Yesterday was the grand final of the 2018 Dota 2 International, the biggest esports tournament in the world, which had a prize pool this year of nearly $US25.5 million ($34.8 million). In an underdog story nobody thought possible, the $US11.2 million ($15.3 million) title was won by a scrappy team that only came together in June. And for the first time, one of the winners was Australian.
Group stages for the Bucharest Major have begun and in OG's first match, support player Jesse "Jerax" Vainikka pulled some serious mind games.
Jacky "EternaLEnVy" Mao, captain of Team NP, was coming off a loss in the team's first game at the Dota 2 Manila Masters when even gravity seemed to let him down.
Anathan "OG.ana" Pham is currently sitting at the top of the DOTA 2 Solo Ranked ladder, with a lonely Australian flag next to his name.
OG might have been favourites heading into Valve's Dota 2 Major hosted in Kiev, but they certainly didn't look it by game five of the grand finals. Arguably the more talented team, and certainly the more experienced, it wasn't until a fateful team fight in the 39th minute of the final match that the European squad re-discovered their inner champions.
You see Australians take the world stage in video games all the time. We're a big force in Call of Duty. Two of the bigger teams in North American Counter-Strike are actually made up of Australians. And while Australia hasn't quite made it to the world stage in League of Legends -- the Wildcard tournament aside -- the local community is one of the strongest in the country.
But Dota 2 isn't. Despite having an exceptionally good track record in the first Dota and faded titles like Heroes of Newerth, Australia's presence is Dota 2 is very, very small. But one player has managed to breakout of the muck after he was picked up by one of the world's biggest teams.
