Ten most memorable moments of The International. Part II

Part II of our retrospective is dedicated to the legendary moments and hilarious memes from The International tournaments held in 2015-2018. In case you’ve missed Part I, it is available through the link.

Dendi? It can’t be…

The All-Star matches and Dendi were destined to meet each other. Danil has spent a few years entertaining the crowd – and he was good at it. He’s been the main source of hilarious and exciting scenes for quite some time. Here’s his silly dance at The International 2013 after he kicked his teammate’s ass:

The main show, however, happened in 2015. Ten professional players chosen by the community had to fight against ten viewers from the audience. One of the invited amateurs was the cosplayer in a terrible Pudge’s outfit. You bet the audience was shocked when the host revealed that it actually was Dendi in the suit. He proceeded to give silly emotes to the cameraman. Unfortunately, Dendi and Puppey lost the match – even despite the fact that ChuaN’s team had six professional players. The show was great, though.

Echo Slam worth six million

We have to recall the most exciting moment of The International 2015, which led to creating a whole bunch of local Dota 2 memes. Only two EG players – UNiVeRsE and ppd playing as Earthshaker and Ancient Apparition respectively – were enough to take down four opponents from CDEC during the fourth map of the Grand finals. It was a perfectly executed play by the two most evil Dota 2 geniuses, and the crowd along with commentators went nuts. A single CDEC player managed to escape the death trap, but the result of the match was predetermined at that moment.

The whole scene clearly showed that you should never be too confident – especially, in such an inventive and unpredictable gaming discipline as Dota 2.

The true defence of the ancients

Perhaps, Captain Obvious has taken the lead now, but we’d like to remind that the initial title of DotA was actually an abbreviation – Defence of the Ancients. The main goal for each team was to successfully defend the main building. Nowadays, they are called the Thrones, but back in the glorious DotA days, the buildings were called the Ancients. At The International 2016, we witnessed an unbelievably exciting play. Evil Geniuses needed to take down the last 210 health points of the enemy Throne belonging to Alliance, but the Swedish team surprisingly counter-attacked. While the Throne keeps standing, you have to fight – and that was exactly what Alliance did. The team won the match after a successful march from their own fountain to the enemy’s one.

It wasn’t the only impressive comeback at TI6. Another exciting match once again featured Evil Geniuses – although then, it was their time to turn the tables. Even despite the fact that EHOME was attacking EG’s base with mega creeps, the team managed to win.

Welcome to The International!

Gabe Newell, the co-founder of Valve, keeps the status of the main symbol of The International. Each year, hundreds of thousands of viewers wait in anticipation to hear Gabe’s signature phrase “Welcome to The International!” Sadly, the big man missed The International 2017. Well, almost. No one knows the exact reason why he had to skip the tournament, but according to the rumours, Newell travelled to Alaska and wasn’t able to get back to the civilization in time. His absence resulted in a popular meme – the cameo of Gabe the Security Guy was hilarious and mesmerizing.

Gabe returned in 2018 – along with a couple of great jokes:

The main handshake

They say revenge is a dish best served cold. Sometimes you have to wait and calm down despite all the odds to deliver the most satisfying comeback ever – and we have a perfect example to back this idea up. After Fly and s4 left OG to join Evil Geniuses just a few weeks before the open qualifiers for The International 2018 started, many believed that the four-time winners of the Majors were literally destroyed by the shameful betrayal. However, n0tail gathered a new team, successfully fought through the qualifiers, and defeated Evil Geniuses on the main Dota 2 arena throwing them off to the lower bracket. Tasty!

The final handshake between the former teammates became a historical moment. The Dane gave an eloquent look, but it was just the beginning. OG kept winning after the sweet revenge, and eventually, we witnessed the legendary finals. You can read more on the matter here.

Our series of retrospective articles ends here. We encourage you to share with us your most exciting memories regarding the previous TI tournaments. In the meantime, The International 2019 starts in less than a month – and we are preparing for an outstanding show.

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