Puppey on the Dota 2 meta: “You just see the same things every game, and it’s boring.”

I say: if you’re going to pay a lot of money, then fine, go ahead and get those opportunities—I’ll be on camera all the time, and you can show me all the time. But if my salary is low, why would I want that? Why should you show me like I’m some kind of Cristiano Ronaldo? I know how much Cristiano Ronaldo is worth. I know why you see him all the time. Because, damn, the guy gets a huge salary, and you’re paying a lot of money for that. So it all kind of adds up.

When I have my own team, I know I’m making X dollars there, and that’s not that much money. So I know I’d better focus on winning, because if I win, I’ll get 10 million. And that’s 50—no, 100—it’s 500, maybe 500 or 5,000 times more than my salary, let’s put it that way. Well, not quite 10 million… Anyway, way more than my salary. Way more. Why would I do some PR stunt for you just so you can feel good about your salary? I’d feel better if I won The International.

Well, it’s obvious that when I started my own team, I wanted to get something out of it. I would’ve sold it anyway, because we’ve already done that. We’ve already gotten a kick out of starting our own club and having some fun, but now the situation is such that these teams without a betting sponsor—well, those teams—they just have more money right now, and they get more media coverage, they win more tournaments, and they’re kind of living in esports. Well, they’re there; they’re really living there.

[They’re the ones creating it, too.]

Yeah, they’re creating it. And we’re just putting up with it, so to speak. But we can’t just put up with it. When we started our team, we got sponsors, people got paid, people worked—it was all kind of fun for us because things were constantly growing. And it was all great.

[You brewed beer.]

Yeah, and everything was sort of working out, everything was fun. But now the challenge is just to get to the point where we’re not in the red. It’s just too hard to live like this. And if possible, I’d sell it, but not for a pittance, of course, because I need to get something out of it, but it’s still better to sell it, because right now all we have is our image. I mean, well, there are some teams, and I get all that, but the thing is, you can use Team Secret as a vehicle—you can take it and do something with this club if you put money into it.

Well, a lot of things were better back then, I’d say. The Dota 2 atmosphere was good because everything was constantly growing, and the players were more interesting, and the ideas were more interesting. Not everything had been figured out in Dota yet, so all the teams had more style. Each team’s style was different. All the Chinese teams played like this, Southeast Asia played like that, the Russians or the CIS community played this way, and the Europeans played differently altogether. The Americans were sort of absent, but there were some players there who played their own way.

But they were all doing different things. Everyone had their own style. And there were so many strategies—those “cheesy” strategies where you could just last-pick Broodmother and win the game because of it. There were a lot of things like that back then. Now it’s like they’ve nerfed everything. And the map is—I wouldn’t say “basic”—but it’s bigger, and the whole thing has changed. But now there are certain things you have to do no matter what. The gameplay is scripted now.

And I’d say Dota 2 has reached a point where you just see the same things every game, and it’s not interesting. I’d say it was way more interesting back then because you saw different playstyles in Dota, but you didn’t know which one was the best. Well, maybe you could tell that certain strategies worked better, but things could change from time to time: split-pushing might work, or some kind of super-pushing might work, or a pick-off strategy might work, or something like that, or just teamfight gameplay. Back then, you didn’t know where the meta was headed. But now, the meta stays pretty much the same all the time. Some items might change, but the playstyle will almost always be the same. And if a certain approach wins more often, everyone will start playing that way. It wasn’t like back then when people would say, “Well, someone’s playing like this,” but some teams would still try to win it some other way no matter what.

So, well, that’s just one thing. The second thing is when something is new. Dota 2 was a new game back then, and you kind of didn’t know yet where it was headed. Would it become bigger or not? You didn’t know that. But at the time, while it was happening, you thought all sorts of positive things. You thought, “Now we’re going to sell our own items; we won’t exactly be millionaires, but we’ll all be actively involved in the economy, so to speak.” Something’s happening—it’s going to be awesome; it’s going to be like a real sport; we’ll be selling our jerseys there, and everyone will be fans—and you don’t know what’s going on. You don’t know what’s going to happen. And Valve will be listening.

And back then, there was kind of this period where they were really trying, because they wanted it to grow bigger, too. And I just remember that during that time, I was constantly talking to Valve, to the developers. I talked to Gabe very often. At every The International, they’d host a dinner for everyone who came to TI, and a sort of mini-party, so to speak, where you could all talk to the developers, and they’d talk to you, too. And I also talked with Gabe Newell in Seattle three times in a row. Every International—whether it was the fourth or fifth, I don’t even remember—but he was there. The point is, he was just there. Everyone was there, and there was this sense of community, this atmosphere, and everything just felt so alive, you know?

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There were tournaments like Beyond the Summit, where we’d all sit on the couch and chat. Just the whole vibe of it. Well, now it kind of exists through these streams—the more, let’s say, official ones where players come and cast the game. Well, that just doesn’t feel natural. They’ve already brought you in; you’re supposed to be here; you’re supposed to cast all of this—you know what I mean? It’s corporate, it’s business. But back then, it was natural. Back then, it was just people doing things together all the time, and it felt natural. And that’s why all these things add up to the fact that those were the golden years, I’d say.