ESFI World

The Dota 2 team over at Valve have constantly re-iterated and polished their work. With weekly Thursday updates, people stuck watching from outside are able to hear about these additions and join in on the excitement of this growing game. Over the past two weeks, there have been a number of additions, but we will try to touch on some of the more important ones:

Cosmetic Changes: Taking the advice or requests of the current beta testers, the team has made quite a few fairly different changes to the cosmetics of the game, as well as a number of smaller changes to the look and feel of the game. Among the more noticeable changes are skill cosmetic changes such as Beastmaster’s “Wild Axes” being more prominent, with a golden trail flowing behind them now, and Lich’s famous “Chain Frost” getting a makeover of its own now, becoming significantly larger in size to compliment its deadly presence in team battles. The most important cosmetic change of all now, however, is the complete rework of Vengeful Spirit’s look, including not just her hero model but also her hero portrait.


                                                                     Vengeful Spirit's new makeover

Hero Additions: As Dota 2 continues to port the vast number of heroes from DotA, we appear to be receiving at least one new hero with each patch every Thursday, which is a very reasonable pace for keeping the game exciting and the players on their toes. Last week, we received Juggernaut, along with his new, non-orc model. This week, on the other hand, Valve handed the players two new heroes, Kunkka and Blood Seeker. All of these heroes add a different element to the game, and they all, frankly, look great in Dota 2, even though the models may have been considerably changed from the original DotA heroes.

                                                                       Kunkka and his Ghost Ship

Spectators: The first official word we’ve heard concerning Dota 2’s spectator system on their blog turned out to be an extremely pleasant surprise. The Dota 2 team released the ideas and future of the spectator system, and they appear to be absolutely astounding, especially for us here at ESFI World, as it means our casting experience will be much more fluid for us and fans (if you haven’t seen it yet, check out http://www.twitch.tv/esfiworld for our Dota 2 casting). So what exactly are these ideas?

As the team states, “We think that spectating games, both live and saved replays, is an important part of the Dota experience.” In order to serve the needs and desires of their fans, they have built the entire spectating system around innovative features to foster learning skills and improving skills, as well as offering a fantastic interface for casting matches. They are offering a mode that allows you to watch a player as if you are at his computer controlling, as they call “Player Perspective camera mode,” which means that the spectator will see every move and click by the individual player, an incredible tool for improving one’s own playstyle by observation.

The next mode that the team announced is “Directed camera mode,” which controls the camera for the spectator—focusing on points of action (thanks to Source TV)— and, at the same time, consolidates every spectator using this mode, as they are all sharing the same viewpoint. The goal of this mode, as they state, is “being able to kick back and relax knowing that the camera will always be where the action is…[and being able to] talk about anything happening onscreen because you know that everyone else watching the Directed camera is seeing the same thing you are.”

The final feature appears to be so far only for replays, but it is nevertheless, an innovative idea that will be geared primarily towards high-level or competitive matches. This system implements commentary of the game directly into the replay, including in multiple languages and with directed camera from the commentator himself. Not only will this feature be core to competitive casting, but casual casters or players wanting to create guides will have a much easier job with this feature.

So as we wait for more news concerning the future of Dota 2, the team over at Valve will continue to keep us updated on new features (even at the conceptual level) and listen to our input or suggestions. Continue hitting that F5 button over at www.dota2.com and keep your eyes open for any updates. As we can see from these ideas and features that the team is presenting us, the future of Dota 2 will be bright and full to the brim with features to assist new players and keep the game exciting for experiences players alike.

Sources: Twice the blood shall I shed!, That's worth a bottle of rum!