John Funk said:
Twilight.falls said:
Well, supposedly Riot copyrighted Defense of the Ancients, preventing Valve from using the name, despite the fact that Riot is no longer affiliated with Dota.
It was purely a move made to deny Valve the title Defense of the Ancients, forcing them to say Dota2.
Incorrect. Riot does not own "Defense of the Ancients." Riot doesn't own "DotA," either. As far as I know, nobody actually has the official legal rights to that name, but the closest to it is probably Blizzard given that the original DotA was a custom WC3 map on Battle.net, and their terms of use likely give them rights on whatever's created with their map editor.
Both Riot and Blizzard have, however, condemned Valve's use of the "DotA" name, because they believe it belongs to the WC3 community that created and supported the original mod. That may be what you're thinking of.
You know, this whole thing seems oddly familiar...
Oh wait, that's right. The same thing happened way back in 1999/2000 with Team Fortress.
Team Fortress started off as a Quake mod. It was created by, maintained by, and fervently played by members of the Quake community. Soon after it's rise to popularity, Valve approached the creators and offered to hire them. They accepted and quickly began work on converting Team Fortress for Quake over to the Source: Gold engine. (which wasn't hard as it was a modified quake 2 engine) Thus, Team Fortress Classic was born.
As this took place, they also began work on a full-fledged sequel. A sequel that looked very much like it's predecessor. I.E. Dark and gritty military realism.
At the same time, some among the original Team Fortress community cried foul and whined about Valve "stealing" the game, name, and concepts from "the original game" and the "community". They decried that TFC was just a rip-off and that TF2 was going to be a crappy, half-assed cash grab.
What happened? Most of them ate their words as Valve turned around and birthed the phenomenal, award-winning Team Fortress 2 we know today. (and nobody start in on the hats. quit whining about the hats. that's another topic for another thread.) Taking the original concepts, ideas, and themes and taking them in a different, more original (and better) direction all the while balancing and perfecting the tried-and-true game-play TFC started with.
Sound familiar? It may be a bit presumptuous to assume Dota 2 will be "phenomenal", but Valve DOES have a proven track record and the lead designers behind Dota 2 are the ones who stepped in to make the original as good as it was, which lead to its rise in popularity. Let's face it, before Icefrog and his cohorts came into the scene Dota was only marginally popular and no where near as expansive and balanced as it became.
So, maybe we can all just relax, lay off the irrational whining and complaining, and wait and see what Valve and Icefrog have done with the game. It could be just a clone of the original. It could be
worse. Or, it could be a full-realized form of the game that's just as fun to play, yet with better additions, better gameplay, better art, and a community that is far more accepting of new players. God knows, the WC3 Dota, LoL, and HoN communities aren't. So if Valve can foster a more friendly community with this game, I'll gladly pay for it. The obnoxious communities of the others are what kept me from playing them.
[on a side note] This isn't directed entirely at the people I quoted. I simply quoted you because your mention of the comments by the community and Blizzard reminded me of the TFC situation back in the day. This is more towards the people who are complaining about Valve "stealing" the game.
