Predicting when live events can happen again is proving pretty tough at the moment, especially when your fans are expected to come from all around the world. As a result, Valve has postponed Dota 2’s The International to a later date, which is likely to be sometime in 2021.
The tournament, which is considered one of the biggest esports tournaments in the world, was slated to go ahead in late summer, but due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, Valve says it doesn’t have “enough confidence” that it will be able to communicate firm dates for the future.
“After extensive consideration of the global health emergency stemming from COVID-19, we have made the difficult choice to delay The International,” Valve says on the Dota 2 blog. “We have been exploring various date possibilities, but it is likely that the event will need to happen in 2021. Given the highly volatile landscape for local gathering restrictions, virus trajectory, and global travel policies, we don’t expect to have enough confidence to communicate firm dates in the near future.”
To deal with the fallout, Valve is now working on restructuring the Dota Pro Circuit for the fall.
However, the next Battle Pass, which contributes to 25% of The International’s prize pool, will still be released at around the same time as planned – give or take a few weeks. It will not, however, revolve around TI10.
