The International 10 DOTA2 Championship 2021

The International 10 DOTA2 Championship is one of the world’s largest esports tournaments, followed by millions of gamers annually. It also consistently breaks the record for community-funded prize pools with a jaw-dropping 40 million USD at the 2021 event.

TI10 in 2021 was even more avidly anticipated than usual: besides the huge prize pool and returning to Europe for the first time in over a decade, the championship was rescheduled from 2020 due to the pandemic and then relocated with just a few months’ notice from Sweden to Romania. Teams from Creative Technology Northern Europe and North America began technical planning of the project in 2019 for a 2020 event in the Avicii Arena in Stockholm and ended up onsite in Bucharest’s Arena Națională two years later!

In close collaboration with Touch Worldwide, Creative Technology supported championship organizers Valve and PGL with an enormous delivery of LED screens, high resolution data switching, playout and intercom for the event. Dataton WATCHOUT multi-display software and eight WATCHPAX 60 media servers were used for content playback on all display surfaces on stage including 950m2 of new Black Quartz 4 LED from ROE. The CT crew was onsite for a full 3 weeks to support the setup and a smooth implementation of the prestigious event.

“One of the challenges with moving from Stockholm to a Bucharest and a stadium size show was the increased volumes of LED and fibre, where we had to develop a whole new fibre infrastructure based on the Neutric 0pticalcon MTP24. A total of 102 fibre strands was run from the central control room based deep inside the arena to the stage 300 metres away,” said Niclas Ljung, CTO at Creative Technology Northern Europe.

CT supplied a fully monitored power supply system involving a number of Stagesmarts PDU systems. The total power consumption for the full LED set exceeded 1,900 A per phase which meant a stable power distribution system was critical for the event. CT also delivered the full Riedel intercom system, with a total of 20 antennas used to cover the complete venue.

“While the path was rarely clear, we had tremendous confidence that no matter where on earth COVID might force our show to land, CT could still mobilize the right people and the right systems,” said Nate Berends, Sr Technical Producer at Touch Worldwide.

And the winners? Russian-Ukrainian esports group Team Spirit beat off tough competition to take home the title and $18.2 million of the record prize pool.