10 Amazing Video Game Moments Created By Fans

3. The Birth Of The MOBA Genre

Dota 2
Valve

With games like League of Legends and Dota 2, there's no arguing with the popularity of the MOBA (massively online battle arena) genre, though it actually started out life as a fan-created series of mods which the industry quickly took notice of.

StarCraft's custom map Aeon of Strife is widely credited with laying the framework for what would become the MOBA game, as was expanded upon by the Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos custom map Defense of the Ancients (Dota), released by Kyle Sommer in 2002.

A small community of fans continued to iterate on the map, and by 2005, professional Dota tournaments were taking place. In the late 2000s, Valve took control of the IP, hiring lead designer IceFrog to create the absurdly successful 2013 sequel, Dota 2.

League of Legends was of course released in the interim, and at its peak in 2014 enjoyed a mind-boggling 27 million daily players.

This combined with the massive commercial viability of the MOBA through eSports is proof perfect of how a pop-culture phenomenon can spawn from the most innocuous of ideas.

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Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes). General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.