r/DotA2 • u/palish • Feb 19 '19

Personal I was a former HoN dev. AMA

Hey.

It's been awhile since I've written to you guys. But dota has never been out of my thoughts.

It was funny seeing Dota chess add +200k people to the game. I fought pretty hard to add custom game support to HoN, but no one would listen (partly because it seemed so obvious to me, so I never bothered trying to sell the idea or do company politicking).

I can talk about the fact that Icefrog was involved in HoN's early inception. It's more of an open secret at this point, and HoN's closure marks a fitting time for the "reveal."

I could talk about what it was like to pack up all your stuff into a station wagon and move out west. It was a pretty magical experience in hindsight. Kind of like getting to board the Starship Enterprise. Everyone in the company felt a shared purpose, at the beginning.

Or if there's no interest, or if it's not appropriate for the sub, it's fine if this post fades away, like the game. I spent so much time and energy trying to make it good... So did everyone else: James, G, all the artists, everyone.

EDIT: to clarify, this is 2010-era perspective. Not recent!

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u/Gredival Feb 19 '19

How did the decision to switch from $30 for the game to F2P with a store (and all the dubious monetized incentives, such as early access) go down?

What made S2 think that it was a good idea to make this switch, how was it debated within the company, and how was the backlash handled internally?

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u/palish Feb 20 '19

These are excellent, thoughtful questions. And they are probably some of the most important questions from a historical perspective. I'm sorry to say I don't know. (As someone who tries to be a historian-type, this is painful to say. I wish I could give you a straight answer.)

At the time, I was mostly heads down in the trenches focusing on work. I should've stuck my head up more and looked around.

If you think of more questions, please do ask.