After over one Year of delays, Dota 2‘s upcoming tournament, The International 10, has been relocated to a new venue in a new country. The event, which was originally supposed to take place in Stockholm, Sweden, will now take place in Bucharest, Romania. Valve announced on Wednesday.
Valve worked with Sweden a year in advance to host the 2020 tournament 2019. As the summer event approached, it became clear that due to the coronavirus pandemic that was affecting the Tournament from 2020 to 2021 – something that many tournaments and events like the Olympic Games and the European Football Championship have also faced. After the delay, the tournament was finally postponed to August 2021.
However, according to a post from Valve last month, despite several assurances last year, the Swedish Sports Federation voted not to include eSports in its federation, and Valve’s game was denied elite sporting event status, meaning visa applications for players outside the European Union would not be approved.
Instead, players’ entry into the country would be subject to the approval of individual border officials. This challenged the teams’ ability to build their full roster and made it impossible to guarantee the integrity of the tournament. On June 21st, Valve decided to postpone the tournament and move it to a new location.
On Wednesday, Valve announced that the International 10 – Dota 2 Championships will officially take place from October 7th to October 17th at the Arena Nationala in Bucharest, Romania. The tournament’s new venue typically holds up to 55,000 spectators, but it remains to be seen how Valve will set it up for The International – although the developer said ticket information will be available soon.
