Valve’s annual Dota 2 tournament has comfortably had the fattest prize pool in all of esports for the last few years. And this year’s iteration was no exception, with fans expecting the 2016 International to be even more lucrative.
In the last 24 hours, that’s precisely what has happened. The total prize pool for this year’s International is currently sitting just over $US18.5 million, almost $25 million in Australian dollars. But that’s a pittance compared to the revenue Valve has made already.
If you want the latest figure for this year’s International, it’s listed on the landing page for the Dota 2 battle pass. At the time of writing, it’s currently $US18,580,479, which translates to $24,824,282.86 after the currency conversion is factored in.
That’s a staggering amount of money. But the real kicker is the one fact that has never changed with The International — the part where only 25% of all Battle Pass sales, or sales of the Compendium for previous tournaments, go directly to the International’s prize pool.
The rest goes to Valve. With some simple math, that means Valve has generated over $74.4 million in revenue already. And given that fans still have another fortnight to throw their wallets at Valve and their favourite Dota 2 teams, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see that figure come close, if not surpass, to $80 million.
It’s worth noting that Valve puts $US1.6 million into the tournament kitty every year. They also funded a series of $US3 million tournaments throughout the year. Nevertheless, it’s time for Valve to cash in — and in a fortnight, some Dota 2 players will become much, much wealthier.
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5 responses to “This Year’s International Has Made Valve Almost $75 Million”
I wonder when LoL will copy the business model for tourneys considering the over whelming support over the years Dota has been getting for the International.
Wondering just how much it costs to book the stadium out for a number of days & set everything up? Surely couldn’t be terribly much in comparison to the $75m revenue
Don’t forget there are also ticket and merch sales.
I am so pumped for TI this year. Have a group of friends coming up to camp at my house for the weekend so we can watch all the games.
The competitive Dota scene is in a fantastic place at the moment. Essentially there isn’t a meta, which is unheard of – recent tournaments have teams playing virtually every single hero in the game, whereas previous tournaments were limited to just the most over-powered heroes. There is also no clear favourite going into it – Secret, EG and Na’Vi are looking super-solid, Liquid are strong as always but can’t seem to beat OG, OG got wrecked by Wings in the Summit 5 finals, DC and COL are also looking pretty dangerous… and Alliance are always great to watch.
It’s going to be a wild ride!
You know what else will make Valve more money, a third game in a series they haven’t touched in a long time now, despite the fact it has an unfinished story.