‘Dota 2’ is hopping on the battle royale train in its own unique way

By Steven Petite Published May 9, 2018

Image used with permission by copyright holder

Dota 2‘s 2018 International Battle Pass is on sale now and one of the perks of purchasing it is a new game mode that sounds an awful lot like a spin on the battle royale variant.

Called “The Underhollow,” the new Dota 2 game mode turns the MOBA into a last-team-standing dungeon crawler.

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The mode’s description reads: “Battle through a labyrinth filled with monsters, marvels, and many other three-player enemy squads as you search for Roshan’s rarest cheese and work to be the last team standing. You’ll need to navigate carefully to earn the XP and Gold needed to destroy your opponents.”

You could draw parallels from finding Roshan’s cheese and winning a chicken dinner in PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. And earning XP and acquiring gold can be connected to acquiring gear in both Fortnite and PUBG.

If you’re not convinced yet, though, The Underhollow even has its own version of the encroaching blue wall/storm that shrinks the playing field in PUBG and Fortnite. As Roshan gets more and more excited about cheese, the walls in the dungeon start to erode and cave in, shrinking the playing field until nothing but the center remains.

It’s unclear how many players each match will hold, but the “many” descriptor signals it will be as chaotic and unpredictable as a match of PUBG and Fortnite, essentially the opposite of a traditional Dota 2 match.

The Underhollow isn’t available quite yet, but it’s “coming soon.” Although it’s not super surprising to see a popular game like Dota 2 jump on the battle royale bandwagon, we’re curious how it will work once it is live.

In addition to the intriguing battle royale-style mode, Battle Pass owners gain access to Cavern Crawl, which sounds like a horde mode. As you win more Dota 2 matches, you can explore deeper into the cavern for a chance to earn exclusive items and a rare Jade Baby Roshan. Also, a new unranked game mode called Mutation implements a random assortment of gameplay modifiers. The modifiers will change on a daily basis.

The 2018 Battle Pass starts at $10 and grants players access to the three new game modes and a slew of other features.

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Former Digital Trends Contributor

Steven is a writer from Northeast Ohio currently based in Louisiana. He writes about video games and books, and consumes…

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