Trademark sleuth website
Superannuation reports that Valve has
filed a trademark application with the US Patent and Trademark office for "
DotA".
The abbreviated title refers to
Defense of the Ancients, a popular mod for Blizzard's strategy game
Warcraft III, which has continued to breathe new life into the title since its 2002 release. The trademark application covers "electronic game software", "computer game software", and "video game software".
UK gaming news website
CVG also caught a hint about the release from voice actor Jon St. John, who announced on
his Twitter that he had worked on Valve's
DotA. His tweet read, "Had a great time in Seattle last week recording for
DotA. The guys at Valve Software are awesome," and was up only briefly before being removed.
DotA lead developer IceFrog
joined Valve in late 2009, saying in a Q&A on his site a few days before that his goal and top priority in the future was to "solve the surrounding issues that affected the
DotA experience in order to allow it to reach new heights".
IceFrog inherited the
DotA project in 2005 from creator Steve "Guinsoo" Feak, who went on to work for Riot Games on
League of Legends: Clash of Fates, which is in much the same vein as
DotA.
Defense of the Ancients is a custom scenario for
Warcraft III based on the
StarCraft map "Aeon of Strife". It challenges the player to destroy the opponents' Ancients by making use of heavily guarded fortresses on opposite ends of the map.
DotA has been featured at many worldwide tournaments, including BlizzCon and the Asian World Cyber Games.
