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who truly appreciated what you did best.

And loved you for it.

She was aware of what I'm doing

and what I'm passionate about.

The breakup was her decision

and I respected it.

We'd been together for close to three years

and ever since the breakup,

I haven't gotten over it.

I recall the last time she spoke to me

she named me as a bastard so

Laughter

We're not in contact anymore,

yeah, but

life goes on.

L'viv, Ukraine

I'm from Ukraine.

My nickname is Dendi.

I finished my university, and

I'm just playing computer games right now.

He was doing music.

He played the piano.

He was doing dancing.

At school, he had musical plays in

which he played the main role.

Audiences were always

impressed by his artistic ability.

When their kids' group was showing,

Danil would always stand out.

When we were growing up

it wasn't a good time financially

for our family.

But my grandma helped us

to get our first computer in 1997.

Early, compared with other kids in Ukraine.

We got visitors every day.

The friends of my older brother

used to come to visit us

and we were playing games.

And Danil, every time looked at what we do.

Every time we would try to push him away

but he would come back and look again.

It was more prominent with him

than with other kids.

During all his conscious life

we were trying to stop him from playing.

We were hiding our computer cord

everywhere in our apartment

but he always found it.

I always wanted to understand him better.

Including that hobby, I wanted

to understand him better.

There were certain reasons.

I'm not going to mention them now.

I think somewhere deep

inside he's a little bit sad.

She stopped preventing him

from playing Dota.

She gave Dendi the freedom to choose

what is the best for him and his life.

Tournaments back then were

really low prizes.

And a lot of prize money didn't

even get to the players.

There's been a lot of scams with

the managers and stuff like that.

There were, like, some rumors that

it's going to be $50,000 first place,

and everyone was going, like,

"Nah, it's not going to be like that."

August 10, 2011

Watch the forums go nuts, guys.

Watch the forums go nuts.

It is actually confirmed.

It is off the fricking hook.

1.6 million dollar prize pool!

That is for the winner,

1 million dollars for winning Dota!

Dota, the game I've played for 5 years now.

Which I played for fun.

For some food money or whatever, you know.

Ok, it's actually getting big.

It's the largest prize pool of any

gaming competition to date.

It just felt like the start

of something big.

Like a revolution.

You know, we had everything we needed

for the game to become big and

respected as an E Sport.

It would kind of like vindicate us.

We're not just playing

because we're addicted.

There's a goal, a motive.

That we can actually reach out and

grab if we are good enough.

Beijing, China

Over in Asia, professional gamers

are treated like rock stars.

It's a viable career opportunity.

They actually live in gamer houses.

So it's set up to be a thing all year long.

I think their approach to practice

is that it's like a day job.

The fan base is immense.

It probably is as big as the

whole western audience together.

Or even more than that.

So now you really have to play good.

You really have to try hard.

It's first place. It's go big or go home.

The big teams get big money.

But the 9th to 16th place earn nothing.

And their salaries are not

worth considering.

While in sports, you have a salary

that you can live on.

With pro gaming, I think that's

one of the toughest parts is

living game to game.

It's like living paycheck to paycheck.

Like, I have to win.

If I don't win, I don't get paid.

That's a tough living for anybody.

It doesn't matter what you're doing.

When your child wants

to be a professional gamer

you don't have any history to look back on

like other sports.

I don't know anyone who's

made a living at gaming.

So it's kind of a scary thing

when you see your kid putting

their whole life into gaming

and not college and

not the traditional things.

What if nothing comes of it?

Regarding the age

I think, yes,

25, 26 years.

It's absolutely maximum for E Sports

because 27, 28, 29, 30

your reaction time is lowering

and you can't click so much, you know,

as the kids do.

A lot of financial responsibilities

are laid upon me right now.

Require me to be successful

in something or have a job.

So it's pretty critical that

I am successful

if I want to continue the gaming career.

He's an "A-Star" student, you know?

Because of this gaming,

it pulled him right down.

It's very sad for me.

So here the bad one is Auntie.

Auntie is the one that always

comes here and

nag, nag, nag, nag, nag.

- Am I right?

- It's tough being a gamer.

Sorry?

- Am I right?

- I said, it's tough being a gamer.

Huh, hy? Multi-millionaire.

Laughter

For gaming, huh?

Sorry, you are not.

Huh? What is your view?

What is your plan?

That is more important.

I mean, we speak ourselves.

We speak our frank opinion.

This is your choice now.

What do you want in life?

That is more important.

If I'm going to win this tournament

my first thought would be

I will call my ex-girlfriend.

Things got real bad between us and

but right now, for me, if I'm going

to win this tournament,

my first thought would be,

yeah, I would call her.

I would tell her about it and

I would want to share this moment with her

yeah.

This tournament is going to be

a moment in every gamer's life.

Everything that you've been

doing has been building up

and is going to happen over one week.

And then it's not one week anymore.

It's one game.

And then it's not that one game.

it's that one moment in the game.

And then that one moment in the

game is where it's going to finish.

And how's it going to finish?

Are you going to be holding up a trophy?

Or are you going to be the most

disappointed that you've ever been?

Cologne, Germany

It's Tuesday.

So one day before the event.

We already have a lot of setup.

We have a lot of computer setup right here.

The whole booth construction

pretty much finished.

So five players per side.

They can see each other through the glass.

They can't hear each other.

This booth is soundproofed up.

Plus, the whole setup here

if you look from above looks

exactly like a Dota map.

And this is the mid.

This is where it all happens.

A few teams have already

arrived this morning.

We had a lot of teams

from Singapore.

We have China.

We had Malaysia coming in

and Russia.

And tomorrow it's finally happening.

DAY 1 of 5

TEAMS WITH TWO OR MORE WINS

ADVANCE TO THE WINNERS BRACKE We're here live at Gamescom

2011 in beautiful Cologne.

It's the first day of the event.

We've got some of the world's

best teams here in Dota.

And they're handing out a tournament

prize of 1.6 million dollars!

It is massive here.

A tournament of 1.6 million dollars.

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