NS commented on the reduction in prize pools for the DreamLeague series tournaments in the 2026/27 season
Community caster and former esports player Yaroslav “NS” Kuznetsov spoke out about the reduction in prize pools for major Dota 2 tournaments.
The quote is reproduced with the source’s spelling and punctuation intact
So the prize pools have started to drop slowly, and they’ll probably keep dropping.
Anyway, if we sum things up over the past year or so…
- Fissure Playground has faded into obscurity;
- Blast moved online and cut its prize pools;
- ESL is the only one left out of the two;
In short, Dota has just one LAN tournament coming up this season—this very ESL one—and everything else is online. I don’t really count PGL as a LAN event because it’s without an audience (and I wouldn’t be surprised if news comes out soon that they’ve gone online too—after all, why not?). Of course, the EWC and TI (IF IT HAPPENS) are in a league of their own—they’re also LAN events. And prize pools are shrinking everywhere. The overinflated esports bubble is bursting right before our eyes, and this isn’t the end of it—in fact, in 2028 there will be even fewer tournaments and prize pools.
Earlier, ESL published the schedule for the upcoming season. The tournament operator also announced that it would continue hosting events for the second division and released the preliminary dates for the 2027/28 season championships.
Photo by Helena Kristiansson, Turtle Entertainment.
