For those who might have missed the most important news from the past week in the competitive Dota2 scene, here is a short recap.
Tournament news:
Clutch Gamers and CDEC Gaming unable to attend Dota Summit 7
Thanks once again to visa issues, both teams will not be able to attend the event in Los Angeles, California. Both CDEC and Clutch Gamers qualified for the event, however none of them were able to secure the US visa for their players. The US embassy from Philippines didn’t allow Clutch Gamers to apply for a B1 visa, and required the appropriate letters for the P1 visa athlete application instead while for CDEC Gaming, the embassy didn’t approve the letters for Flyby and Shade, as well as the team coach.
Up until now, only the replacement for CDEC gaming had been found. It will be LGD Gaming flying to the sunny LA later this month. BTS didn’t make any announcement regarding who will take Clutch gamers spot as of yet.
Infamous and Mousesports qualify for Galaxy Battles
Galaxy Battles will be Mouz’s first LAN event after the Kiev Major- having missed out on qualifying for any of the other events ahead of TI 7. The same can be said by Infamous who had a flawless run in the US qualifiers for the $150,000 event from China. Both teams will compete at the Shenzhen Bay Sports Stadium from Shenzhen, China from June 14 to 18.
Galaxy Battles participating teams:
Newbee (direct invite)
iG Vitality (direct invite)
TnC (direct invite)
Thunderbirds (direct invite)
Happy Feet (SEA qualifiers winners)
ViCi Gaming (China qualifiers alternates)
Infamous (Americas qualifiers winners)
Mousesports (European qualifiers winners)
Newbee are your Zotac Cup Champions
The first Zotac Cup Dota 2 tournament concluded last Saturday, June 3, with Newbee taking home the trophy after a 3-1 victory over NP in grand finals.
ROG Masters announce a $250,000 tournament for Dota 2 and CS:GO
According to the official announcement, the 2017 ROG Masters will see numerous teams from more over 30 countries fighting for their share of $250,000 prize pool. From June to November ROG Masters 2017 will take place over four phases and two different games - Dota 2 and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive.
Team announcements:
NiP drops their Dota 2 squad after disappointing six months
NiP has announced they have parted ways with their Dota 2 squad after making their re-entry into the scene January 2017. The organization will not be picking up a new roster in Dota 2, instead choosing to focus on their CS:GO, League of Legends and Overwatch teams.
Ninjas in Pyjamas roster at time of disband:
Adrian"Era" Kryeziu
Micke "miCKe" Nguyen
Aydin "iNsania" Sarkohi
Kalle "Trixi" Saarinen
Kai "H4nn1"Hanbückers
Planet Odd sign Thunderbirds
The International 6 runner up boys got signed by a new company venturing into the esports world. Planet Odd is a new company aiming to make a name for themselves in the eSports business. There is little to no info about who they are, other than the fact that the company is actually owned by Casumo, a casino located in Malta. Planet Odd announced their entrance on the esports scene mid-April this year when they posted only a launch party promotional video. A few weeks later they signed a female CS:GO squad, three Hearthstone players and a team of five streamers.
Planet Odd roster:
Aliwi ‘w33’ Omar
Roman ’Resolut1on’ Fominok
David ‘Moon’ Tan
Martin ‘Saksa’ Sazdov
Rasmus ‘MiSeRy’ Filipsen
Valve announcements:
Siltbreaker campaign delayed
The first Dota 2 multiplayer campaign was promised to be released at the end of May. However, Valve admits that they haven’t finished working on the product. The Siltbreaker campaign was announced with the International 2017 Battle Pass release on the 5th of May. Designed as a co-op storyline in two acts, The Sand of Fate, the first act of the campaign was promised to be available to all the Battle Pass owners at the end of May while the second act, A Vault in the Deep, is supposed to be released sometime in July.
The International 7 Short Film Contest is on
Valve has continued the tradition of the Dota 2 Short Film Contest for the International 2017 also. Passionate filmmakers from around the world will, like the players, also be battling for a prize pool of their own with Valve having set prizes for the top ten short films submitted. Similar to last year, the first three prizes will be $25,000, $10,000 and $5,000, while the rest of the seven entries that made the top ten will be given $500. However, an interesting change-up from previous years is that this time the length of the Short Films has been increased from 60 seconds to 90 seconds.
