blizzard-dota posts

You can add Blizzard VP Rob Pardo to the list of folks who don't care for Valve's attempt to trademark the use of the name DOTA for Valve's upcoming game DOTA 2. In a chat with Eurogamer at BlizzCon, Pardo stated, "Valve is usually so pro mod community. It's such a community company that it just seems like a really strange move to us... I really don't understand why [they would do it], to be honest."

Valve first filed a trademark for use of the name DOTA earlier this summer. In October, Valve announced that it would release DOTA 2, a stand alone graphical remake of the original Defense of the Ancients mod that was first made for Blizzard's RTS game Warcraft III. Pardo stated, "To us, that means that you're really taking it away from the Blizzard and Warcraft III community and that just doesn't seem the right thing to do." Valve has yet to comment on the DOTA trademark controversy. Blizzard, however, is still planning to release Blizzard DOTA, an upcoming custom map for StarCraft II. Pardo says that if Valve tries to contest the use of DOTA for the StarCrat II map he states, "Our contention is that it should continue to be available to Blizzard and to our community."

While Blizzard didn't talk much about its plans for the Heart of the Storm continuation of StarCraft II at BlizzCon 2010 today (next year, maybe?), today the developer announced plans to release four very unique custom maps for the sci-fi RTS game. The maps were one of the main subjects in the StarCraft II Custom Maps and Editor panel at the show today.

One of the maps, and one that's sure to be hugely popular among long time Blizzard fans, is Blizzard DOTA. This will be Blizzard's version of the Defense of the Ancients mod first made for WarCraft III and has since spawned a mini-game genre on its own. This map will feature 12 heroes from all over the Blizzard canon including Sarah Kerrigan, Sylvanas, Jim Raynor, and Muradin Bronzebeard in a 5 vs 5 team based map with a chess theme.

Other custom maps include Left 2 Die, which is based (sort of) on Valve's Left 4 Dead zombie shooter. Players take out infected structures during the day and build defenses to deal with the Zerg infestation at night. Starjeweled takes inspiration from PopCap's Bejeweled with puzzle solving becoming the key to training your troops and taking out enemies. Finally the most unusual map has to be Aiur Chef, which takes the premise of the classic cooking show Iron Chef to StarCraft II. Players must try to collect components on the map to make meals based on one main ingredient and sometimes there's fights to the death involved.

Blizzard has said all of these custom maps are still in the early stages of development and could change before they are released for free to StarCraft II owners. Blizzard will also release other more conventional free custom maps and ladder maps for the game in the coming months.