The finals of The Worldwide 2025, the annual Dota 2 world championship match, are actually underway, and to get issues began on the appropriate foot Valve boss Gabe Newell shared a particular message with followers: In spite of everything these years he nonetheless loves the sport, although a number of you might be fairly imply to him on-line.
“14 years in the past, we held the primary The Worldwide within the German metropolis of Cologne,” Newell mentioned (by way of JakeSucky), presumably from the consolation of one among his yachts. “The primary Worldwide actually amazed me. It was wonderful to see the gamers’ talent and the eagerness of the group. Earlier than the primary Worldwide, I actually preferred the sport, however after TI I fell in love with it. I like not solely the sport, but in addition the group.”
Heartwarming, is not it? And, it appears, additionally true: Newell mentioned in 2011, after the primary Worldwide, that he’d put about 800 hours of playtime into Dota 2, and that “it is most likely the sport we have made that we’re most obsessive about enjoying.”
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“Day by day after we’re performed engaged on the sport, everybody goes house and performs it until two or three within the morning,” Newell mentioned, method again then. “So yeah, I like enjoying the sport.”
However it’s not simply the sport he loves, Newell continued in his new video message: It is the group of gamers who deliver it to life.
“Certain, individuals discuss shit at me in chat, and about as soon as every week individuals say, ‘Hey, noob, uninstall the sport and ********,’ however that is actually about their enthusiasm for the sport, and the power that they create. And that is why, in any case these years, I nonetheless play Dota each day.”
“Certain individuals discuss sh*t at me in chat… I nonetheless play Dota each day”Gabe Newell’s intro for The Worldwide😂 pic.twitter.com/90LQoGeTQhSeptember 11, 2025
Okay, properly, that is perhaps rather less inspirational, however full factors for telling it like it’s: That is the true Dota expertise, alright. In fact, there are good odds right here that Newell is not being totally severe about the entire thing: He is recognized for having deadpan enjoyable with this type of factor, perhaps most famously with the Potato Telephone episode of 2022. In comparison with that, that is positively restrained, however nonetheless fairly nice.
The finals of The Worldwide 2025 kicked off immediately on the Barclays Area in Hamburg, Germany, and can run till September 14, with a $2.6 million prize pool up for grabs. You’ll be able to observe together with the motion at dota2.com.
