Icefrog (DOTA guy) announces Valve project

Danrax

This game is going to be insane... Icefrog with a big budget = unstoppable

 

http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-13320-Detroit-MMORPG-Examiner~y2009m10d5-Icefrog-announces-Valve-Project

Teiman

 DOTA is the manifestation of a game based on a veeeery long learning curve, with a million details to know and understand, and this combined with a gameplay where a newbie players radically unbalance a game.  Is just bad design, a "perfect storm" that make it incredible harsh on newbies and casuals...   I think is a poor gameplay. 

ThomasN7

This will be awesome! I love Valve and they will do great with this.

drbaltazar

 i like the beat!!!!

http://www.playdota.com/

check  the video!!!

Axehilt

Hmm, so uh...is he still just working on DOTA and not some new game?

Sort of agree about DOTA"s sharp learning curve.  Was sort of hoping the new DOTA clones coming out would take steps to address that problem, but HON seems to be a nearly-identical recreation of the game and LOL seems like it might have a dubious amount of character progression (for a game usually determined purely by player skill.)

That's part of why I don't play more DOTA I guess, since the game cares alot whether you know the exact best items to grab at any given time (well, and the mechanics of when to push, when to gank, and where to click are important too but as a veteran RTS player that particular barrier to entry (ie controls/interface) proved nonexistant.)

Still, it's always great to see someone who's clearly an amazing modder get recognition.  Even with its barriers to entry, it's a fairly deep game with amazing amounts of effort put into balancing things.  This makes it great for competitive/serious play, which is really one of the big keys to being a popular game (WOW is similar in that regard.)