The International 2012: review and tournament retrospective

Last time, we remembered how the story of the biggest tournament in the esports industry began. Many professional players and representatives of the Dota community were skeptical about the sequel. The majority thought that the Cologne championship was a single event. But Valve decided the opposite. The sequel tournament, if you want to call it so, was announced in 2012. So, let’s go right back in 2012.

The sequel we deserved

After the first test tournament, Valve brought Dota 2 to the masses. The success was overwhelming: the game beat records in the number of users playing on Steam. It was clear that The International made its impact on such a success. It was not surprising that Gabe Newell’s company announced the second championship in the series in spring 2012 – The International 2012. This announcement literally blew up the esports community. After the end of the first TI, many teams had continued playing the first part of the game but absolutely everyone moved to Dota 2 after the announcement.

The main feature of the second The International was its venue. It was Seattle, which was a home for Valve. Starting from 2012 and till 2018, this city was the house of The International.

The format of the event

Only the name and the number of participants left from the previous tournament. 16 teams took part in the largest tournament. But unlike the previous year, all teams were divided into two groups this time. A draw looked in the following way:

• Group А: LGD Gaming, Team DK, Evil Geniuses, Team Zenith, CLG, Absolute Legends, Mousesports, Moscow Five;
• Group B: Invictus Gaming, complexity Gaming, Orange Esports, Na`Vi, TongFu, EHOME, Darer, MTW.

Another important feature of the tournament – Eastern and Western qualifiers.

Only 14 teams received invitations, two advanced from these qualifiers. TongFu and MTW made it to the tournament through the qualifiers.

Hitched the leaving wagon

One more unpleasant and pretty interesting situation happened with the team mousesports. Initially, mice should not advance to the main tournament of the year. The team placed only third in the Western qualifiers but the salvation came from unexpected sources. The Malaysian team MUFC was not able to attend the tournament and Valve decided to give the last slot to the European team. Another interesting fact: one of the players of mousesports, the Romanian player «ComeWithMe» did not receive a visa and was replaced on KuroKy. The missing of the main tournament of the year influenced the future fate of both CWM and KuroKy. Because who knows, many playing at TI2 helped KuroKy’s future championship but we will talk about it later. The main thing is further.

The supremacy of East

Chinese teams ruled at the second The International. 5 teams out of 16 participants were the representatives of the Celestial. The Chinese were always known for their Dota skill, the second The International was the confirmation.

The representatives of the eastern Dota prepared very seriously. Talents who covered the event always noticed who focused they were. The players of the Chinese teams stayed together, shared the information about their opponents, they distanced from western colleagues. However, this approach brought its results. 4 teams from China entered the top 6, only TongFu were not able to hold the place higher than 7th.

The triumph of IG

And here we come to the main event of The International 2012 – the victory of Invictus Gaming. IG had been showing an incredible level of play since the very beginning of the tournament. The team lost only one team in the group stage, which guaranteed it an advancement to the winner’s bracket. There, the team beat EG with some problems but lost to Na’Vi and stepped down to the lower part of the bracket.

In the loser’s bracket, the team headed by Faith defeated their compatriots three times: 1-0 against EHOME and 2-1 against DK and LGD. They had a rematch against Natus Vincere in the grand final.

It was clear from the very first map that it would be difficult for the Ukrainian team. The Chinese team confidently won the first two maps but faced the aggression on the third one. IG finished Na’Vi with their signature combination of Naga Siren, Dark Seer, and Tidehunter on the next fourth map.

The Chinese team secured the honor of the region and paid off for the last year’s failures. Speaking about Na’Vi, they had to face one more challenge, which would enter history. Stay tuned.