his place. After that Icefrog develop the game without profits and open it free to play. Bugs fixed by players, game develop in open source metrology and become a crowd mind source. But in 2009 Mescon and Icefrog had a falling out and the journey of Dota 2 started. With that break up Blizzard reached the Icefrog and offered him the head of the game design team in Blizzard Entertainments. Blizzard tries to convincing Icefrog and develop new trademarked Dota version. Because of highly emotion reasons Icefrog did not accept that offer and reject it because of Blizzard profitbased game develop strategies. Two weeks after Gaben and Icefrog comes together and announced the new version of Dota, Dota 2. It made a huge influence in the sector. Lots of legal issues followed after both Valve and Icefrog from Blizzard, Steve Mescon and Sentinel Studios. After two years of development and legal process, beta version of Dota 2 released with a tournament in Gamescom 2011 with the biggest prize pools in eSports since that time. In 2013 latest version of Dota 2 released with 3 million beta players in Steam and breaks the world record with daily 800,000 new players. After two months releasing the game Dota 2 generated up to %3 of the global internet traffic.5 Today Dota 2 become the one of the biggest eSports branch with more than 10 millions active monthly players and more than $30 million awarded prize.6(Graph 1) All the competitors of Dota 2 were inspired from its own first version. League of Legend, the biggest competitor of Dota 2 and most viewed eSports in the world, created by Steve Feak. The newcomer of moba category Heros of the Storm developed by the owner of first version of Dota, Blizzard Entertainments. As you can see Dota itself created a new competitive game category and effect the eSport’s fate. 5
Warr, Philippa (September 17, 2013). "Gabe Newell: Dota 2 updates generate three percent of global internet traffic" . Wired UK . 6
"Esports Earnings" . Retrieved 15 May 2015. http://www.esportsearnings.com/games
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Graph 1: Esports tournament prize amounts, 1998–2014.
All those informations important because of the shows us how gamers think and choose which game for play. Today Dota 2 community created by players who play it since first version and their recommended friends. Respect to first version of the game and wants to protect it as its orginal game play are the two vital points of developing and marketing of Dota 2. But does really Valve have a unique marketing strategy for Dota 2? Well I do not think so. Only one of ten player said that they start to play because of the commercials or because it is free to play. %44 of the players played it from first version and moved to second version. %41 of them started to play because of their friends. But last year LoL takes the lead and dominating the moba category with a good marketing strategy. That is why Valve need some good ideas for Dota 2 otherwise they lose the market share and their fans year after year. Dota 2; Crowdsourcing and Organizations The Valve’s earnings from Dota 2 is clearly show us how the players enthusiastically love their games and try to develop it. Dota 2 is a totally free game. That is the biggest difference from the other. Both Blizzard’s HotS(Heroes of the Storm) and Feak’s LoL are free to play games. But difference in here is if you want to play all heros or goes to 10
championships you have to pay in game stuff. In Dota 2 has nothing purchasable that can affect the game directly. All the purchasable items in Dota 2 just heroes cosmetics, chests boxes and online tournament tickets. Dota crowdsourced by its own fans in all its history. All tournaments prize sourced by ticket and special tournament events. Even official Valve’s Dota tournament The International organization by crowdsourcing rules. Valve gives the $1.6 million to prize pool and undertake the teams accommodations and organizations. But last year, in The International 2014, prize pool reach $10.9 million and winner team gets the $5 million with the biggest award that given in eSports by now.7 Dota 2 community tells to the marketers something special about them. They can stand on its their own feet. That means they ready to buy stuff for their games. %60 of them buy in game items at least one time. %65 of them said that even there will be a huge sponshipments for tournament they still want to join crowdsourcing. Because Generation Z handles its own issues together. Target audience eSports; Target Audience In the light of the research of Twicth.tv today streotypes of the eSporters catching up the reality. Glassyeyed, addicted or isolated antisocial gamer identity no longer available. Today gamers splits fairly evenly by gender. %48 of them are now female players. 8 They define them social, educated, family oriented, optimistic and successful. For most of them being a gamer is a positive force for them. Gamers feel a lot more leader, creative and positive according to nongamers. Dota 2; Target Audience In the light of my research in Dota 2 players gives to me some similarities with Twitch’s research. Today %30 of Dota 2 players are female. %75 of them are 1829 years old. Less than one in ten player is under 18 years old. %60 of them in the university or
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Newhouse, Alex (27 June 2014). "$10 Million Dota 2 International Exceeds Super Bowl, Masters, and Tour de France Prizes" . GameSpot . Retrieved8 July 2014. 8 Twitch.tv (4 June 2014) " The new faces of gamers " http://blog.twitch.tv/wpcontent/uploads/2014/06/TheNewFaceofGamers.pdf
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graduated from one of them. %70 of them play online competitive video games more than five years. %60 of them play online video games with their friends. Two in ten Dota 2 players never bought games from Steam. Dota 2 players choose strategy games to others and %75 of them never play any other moba game in their lives. %90 of them like the improvement of Valve in Dota 2. Also almost all of them recommend the game their friends at least once. My research based on an online questionnaire method. I reached them from official Dota 2 forums and social media channels. More than 500 Dota 2 player answer the multiple choices, check boxes and very little openended questions. The research itself is highly reliable because of the target audience and their internet usage. But still I have to accept that there are some construction bias in my research. That is why I will support my finding with other researches. eSports; Future Target Audience When it comes to eSports, you have to think about little gamers and their parents. That is why I did some additional research about what parents think about eSports. Research split fairly in genders. %95 of participants are 29 years old or more. Highly educated parents who lots of them have one or two children answered the questions. %80 of them did at least one amateur sport when they were young and they think that playing chess, football, basketball etc. can help the developments of the children both physically and mentally. They know the differences of Generation Z but half of them never heard anything about eSports. %80 of them played video games monthly but still they prefer to major sport branch to eSports for their children. %70 of them does not think that video games affect their children in a good way. But most interesting part of this survey is %60 said that, If eSport’s good impacts on the development of the children will approve academically, they will encourage their children for play eSports. This research is not reliable because of its target and their habitats. But it showed up to me that most of the parents have no idea about eSports and its benefits or yearly incomes of an eSporter. But they ready for it and if eSports tell the parents correctly most of them will support to eSports. That means the video game brand that will set up the marketing communication strategies with that basis will have the biggest marketing share of eSports. 12
Brand Analysis Dota 2, As a brand The video games brands are little different than the others. Their target audience, distribution and communication channels are unique. So that makes differences in their identities and architectures. Lots of the video game brands do not have differential communication plans. But they still have market shares and wellknown in the their target audience. That is because of the behaviours of the eSporters that I mentioned before. Nevertheless brands need a plan to distinguish them from others. Dota 2 itself redesign as highly competitive battle arena. Two official trailer released for its first announcement. Those trailers published on Youtube and summon players to the Dota 2’s mysterious story. But that does not work very well as players said. Valve’s unique distribution power and enthusiasm of the Dota fans carried the brand to its today’s position. 4 years ago Valve did one more thing for Dota 2 brand awareness. A documentation made by Valve in the first The International called Free to Play. Documentation tell the gamer that there is a new path for all gamers. A path that promises all professional gamers to a way looks like rock star’s. Valve told to all gamers that every player has the same change to win $1 million with practicing and playing like a team. That documentation had huge impact and lots of today’s professionals influenced by that movie. As you can see as brand Dota 2 does not have hard lines. Valve just try to promises mysterious and classic Dota adventure to their audience. Although the audience itself do not think difference from Valve in that subject. In my researches players describe the game with, team work, competition, strategy, intelligent, fun, reflex, life, anger, love and friendship keywords. %37 of the Dota 2 players feel like a chess player when they play Dota 2. Also %17 of them feel like a hero in the battleground and %9 of them feel like a part of something bigger. All those insights describe us the feeling of Dota 2 players and game itself as a brand.
Table 2: Dota 2, Brand Salience 13
Dota 2, Brand Awareness and Competitor Analysis Unfortunately we can not talk about awareness as clear as others when it comes to video games. There are no such a awareness in nonrelated audience. People who do not play video games a lot do not aware from the games and differences because of the distribution and communication channels. And people who know all video game sector do know the all the games and differences. Almost every fps category games played by almost every player because of their gameplays and shortness. But in competitives like moba category players usually play one or two games at all. If he or she is not a professional player, than a Dota 2 player rarely show up in LoL or HotN (Heroes of the Newerth). In this situation friends and gamers community makes the decision about game. That decision set by the in game specialties and differences. Competitors of Dota 2, League of Legends and Heroes of the Storm Like I mentioned earlier LoL is the biggest competitor of Dota 2 with the biggest viewers growth. Feak’s LoL influenced from original form of Dota. Both games tell the audience that they are free. You have no power with money in Dota 2 but in LoL thinks are little bit different. In LoL you can go to top fastly by buying in game stuffs. But still if you do not pay for this stuffs you can go top just little bit late. Blizzard HotS works like LoL too. Main difference in here is the game play and history. Both LoL and HotS have less complicated game engines than Dota 2. That makes them playable by every demographic part. When only one of ten player is under 18 years old in Dota 2, that number goes up to %3035 in LoL. Also with %45 female players rate LoL have more fairly split in its target. With 32 million unique viewers LoL took the biggest share from eSports.9 Blizzard’s HotS does not released officially. Beta test are still going but when it comes to Blizzard you should take your precaution way too early. Even %40 of the Dota 2 players think that Blizzard makes better games than Valve and others. They created this competitive world and gamers community, that is why they will always get their share from the pie. Sooner or later Blizzard’s HotS takes bites from both Dota 2 and LoL. Because Blizzard have the power of media.
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Riot Games (01 Dec 2014) " Worlds 2014 by the numbers " http://www.riotgames.com/articles/20141201/1628/worlds2014numbers
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The game still on the beta test but they made a tournament called Heroes of the Dorm in U.S. graduate students and stream it lively on the mainstream Tv channel, ESPN. First time in the history an eSport event comes up to major media channels and meet to nonrelated viewers. There were quite interesting reactions to Blizzard’s move in social media. (Tweet 1 and Tweet 2) But line crossed and Blizzard goes public. That will change the balance between brands eventually.
Tweet 1: Jimmy Durkin Official
Tweet 2: University of California Official Account
We will see huge events in eSport arena like Fifa Champions League in a decade. Sponsorshipments, tickets and awareness goes up to high ground. And also we will see the rise of the brand and also falls of the some brands even bankrupts them. That gives us to another reason for take radical decision and unique communication plan. Suggestions Almost every (%90) Dota 2 players think that Dota 2 can lead the eSports as its first place. Also they want to watch their games in mainstream Tv channels. They think that they need a global federation system like Fifa and the global rules. In lights of those number, my researches and the reasons that mentioned earlier I will try to give some suggestions Valve’s Dota 2. First of all Valve need a better communication plan for Dota 2. A plan which bring in front of us the historical, mysterious sides of original Dota itself. Most player feels like hero or a strategist who play chess, when they play Dota 2. Valve have to put pressure on that and start to making commercials to introduce Dota 2 in this parts. As I mentioned earlier Dota 2 players looks positively to sponsorshipment in tournaments. Well that is our point. Valve need a global love brand to sponsor The 15
International. Heineken carried Fifa’s CL for a decade. Playstation, Gazprom give highly valuable contributions to professional football leagues. I am not talking about a technology brand in here. They do already involved with professional players and teams. I am talking about wellknown global brand that give value to Dota 2 and drive its publicity. LoL (League of Legends) try this last year with Coca Cola and took good feedbacks about that. The International powered by Redbull sounds quite good. Think about that! Twitch shows us how fairly splits gamer’s gender pie. LoL has professional female teams and %30 female players rate. Unfortunately Dota 2 which its hero pool keeps %30 female character have a lot more less female players than LoL. Also we can not see any special communications for female players. We know the potential but do not use it. Do not need to goes same mistakes that football did it before. Think about future of eSports and count in female player potentials in communications plans. Radically you can even think special offers or tournament for female players. Academy keeps the distance between eSpots till now. It can be change in future. Video game brands can gives academy to informations about players that no one have. Of course return of academical eSports researches. Now we know how important academic research for parents and future of gaming. Power of mainstream media still exist and it is unique weapon to reach nonrelated audience. It will be hard and long way for eSports but day by day people understand and accept them as sport. When that day come the brands that goes itself publicly mainstream medias will take one more piece of pie. When we talk about publicity Valve have unique weapon called Gabe Newell. His Pr power and life style can easily goes somewhere else. With a hard work and good longterm communication plan we can make a new Steve Jobs from Gabe himself. That will helps both Dota 2 and other games of Valve. Even I do not think that Gabe accept this idea but a documentation series about him and Icefrog can be the first step of the publicity. The biggest earnings of Dota 2 comes from official and unofficial tournaments.10 More than $28 million awarded prizes Dota 2 takes the lead and more than $10 million up to coming with The International 5 . Valve need to reorganize that power. Rules, elimination systems, how to stream and even speakers need a global system. No one wants to saw bad speakers or questionable elimination in tournament that they paid. Takes lesson from Fifa. 10
"Esports Earnings" . Retrieved 15 May 2015. http://www.esportsearnings.com/games
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Country leagues, Champions League, European Cups and World Cups are not in same years and have different values for its own audience Fortunately, Valve announced a new tournament series when I write this article. There is not much information about it but we know that there will be 4 different tournament for each season in different countries. One in U.S. two in Europe and one in far east sounds quite good enough for now. For very at last Valve need to improve substructures of its system. Most of the complainants about Dota 2 comes from Valve Servers or Dota 2 Matchmaking System. They want to improvement in MMR System immediately. I mentioned before how important gameplay is in eSports. Valve need to listen its fans and do changes as soon as possible. Also most of the players think that newcomers do not know how to play Dota 2. In that point Valve need to explain the game with mechanics and teamplays. It is the main effects of gameplays. Focus on it! Conclusion This article started as a graduate project and become bigger than that with Dota 2 fans. I know and accept that the fact about research reliabilities and qualifications. But that does not change the main idea of the article. The way that gamer’s expression themself do not change soon. A game like Dota who have classical history and enthusiastic fans should be more careful on its communication and marketing plans. eSports already be a hundreds of million dollars sector and keeps growing. Day by day market shares going down and competition goes up. Brands, Valve as a subject of this article has to know that eSport is not the next big thing anymore. It is the big thing that we live now. 17
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