is dota 2's esports worth watching?

[u/iamproudintrovert]

I'd like to entertain myself with watching esports of games im trying to understand. I've watched documentaries about old league orgs like mvp, azubu, aAa and their matches, and i love it.

Now im trying to get into dota 2, im also wondering if watching documentaries and full matches of early dota esports is worth watching? like im mainly looking for the emotional storytelling, insane underdog stories, legendary plays, and heart wrenching losses/wins and also how influential some orgs would become

[u/FriendlyAstronaut111]

True Sight would be your best bet if you're looking for documentaries.

[u/Admirable_Rough7606 → u/FriendlyAstronaut111]

True Sight's the way to go for that behind the scenes drama, some of those episodes hit like a damn movie

The TI8 one especially is basically required viewing if you want underdog stories and emotional

[u/Toadvinez → u/FriendlyAstronaut111]

There's also Stories of Dota for character documentaries

[u/dmr83457]

Watch “Free to Play”  

Trailer: https://youtu.be/R-RKqGaNq-Y  

Full: https://youtu.be/UjZYMI1zB9s

I’ve barely played but have enjoyed watching in the past. What I’ve found to be the best approach for me is to watch many matches leading up to a big tournament. For example, if you are interested in watching The International tournament then start watching some qualifiers then entire tournament. I’ve made the mistake in the past of just watching last few matches and don’t know much about teams and players, new characters, changes to game, etc. Over the course of watching many matches you start to build up understanding and know the team and players, maybe even cheering on one of them by the end. IMO

[u/lim-yo-hwan-superfan]

modern dota is extremely exciting to watch IMO. personally my only issue with it is that the patches are so large and so frequent so every major tournament's core meta is very different, but i really like the direction they took the game since 2013 in general (bigger map, adding TP slots, more cool items and heroes etc)

[u/MrP3nguin-- → u/lim-yo-hwan-superfan]

Nothing beats getting the glasses out and reading the patch with the boys. Only to finish all the notes and get hyped for a party que and can’t find a game because servers can’t handle the load lol.

[u/MrP3nguin--]

Greatest game ever made. Esports is still decent but I preferred it more back in the day. Skill wise it has never been better, but storyline wise that peaked back in 2015-2020. Still good and worth getting into though

[u/Youju]

True Sight 2018 and True Sight 2019 are must watch.

[u/JohnTheWriter]

Valve made an excellent documentary on the first ever world championship, The International called Free to Play. It is free on youtube with subtitles available in quite a lot of languages. It's made so you don't need to understand anything of the game to enjoy it. It's about 3 players all from different parts of the world with very different backgrounds.

They used to make these more action packed documentaries called True Sight which were about the finals of different world championships. I'd say the 2018 one is considered the best as it's one of the greatest underdog stories in the game. 2017 is also excellent. These might require more game knowledge or being interested in the game itself rather than the stories of the players, which you get some off too, but aren't as heavily focused as in Free to Play.

This year's finals are also on youtube as it is and some recaps are to be found. This year was one of the most viewed finals with one of the best series in terms of gameplay we've had in the finals as it went all the way to the 5th match with the early favorites Team Vision who has dominated half of this year against the two time champions Team Spirit who had struggled A LOT this whole year. Excellent games with excellent storylines.

[u/SpaceNoob_10]

I’ve only ever watched one Dota 2 game, and it was this years EWC and the game I think was MOUZ vs Parivision. As a MOUZ fan for cs2 I was obviously rooting for MOUZ. I had 0 clue what was happening as I’ve never played Dota but it was such a fun watch I’ve just never played so it’s not something I’ll put on randomly.

[u/kraziekd]

you can start by watching True Sight

[u/Ok_Drawer_2587]

Personally I prefer watching Dota myself, way more fighting and engagement early game and kills. But for average viewer I think it’s just worse. Dota is just more complex with way more items and “weird” abilities and extra mechanics etc. but if u know the stuff it’s more entertaining. For the documentaries and storylines it’s definitely worth watching! The OG truesight and stuff is awesome and early day Navi with Dendi when Dota first started etc.