The Reality Behind Dota and League's Downfall

[@jjadned]

As long as there is the mentally unstable, there will be a MOBA playerbase

[@JohnMelon-qg9tj]

lol

[@jeusmarcomascarina4102]

everything is now just a follower, I am still a casual player and I does not care if they stood the highest rank. I want to play more games and play it back when i miss it. But these try hard players is also the reason why people are leaving their games and asking why they can fight weaker players. Also the way people demand for updates are also people who complain changes. So I learned that very bad in Minecraft,. I think players should start to chill. This games will not give money without professional career even you stood in highest rank.

[@gutsglory3625]

icefrog and his fellow developers are also mentally unstable. Imagine buffing certain heroes too much while nerfing already the weak heroes.

[@DerDop]

Have you ever played StarCraft?

[@imanjx2914]

@@gutsglory3625 NERF CM, Equivalent to NERF CHAMBER in Valo

[@basti.9022]

If Starcraft is still alive Today. Dota 2 will never die.

[@parham1023]

Your comparison has one giant flaw: SC2 is alive cause its being maintained. As much as I hate blizzard, they are doing a decent job keeping the game balanced with patches. And then there is Valve... took these mfs one year to release a hero

[@soileH]

@@parham1023 is this a bad joke about SC2 maintanance?..

[@edwardkravchuk5659]

The thing I hate about modern gaming is that you can do anything, ANYTHING, but instead they just make another fps game that copies mechanics from other popular games

[@xolotltolox7626]

It's more that FPS games are just the best we can do with 3D games due to the limiation of control complexity

[@cloudynguyen6527]

The thing is... you're expecting AAA games to cater to your specific need. And they don't have to because they know people want a familiar game to have a fun and easy time. If anything, you should look forward to indie game. Indie game market is hella competitive so they must innovate or else they'll bankrupt themselves.

[@hakimmacpat1225]

Gamers also don't want to admit that it's also us consumers shape the market. They will not stop making generic fps games if people won't stop buying them

[@edwardkravchuk5659]

@@cloudynguyen6527 Thats why I mostly play indie games and emulators

[@ArilandoArilando]

There's plenty of non-FPS games releasing lol.

[@MincWW]

"RTS failed because it doesn't play like FPS"

[@Drafon-ui9wo]

16:24: "Dota complexity is bad because you don't have friends".

[@Ang3lUki]

Hmm, I wonder what MOBA plays like an FPS...

[@lstsnwfll]

@@Ang3lUki Valve's Deadlock.

[@Ang3lUki]

@@lstsnwfll BINGO, GET READY FOR A DEADLOCK SWEEP BOIS

[@teralore]

@@Ang3lUki With WASD and the mix of themes and gameplay. It's potential reach is not to be understated. I really hope they pull it off

[@Capo1504]

if i made a game in 2013 and 500k + ppl play it daily for the majority of the last 10 years dont tell me its dying

[@Acex2ron]

And that's the point of the video--despite every single one of these factors, these games are somehow alive and well.

[@TwoSouthFarm]

@@Acex2ronMOBA is some serious meth

[@Ang3lUki]

If you sit down and think about it, it really was made in 2004

[@Capo1504]

@@Ang3lUki lol true

[@zekzimbappe5311]

​@HelloHelloe If u watched the video u would know that the topic is kinda the opposite of the title

[@rustygaming1997]

Dota is dying because it's the amazing 10/10 game where you play with the worst people ever lived, and the thing is - you're one of them, and in some games you're even worse. And yes, I'm talking about myself too.

[@parham1023]

Also, dota is owned by Valve...one of the worst companies out there: Lazy, incompetent, and careless

[@DaspYDoog]

@@parham1023 Blud hasn't booted up the game in 4 Months. They have been releasing constant updates, what you on about?

[@levisamom5069]

Took the words right out of my mouth

[@viltautasYT]

League is worse, i played both for similar amounts of time (~400hours) and dota2 is way nicer, or atleast people arent flaming you for carrying them, unlike league. Maybe I'm biased cuz I play jungle...

[@lamMeTV]

Both Dota and LoL are ruined by their lack of moderation

[@Chasodey]

In defense of mouse movement: don't forget that most Diablo-likes are also played with mouse movement and keyboard for skills, it gives certain accuracy to your inputs and also doesn't lock you into controlling one character like in Dota. Right now Valve is developing Deadlock and Deadlock looks dope. But you won't get that much info being locked into tp camera and you can only rely on your minimap. You also won't get any kind of summoner skills in this game while you can have multiple units with an overview camera and mouse control. It's not that widespread but it's an input method that won't die for a very long time, believe me

[@Midaspl]

PoE2 introduced WASD, but yeah, you have to have serious brain damage not to be able to translate one to another...

[@Chasodey]

@@Midaspl That's why I said MOST Diablo-likes, I'm aware that PoE 2 will have wasd movement

[@Luiz-qe7hk]

​@@Midaspl The thing is, poe2 game cycle is being built arround WASD, they had to rework the WHOLE game to make it work, if youve seen the interviews, they said they had to completely remake new mechanics and interactions bc of new classes/skills, for example how block works or how evasion interacts with damage or even the dodge roll, if the same happened to games like dota or league, they are gonna go through the same process, and at the end, you would barely be able to call it the same game

[@lincolnreinert1205]

As a Chen main (200 matches on that hero, and my second most played hero is enigma at 30~ish) I carry the RTS flame onto the moba genre to this day.

[@sabnock31]

As an old Techies main (~1400 games with second most played being CM with ~300) I carried the flames of Minesweeper and butts of my enemies until the day he died... Still pissed at Valve for listening to crybabies on Reddit and removing such an iconic hero.

[@HeseliqMikav]

​@@sabnock31as much as I hate your kind, I do agree that they shouldn't have changed techies. He might be rage inducing but he's so unique that i actually misses his old mines.

[@sabnock31]

@@HeseliqMikav don't hate the player, hate your inability to adapt. I've had matches where I stomped on supports against Techies to the point he was useless through the whole game. You just had to know counters (evry single summoner, Necro 2, early Gem, etc) and know how to position against him. Don't hit jungle mindlessly, don't push towers w/o vision, end the game faster, build mag res, hp, and bkb.

[@leofwulf268]

I'm gonna go ahead and say that it suffers the same issue with wow which is "aging playerbase" that means that it retains the same people who started it playing about 10 years ago or so who chose to stick around and struggles to get new players because by the day, for newer players to "keep up" and learn the mechanics without feeling overwhelmed is really really hard. I mean shit they either keep releasing more champions each one more complicated or the meta is always changing because of tweaks to champions and items so you need to just know what works

[@cukkucake]

Dota is much more committed to old school mechanics than LoL is, there are more complexities to it but most base mechanics generally have remained the same so you can still refer to older resources for learning the game, compared to how different each league season is/was in comparison. Also Dota provides much more detailed player tutorials even for more technical stuff like pulling creeps while in League you basically have to learn on your own or through other resources outside of the game to keep up with update changes, so I would argue that it’s actually easier to learn than League, though it takes more time to learn

[@nuwanda2702]

The curse of being able to play both games is that the "break" is just to play the other one back and forth lmao.

[@breaker1709]

based

[@justartagain1056]

I just started playing DOTA 2 this year with no prior moba experience or even RTS (besides a bit of AOE 2) and I honestly found the game to be pretty good. Sure some things are hard to learn without looking at videos and what not but I don't think that the experience of learning how to play them is insurmountable. I can't say whether I'll still be playing it in 5 years but for now it's fun. They might not have that edge of novelty that they used to have nowadays but just like with any good games, there will always be people who are dedicated enough to try them.

[@caspermultiverse]

Dude i started dota back in 2014 and even after getting married and hard work at the office, i still play Dota 2 at age over 30. Trust me you may find many fun games in your life but you'll surely come back to play Dota 2 cuz after getting into it there is no way out.

[@justartagain1056]

@@caspermultiverse I likely will, as long as it doesn't get the CS2 treatment where it's replaced with an inferior version

[@MetalblaydX2]

I have lived in thailand for 2 years and these people LOOOOOVE them some Arena of Valor and Mobile Legends over here. I am pulling late nights climbing ranked with my roomate / longtime friend on mobile legends just like we used to when we were in high school with league of legends (I am currently 1 division away from hitting Mythic Rank in mobile legends which is pretty much Challenger!) Mobile gaming in Asia is a different beast entirely and not too many people from outside the east talk about it.

[@HeavensBane53]

TF2 has proved that a really god damn good game with a dedicated core player base is really difficult to completely kill off. I was a huge TF2 enjoyer back in my high school days, and every now and then get the itch to go back that's mostly dampered by a combination of how much has changed since then, and the painful knowledge that, while I was once in the upper echelons of the player base, I'd now be a below average scrub. Dota is another timeless classic and an absolute marvel of game design, just like TF2, and as you said will be very difficult to kill. I'm one of those more casual dota players these days that mostly just plays with friends and we get in a couple games a week on average when there is a big event or patch out. Looking purely at my play time I've all but quit the game, yet I will still confidently say its one of the best games of all time and an absolute favorite of mine that I will never fully quit. It's a somewhat similar story with league. I still get urges to come back, though every time I did act on those urges the player base quickly reminded me why I stopped playing and the urges got less frequent. I much prefer dota, but league is a fun game with its own charms that I would like to be able to enjoy again. Unfortunately, I get the strong feeling that if league does see a drastic decline in the player base it'll only be the most sweaty toxic whiny babies that'll remain and make it even harder to get back in. Also I will say that in dota meta related toxicity seems to notably decline as you go down in mmr, at least outside of ranked. Unfortunately I have not been successful in my attempts to return to the trench tiers, but from I've heard from my lower mmr friends they almost have the opposite problem, where it's common for people to run bizarre builds that make little to no sense. Hell, even at a decent MMR I've been surprised at how accepting people can be. All those times I ran pos 3 CM I somehow didn't get flamed for it once.

[@Raizer_VT1998]

as a 26y/o who started playing dota 2 in 2014, i have to agree with a lot of what you are saying here. in middle school i would play a ton of command and conquer, and so the basic way of interacting with dota 2 was extremely familiar. i had a crappy toshiba laptop that i could get 45 fps avg which was enough for me at the time, and i had like 8 friends who all played with me. now i work full time, and really only get to play on the weekends. the matches are just too long in general to play before or after work.

[@quoctridinh1885]

fantastic video. Eventually, the playerbases of both league and dota will stabilize at a lower number. And even then, they will still be more popular than the majority of the FPS games on the market. Sad that the prime days of these games are gone. But also glad that gamers now have so many choices to play the games they want

[@bimanairman]

its so hurtful to see all these videos about people retiring dota and league cause we can tell that the end of this era is not too far away. this is so incredibly difficult to swallow for a kid like me who grew up with dota 2

[@BU683AR]

Downfall of dota 2? bro they been saying dota 2 is dead 5 years ago. LMAO

[@minnelcandelario6893]

how about LoL? Its been dying for 10 years now and still generating lots of cash

[@BU683AR]

@@minnelcandelario6893 10 years ago?, quite the opposite really If you look at their player pool I think it's one of their peek.

[@BU683AR]

@@minnelcandelario6893 Ya what about a turd game? what about it?

[@minnelcandelario6893]

@@BU683AR oh your one of those guys? Nah your boring . And btw Dota 2 is not growing because of it's complexity, it's not growing because learning it is a chore tbf it's the same with league.

[@BU683AR]

@@minnelcandelario6893 LoL is welcoming for the beginner but dota 2 is not, so I dunno what you're talking about.

[@thesummaryguy3911]

To be fair, as birthrates have declined, most games have an aging player base

[@kjyu]

I play dota 2 and i use 2/3 of the keyboard as binds. QWERDF as abilities, A attack S stop, ZXCVBT and space as item buttons, tilde and 1-5 as control group buttons, tab for next unit caps for shop, F1-F3 as camera binds F5-F7 as courier controls, and couple others as chat wheels. There is an alternative control scheme with WASD as camera controls but it's just wasteful to occupy such accessible keys for that purpose, I don't think you can and should make it any less complex for people coming from FPSes though. edit: Meaning, if the devs were to accommodate hero controls, they would have to cut hard on the existing complexity of the genre, It's a tradeof stemming from limited input count.

[@cominksuadnyana4980]

One thing that I found kinda ironic in downfall of MOBA genre is because the game becomes more “Systematical“ (I don't know Better word to explain it 😂) and makes you have to follow certain "pattern" to play I mean most of MOBA don't allow you to build items differently, limiting your creativity, using Heroes/champs outside their designated role/lane, the game is too punishing if you're late to get/do something in a certain time and we simply don't like to meet people who just learned the game This is a take from Vars that he said he doesn't like to watch league's pro play/ tourney scene coz everyone just play safely as how the game or everyone should be, they'll go here and there in a cretain minutes in the game, they will do these, they'll build those, something like that. This kinda different in DOTA 2 coz we saw more weird and uncommon things happen in DOTA 2, but let's be real, DOTA 2 progress is currently more "systematical" too ("anything can works" is starting to fade) Aside from those tryhards, gatekeeping, and egomaniac players, we don't have that much of freedom to experiment new playstyles or new build or role

[@rattango9819]

ehh not really at least in terms of dota. There are still hidden techs that could be done but only those with thick skin and great friends can achieve. For example if you look up some meme builders, they will limit test, even in rank but with friends with a goal. What I'm trying to get to here is, it's like playing basket ball with random kids at the park and you keep trying to throw three pointers from centerline but your teammates don't know that. If you hit, they'll celebrate, if you miss they'll mock you. Same concept here. The issue is not that its becoming more systematic, that is something to ensure that players can be cohesive inside a match. The issue is you trying to buy dagon on sniper and expecting people to understand you. If it works, of course players are going to celebrate alongside you, if it doesn't ofc people are going to flame you for it. Experimentation can still happen, but you need fellow like-minded people in your team to achieve a conclusive evaluation of your build. That's why when there's a new patch coming out, you can still se the experimentation occuring in pub and ranked games without people getting too mad, because everyone is in the testing phase. But if you continue with that mindset 2 months into the new patch, some are going to argue with you. Or, you can still experiment solo in pub or ranked, but you need to have thick skin and hit your strides. Because the game still has that anything can work mentality, you just need to understand that *some things don't work and has been proven as such*.

[@JohnMelon-qg9tj]

tinker support wants a word

[@Aerometria]

now dota hero have 2 facets this break the 'systematical' by half

[@HeseliqMikav]

Idk man, I saw support BB on TI yesterday and it actually works

[@holliscf]

someone not playing dota

[@Adam3343]

11:23 those prejudges are steaming from the fact that 98% of the mobile market is shovelware P2W crap that drowns you in ads and most people don't know any good games that are not pc and console ports edit: sorry i forgot about Gambling Simulator™ The Game

[@ougonce]

You have an Assassin's Creed profile picture. Let's not pretend you're a specialist in good games.

[@DroppedMyMarbles]

​@@ougonceyou have a umineko profile picture tho

[@Adam3343]

@@ougonce I'll be honest with you man, that profile picture is older than some children in preschool. I just never changed what my child self decided to put there, because let's be real, who cares? Besides I choose this because I thought assassins looked cool not because the game was good. I've never even play it.

[@angel_of_rust]

those 2 games still have a huge playerbase but you'd be hard-pressed to find a single person in either playerbase that would actually say they enjoy playing them.

[@Rhampi]

Jokes on you, I enjoy playing DotA. And I dont even hate myself

[@minnelcandelario6893]

Enjoyed playing Lol and the trick is knowing when to stop regardless if your winning or losing. Because its like gambling you dont go "another one" or youll drown

[@angelachan9238]

If League dies, the number of male virgins go down at least.

[@Slateproc]

I miss TryMike4Instance and JimBenDoto 😔

[@pressedv3017]

I miss those guys too. Especially JimBen

[@castlehair]

I just hit archon, and while I do agree that if you pick something far off meta you will get called on it, I got that rank by playing maybe 1 hero that is meta in the pro scene the rest are considered awful in the pro scene. The guy who went on you for playing venge mid tho was just insane as currently she is amazing in any role right now, but that's what i see more often than not when people get toxic they look at one thing they THINK they know better than lose their mind at whoever is the precieved offender

[@da_bes]

people have been saying dota is dying for over a decade now, and it's currently the second most played game on steam.

[@saito853]

If anyone think his whole WASD control thing is bullshit then it's absolutely not. I recently got into an MMO "Lost Ark" and couldn't get any of my friends to play it SPECIFICALLY because it's click to move.

[@applesauce1230]

I agree with most of your points but the shift from normal games to high elo hilights and guides is definitely what drives the point home. There is not a single league creator that I watch other than bauss and ratirl bc even tho high elo they have fun playing it, there is not a community for having fun in these games anymore.

[@TZAR_POTATO]

So no Dota 3, League 2? D'awwe

[@ziadahmad2440]

Comrade Potato Here ❤❤

[@pios_tv]

Very nice video and detaily explained. All facts that you stated are true, which is rare for me to find on youtube. Old playerbase, ranked matchmaking in both games helped with the decline. Right now Im playing deadlock and it feels like I reeturned 10 years back in time, when there was no ranked matchmaking and Dota was in beta. Just people having fun and learning the game

[@dennisdoodlez]

I would LOVEEEEE a video in which you detail what you love about League and Dota, and what you'd think the other would benefit from the other. For example I think Talents are genius and just added fun to the game and League with talents would be sweet

[@radiahmed126]

I think the biggest issue is that MOBAs aren't new player friendly. No sane person would have the patience and the time to learn a game from scratch. Especially a game like feel like a commitment like moba game's.

[@NattyBuns]

I was thinking about playing dota2 again after many years because of ur channel and the resources u've provided Then I got invited to the deadlock playtest and now i'm addicted Can't wait for your deadlock content!

[@Bigbean2999]

Honestly the only thing that was keeping me away from mobas was the top down camera and lack of movement (i mainly enjoy quake like games) and now with deadlock i can scratch that itch

[@wigglepuff9945]

For what it's worth, as an experienced league player who has roughly 100 hours in dota 2, dota is extremely hard to get into when you don't have a friend who already plays it to help you out. There are so many mechanics in dota that I'm sure have a purpose, but to a new player just looks like complexity for the sake of complexity. And that's coming from a player who plays MOBA's, a brand new player to the genre would be even more overwhelmed.

[@soileH]

As someone who has 10+ years of experience in dota, it's hard for me to even comprehend the complexity behind it. The game's core is rather simple, I'd say. Or it was until innates introduction?..

[@KitsuneFaroe]

​@@soileHwhen you play other MOBAS you see what they meant, to an extent. All the ítems have more of an impact in Dota. There is trees, highground evasion, day-night cycle, turn rate, cast delay, tower and creep aggro, pulling/stacking. Lot of mechanics that other MOBAs doesn't have. Of course most you can understand by using logic and by experience. But is not as straightfoward asthose others.

[@TwoSouthFarm]

The best time to enter a new MOBA is today and the worst time is tomorrow. Such is the curse that MOBA must bear forever…

[@Luiz-qe7hk]

One of the reasons league dominates the market, its straight forward, not simple, it keeps people coming back bc they want to improve and compete, but its a milion times easier to get into, unlike some rts's like starcraft, warcraft or mobas like dota

[@ancy1205]

It's because Dota is badly designed. You need to have a focus, design every mechanic around it and trim the fat. For MOBA, it's the battle vs the other player. Complexity is great, but it need to be in the right place.

[@darwinjohnrobles7325]

Everything you said there really hit me hard. I just wish the cosmetics were not that expensive and also need to have more imagination in them, maybe that will reignite my reason to play again.

[@warlocke1894]

For me, having the mouse do the movement, basic attack, camera movement, and ability aiming just make sense because none of the functions overlap themselves when you want to do them except for Kiting but thats why "Attack Move" exist.

[@uziTGC]

there is no “downfall”, you’re just looking for clickbait

[@123pa1n]

its funny, back in the day the appeal of Mobas was the fact that, unlike RTS games like wc3 or sc, they were more accessable specialy when it comes to multiplayer

[@taru3374]

The only reason I discount mobile games is because they're extremely predatory not saying there isn't any that aren't but still

[@Magicwaterz]

Yeah, I don't think a mobile MOBA game is gonna make me take Dota2 on long breaks like I have not played Pokemon Unite for over a year and my main complaint of that game is that characters are locked behind in-game currency which takes eons to grind. I ABSOLUTELY LOATHE GAMES THAT LOCK CHARACTERS IN SUCH A GRINDY TASK.

[@LordPatroclus]

That's my issue with PC League too. Champs take ages to unlock once you're not a new player. Wild Rift showers you with their champ unlock currency though even if you only play like 3 easy VS AI games a day

[@StarStew]

dude i don't know why you getting so many dislikes, these were really well said points and as an old player of moba since 2010 i agree with everything!

[@yuscilfer1429]

I was about to say that Deadlock is gonna be the new Titan, even Shroud who never plays MOBA before is actually going crazy about it and Spectre Divide is even launch this week and rather playing that, he is locked dead in Deadlock. But that was the reason behind this video, Deadlock, I wonder if Riot's gonna do their own version, because it seems that Deadlock's map/landscape has a great comparison to the world building of Arcane (the Netflix series). Just put the map of both Piltover and Zaun and with League's Champ, (hopefully the roster has guns?) but then again some of the Paladins heroes doesn't need guns like Zhin and Furia.

[@vitor900000]

Quitted Lol more than 10 years ago. Tried to play it again 2~3 times over this period but couldn't do more than 1 match of aram due to how ugly the game is. Now its even packed with malware so I for sure never going to try it ever again. I also played Dota 2. Don't remember when I stopped. Never tried coming back but I preferred it over lol. Yet my favorite Moba was HotS. Sadly it died. Such a good game... Its a shame it was so poorly optimized. Taking 5~10mins to comeback to a game after a DC/crash was a big buzzkiller.

[@lamMeTV]

If Deadlock gets the balls to make Yamato actually melee I will play it

[@Acex2ron]

She also got that Silencer helmet looking ahh forehead

[@ner-o3252]

yeah this would never work you would just poked out of your lane cant get any cs fall back be a useless dummy for a whole match cool thing would be changing her bomb to a sword slash that deals more damage

[@Loongguy]

Got a lil fall out with friend who's being a bit competitive while I just wanna goof around and have fun in a non-ranked match, I'm not running down lane or anything, I'm still trying but after some time it just seems that we couldn't get along in this genre of game. Game is hard.

[@Lastofhiskind-00]

The thing i hate about league is the devs don't show tits of the characters. Very disappointing. The dresses should be more revealing.

[@tuvarkz]

In DotA 2 anything can work, provided you know what you are doing. So, why did you pick Venge mid? Also, I miss Compendium battlepass. There's no good reason to buy the new Compendiums.

[@Acex2ron]

I queued up specifically because I felt like playing Venge, but every other role was taken. In a Turbo game with no stakes, I should be able to play whoever I want.

[@rattango9819]

Venge mid can work. Good range hero, has a melee passive meaning you can cs uphill without missing. You can build a lot of melee exclusive item but as a range character. Good nuke, debuff, and utility. It's not that bad of a hero to go mid. In turbo, people just complain to complain.

[@tuvarkz]

@@rattango9819 The thing is, venge *can* work but doesn't necessarily always do so. And given it's mid, there's usually an onus on the mid player to pick something that fits the other heroes that have already been picked. Picking Venge mid just because 'feel like playing Venge' is borderline throwing.

[@rattango9819]

@@tuvarkz hey you can say whatever you want. But here are the facts. Its not the worst pick. You can make it work. Everyone else already got their pick and role. Mid is the only open role left. Its turbo. You're being way over your head for a turbo game. As long as its not intentionally feeding, just play whatever you want. Most people in turbo just tryna chill unless you are in SEA where people are never chill in any game whatsoever.

[@Acex2ron]

​@@rattango9819 This proves my point exactly. The fact that someone is saying something is borderline throwing in a game with literally no stakes contributes to the idea that the casual is dead. The sweats are everywhere, even in Turbo, and they're ruining the experience.

[@josiahdanyluk9597]

Ok quick correction. People did not dub it the MOBA, riot did. Up to that point they were called Dota style games. But riot wanted to distance themselves from dota, especially pendragon who used to work on the original dota mod and also had a huge falling out with icefrog who was in charge of development.

[@pRIderzaur]

generally agree with everything you said except the movement/mouse part. If you can't grasp this you never played any sim/builder, rts, most RTS games. And that's fine, it's a learning curve, but that in itself can't be such a bane on the games. WASD on a top-down perspective feels weird and I never truly enjoyed first/third person aspect in strategic games like these.

[@adaeterno]

Moba require immense use of hands which can lead to health problems like RSI or carpal tunnel syndrome. Most people don't even want to click that much.

[@pcxxy]

Lovely video. Can't wait for your next one about dead lock

[@howdy-is8os]

I just wanna throw in my two cents about it. A reminder that Dota All Stars was a thing people played for fun and was considered easier than WC3, and people didn't play dota then as seriously as they do now. A normal moba game lasts around 15-50+ minutes, stuck with toxic teammates, smurfs, and newbies with no way to leave without punishment. League had people quit games minutes in if even the slightest thing goes wrong. Jump into a game, if it looked like a bad game just bail. If if looked like a good game the opponents just bail. Then they tried to fix that with the 20 min surrender rule (which is now 15). Around 2017 was the release of PUBG and battle royales solved a lot of pain points with gamers. If you died, no big deal just queue in a new game. If you were good the remaining players are also good. There's also a huge amount of luck involve which you can blame instead of skill. Around this time was also the surge of mobile and gacha games, which are mostly casual and noncommital. Combine with tiktok era zoomer attention spans younger players aren't interested in a committed moba game to sink their teeth into.

[@marvcollins7842]

The only way to get into either of these games without having the worst experience of your life is to play with a friend who can teach you. And as we all know, in current year, friendships are a thing of the past.

[@josephlouisbondoc7918]

yea bcoz in modern era there are some self entitled players

[@caegjohnandrey1250]

2015 - dota is dying 2024 - but dota still alive

[@Sugoicooks]

I have never played any pc moba ,but Mobile moba is my childhood .

[@Shaijn815]

I think a game like bloodline champions would be much more popular today with its wasd movement, extremely short cooldowns and matches and the death match format over the long ass run time mobas have. Despite the fact they couldn't get a stable player base back when it released as mobas were too popular and players entrenched. loving deadlock so far in it's alpha as a melding of tf2, overwatch and moba

[@pnx073]

"gamers" these days are just a lot more casual and a simplified point and click system is a lot easier to learn than RTS-types. You see this in fighting games, too, which also has a different camera setup like MOBAS/RTS games do compared to the first person shooters in the list.

[@Notllamalord]

The game gave me carpel tunnel lol. The problem with the MOBA skill curve is that players have generally gotten better. Plat players now perform similarly gold-wise to world champions from a decade back. With smurfing it's so hard to be a new MOBA player

[@MVersusP]

LoL is dying in my friend group due to our age and meta. We are all around 30 so many of us don't have time. In the last few years, even though all of us had 9 to 5s, we still played the game from when we were home to when we would go to sleep. However we have one friend that is a doctor that didn't want to take time to get better at the game (just watch a youtube video or two). While that doesn't matter that he's not good, he would also tilt so bad that he would actually get mad at us, even though he would make a macro mistake that everyone else knows. One of our friends had enough and switched to playing Valorant, which caused our whole group to stop playing on summoners rift. I don't think I've played with a 5 stack on the rift in months now. I still love league but I don't particularly care enough to play solo q ranked. I'll miss the days of taking norms a little too serious but still having fun with my friends.

[@propov1802]

Yeah, mobas have been "dying" for years now and yet they're still popular.

[@theconduit21]

Just when I heard a new refreshed MOBA experience, I knew Deadlock was coming. And its an icefrog game. What a time to be alive.

[@SuperRaynet]

I still pick and build anything in dota 2. 3 losses in a row with ogre off fulling 1,3 with phase boots

[@boldisordorin9010]

The content point is so true. I miss instalok and animations. Now it's just streamers

[@UsingGorillaLogic]

The thing that makes things worse is lol and dota always had... Mostly negative perspectives outside looking in. Trying to convince someone to play either of them is so hard because people are inherently grossed out by the genre.

[@jumpin2889]

I agree. I honestly think deadlock is the next step for MOBA enjoyers

[@elainasjournal5734]

I had this experience when I came back to League last month. I play just okay and I’m at Bronze, but the expectation from other teammates is just crazy like I missed 1 creep and they flame me for a whole min. Die 1 time and they start insulting. Why are these sweaty tryhards everywhere, even in Bronze?

[@LordPatroclus]

I'm glad you brought up match length. I've never played DotA, but I have put a fair bit of time into League. And honestly, sometimes I want to get back into it, but it's just such a time commitment in every aspect (so I usually play Wild Rift instead). 30-40 minute matches are stressful and anxiety inducing. (And Riot just keeps slowing down the game and people look at you weird if you say that matches should be 15-25 minutes max) I know ARAM is there, but sometimes I just want to play a specific champ or two and ARAM doesn't allow that. I wish they added some sort of permanent URF-like mode. And then there's the topic of unlocking champs. It's like... Oh you want to play the new champ that got released but you don't have enough Blue Essence? You better grind for several weeks! I don't think Riot would lose much money if they either made all champs free or they did what Wild Rift does i.e. absolutely shower players with the champ unlock currency. I'm from a poor country and I only have a laptop from 2018 for playing games. So it truly just sucks when my only options for PvP games are League, DotA, Valorant, etc. Edit: Holy shit, you brought up casual players. I'm a casual player of PvP games all things considered. I stopped caring about Ranked a long time ago. But for example, if you try to play League "casually" you just get yelled at by toxic teammates and you get ran over by the midlane Yasuo in Unranked Draft who's been playing the game since they were born. I don't care about metas or anything, all I want is to get placed with and against players of my own skill level ;;

[@breaker1709]

You're wrong, MOBA's must have a "high entry threshold" otherwise they simply won't be of interest to anyone. The entire gameplay of MOBA's implies a great variety in gameplay, both micro and macro, whereas shooters with a minimum entry threshold have extremely little variety. For example, I'm absolutely not interested in playing them because the whole gameplay boils down to being able to shoot better than the enemy. That's it. Nothing else is required from the shooter player. Whereas in MOBA's, due to the large in-game capabilities, I am able to beat opponents not only because I press the buttons better and faster, but also because I make the right decisions.

[@FoggyInc]

Great points but like I've never had an issue with dota client idk what you were going on about there

[@simonlevy00]

no mention of smite? the whole point of it is wasd

[@induktioliesi]

he did literally talk about smite though? :D

[@simonlevy00]

@@induktioliesi he talked about the Devs making smite 2, not about the game itself, despite being a perfect game for this topic

[@Topunito]

I did watch the video to the end but honestly I still think even implying League has fallen off is too much lmao, genuinely I don't even believe League's popularity is declining like at all, despite all the points you made for why it might make sense that it would. It's quite literally still one of the quintessential mainstream games, it hasn't even been reduced to an isolated community, league players are everywhere, in social media and in real life. At worst it appeals slightly less to people that are younger than 20 and/or are more casual gamers, compared to something like Valorant, COD or Fortnite, but it's still one of the absolute titans, leaders of the industry. Hell, Valorant isn't even coming close to its player count at all despite being made by the same company and theoretically having better appeal for modern audiences. The game will need to be optimized (maybe even rebuilt or have a sequel be made) at some point, but in some form I wouldn't be surprised if League survives for literal decades from now, if Riot knows what they're doing.

[@dovesr0478]

I enjoy MOBAs but I refuse to play anything but support because farming gold is the most boring shit imaginable, and contributes to games taking way too long. I actually think HOTS was headed in the right direction by removing gold and items entirely. The barrier to entry is vastly lower than other MOBAs, and you get to do way more teamfighting which is the best part of the game. It has other problems of course, but the learning curve is nowhere near as steep. It's unfortunate that it was seen as casual trash when it came out, and to an extent that was true, but I think nowadays it would be a breath of fresh air given how sweaty the other games have become. I think it could have been really successful if it didn't make players grind for heroes like in League, and of course if Blizzard didn't fall off a cliff and straight up give up on the game. It was definitely set up to pass the test of time, and had minimal bloat over its lifespan. If we ever get another big player in the MOBA space I hope the developers are brave enough to deviate from dogma and actually try to solve the problems plaguing the genre instead of just making a different flavor of the same thing we've had since the WC3 days.

[@Xweiyiq]

Dota has too much of a hold on those who play it, not to mention that Dota "dying" is still well over 700,000 peak players this month and still well over 900,000 peak in the past 6 months. To say Dota is dying is absurd. League at least doesn't share its numbers so we can't say for sure how many play it, but I highly doubt its numbers will be dwindling anytime soon considering I still hear it get brought up no matter where I go.

[@unprovoked99]

obvious clickbait video for views my man. to soon to call it. dota 2's 24 hour peak yesterday was literally 700k. league's online players right now is 1mil and 130mil active within last month. they have more players combined than most steam games right now

[@Gildorify]

Man, I did not expect feels when I began watching this video... Cool shit though! Well done! I love semi-history lessons and analysis-type videos like this.

[@distritochristianangeloa.157]

I think Deadlock will break the Moba curse considering it is a half shooter where WASD is for movement and there are few techs needed to learn mainly builds that makes it accessable to play

[@KitsuneFaroe]

I mean except the shooter part that's kinda what every MOBA that's not Dota is. But is true that it being a shooter can more easily transfer skills and gameplay from most popular service Games today.

[@deadromon6991]

holy shit, if your league background footage is recent, they still have the shitty recall button UI were you can see through a gap in bottom left corner

[@LOWKAN]

Amazing info!! I always disliked league and dota 2 but loved the art style of dota 2..but once i played them they weren't that bad... never understood top town games like that tho and on TOP of buy skins you hardly can see. like you mentioned. i was a fan of gears of war 2 3 n 4 and when Epic Games made Paragon(v44 2018), i was shocked and ready!! and sadly that turned out to be a dream. hahah...so Predecessor is kind 'a reviving it but...i think I personally see a lot of what i liked in Paragon with Deadlock and not just competitiveness of them, but also the innovations Vavle has put in. Unlike Predecessor...besides move it to UE5 i guess. Any way... Still like any moba it can be overwhelming and you might know more moba things then shooter, or vis versa. I could always see Moba's moving to this format tho. I think it's common sense to sell hero skins in 3rd person shooters and just like Fps its guns skins would probably be more popular...but i guess if you want a cool spawn skin. cool. I'm sure there will be another try at FPS Moba's which would be interesting... If Moba top towns do die...which at this point who knows what could happen lol. sorry...for the long weird thoughts! Just got me excited!! and i love these videos! Great stuff keep it up!

[@GamerRiad]

as of right noew 6 people from 1 of my friend group are getting into dota and 2 of those I got into league. We must bring more sacrifices brothers and sisters. We need fresh meat to flame XD

[@peterpaul3025]

What kills MOBA games is, this games concentrates more on a COMPETITVE side rather than Casual side of gaming. Its kinda sad 😢

[@klentmalihoc1351]

Aging players hits hard ❤…😢 nothing really last

[@soileH]

When you started to talk about AWSD I knew where this is going XD We have quite a few entertainment-focused dota content creators in Russia, not so sure about the English landscape. Dota is overwhelmingly more popular than league in Russia so it makes sense.

[@Acex2ron]

That's actually something that didn't make the cut! Dota (and League's) perceived "Death" is only really an English speaking phenomenon. From what I'm hearing, certain geographies like Russia and South America actually have growing playerbases. However, a game declining in popularity in the West, especially when the games are made by American studios like Valve and Riot, are seen as games that are "dying" because the rest of the world tends to follow.

[@soileH]

@@Acex2ron Exactly. And the fact that Russian and Spanish communities are rather self-sufficient not much is spilled into the English-speaking community. Meanwhile, numerous SEAsians who have started joining the English-speaking community because their local ones are not nearly as independent might have created a semi-false image of these games losing popularity. In reality, a decent part of it is the overall shift in the English-speaking community.

[@wumi2419]

I have also heard one of them say that channels that shifted to entertainment-focused content are alive, while channels whose content was grinding ranks, meta analysis, etc. are pretty much dead. A lot less people are interested in ranked now than in 2018. And from what I know about league, it's way harder to make crazy things work there unless you are smurfing. Main way I myself play dota is some ranked with friends in the evening/night. Ranked is more fun, probably because 3 out of 4 of us are bad at the game, so trying to win but not caring too much is optimal. And ranked has role lock. Oh how many times I was forced off support to play mid because 2 lanes had parties It's a pity Jenkins isn't posting much on youtube, his videos are fun.

[@soileH]

@@wumi2419 personally, I find Jenkins's content to be lacking compared to Russian KZbinrs but I guess, each to their own.

[@gokturk15]

I thought this was gonna be an educational fun video. Instead, it was a depressing one that reminded me my dota friends have moved on and I have not.

[@tagnati5585]

I don't like when skills are transfarable between the games. Because it becomes impossible to start playing a new competitive game, it feels like there is a bunch of smurfs. I played only Dota 2 and Rocket League my entire life. There is LoL to transfer skills from to Dota 2, but the macro in these games is too different so it's not a big deal. Rocket Leage is a complete unique experience, there is nothing similar to play literaly. In both of these games when you are a noob you get enemies of your exact skill level. This does not apply to shooters. When I started to play shooters I got completely destroyed immediately. When I am only learning to aim, everybody else shooting me in the head. This is frustrating af. This is why I play The Finals. This is the only game that is dynamic as Rocket League, strategic as Dota 2 because you can castomize your loadout like in Ability Draft and there are melee weapons that not require to aim a lot and realy viable.

[@Maecks]

great video - spot on insights to my own... keep up the good work!

[@remontariv1130]

Should cover a video regarding the Southeast Asia segment

[@dusc4]

wasd? my bro in the beginning we were doing ↑← ↑ →

[@OrdoMallius]

Dota has the same amount of players it did 5 years ago. It ain't going anywhere it has ONE MAP for fucks sake.

[@cvs_en]

Not sure what you are on about. Dota has had both an engine change/update (source 1 -> source 2 during the whole D2Reborn) as well as multiple Spring Cleaning updates. Acting like the game just shits update on top of update is false. Not saying it doesn't have issues or that they don't fuck up from time to time,

[@Acex2ron]

My brother in Christ, Reborn was almost 10 years ago

[@CloudMV]

League is just plain horrible, i finally was able to quit after long 15 years of non stop daily grind of this terrible game, went to play dota 2 , far better game in all aspects , kinda hard to get in to but once you get grasp of fundamentals and how the game works its quite enjoyable and interesting game.Player count? Who cares,I personally enjoy playing mobas aslong as there are people still playing and I queue up its alright.

[@daben7145]

I used WASD to move the camera in LoL when I started in season3 and do it til this day :D

[@viltautasYT]

I feel like Paladins champions of the realm is the closest thing to a shooter moba, Shame the compamy made some terrible decisions, but I still highly suggest trying the game, again, closest thing to a shooter moba ive ever seen

[@fifofuko1864]

dota has most passionate playerbase. it would die only if the dev team gets tired of the project. let's hope not. dota is a passion project.

[@holliscf]

kinda funny applying personal experience but extrapolating it to the whole community

[@Sebbenify]

I think is a matter of life time. Your core audience gets older and you can't attract new player since your mechanics are really complex, so you are left whit the only people who would commit to learn how to play your game. I think it would happen to most competitive games, it easier for someone to just start playing a game with a small learning curve since they would start having fun faster and get frustrated less often. When you make them so complex and prone to snowballing effects you deter most people. For your game to attract more people it needs to be: streamable, easy to understand what is going on, built big epic moments that people will remember and a small learning curve. Take for example, DotA 2, if you are not being coached, you can pick the easiest hero and still have to undertad basic mechanics, itemization, FoW mechanics, aggro, LI and know what the enemies and ally hero picks can do to undertad how much you can push and how much you can be pushed.

[@michaguszko7164]

Rocket League doesn't use WASD, if you are using keyboard + mouse instead of controller you are giving opponent huge handicap. RL is the only reason I own a controller, so trust me.

[@jamesjaya6744]

If you go dota 2 subreddit a lof of people cry about the lack of new heroes. I might be a minority here, but I actually prefer map changes instead of new hero. Since it replace a mechanic instead of adding a new one. I feel like Dota have been getting so bloated these days. It is impossible for new player to actually get into this game. Heck, even I don"t actually know what half of these heroes can potentially do anymore with talents, facets and innates. Personally I like the facets and innate changes, but I wish they take some mechanic that have been going stale like talent trees and neutral items. If you go to d2pt, most heroes have the same talent tree that people pick over and over. Even the one that is flexible like snapfire is determined from the start of the game, whether you go core or play as support. Of course there is some exception.

[@YullishPelor]

Icefrog switched to deadlock, so im going over there.

[@fhoenixx5185]

The only thing that i dont get about league players accepting as a game mechanic is recall and tp not being a consumable 4 man dove on top. Well done if the tower aggros and kills enemy for you. No courier to buy items is mad. Ive played both league has better champions and kits. Dota has better map mechanics. Overall enjoy both. Honestly i would just play urf all day everyday if it was permanent game mode. Pure dopamine...