Dota 2: Dragon’s Blood is an animated TV series on Netflix. This review does not spoil the specifics of the plot. 

The Netflix series was clearly not done by Valve. Valve makes video games. And they are good at it. One of the things I really enjoy about their video games, at least the ones that I play, is how they can work in story elements into games that are not driven by a plot. 

Team Fortress 2, TF2, was one of the first games that I really played. It is a team based shooter. You and your team attack the enemy to gain the bases or check point or briefcase. The game play was fun, not too impossible for me to pick up, but with enough of a ceiling that my brother sank tons of hours into the game. There is no plot to the game. Yet, Valve was able to include clever dialogue lines, small hints to a greater story in the small background elements of the levels and later with their comics. Sure the stories from the comics were not deep, but they were well done – fun, amusing and competently written. 

This attention to detail was carried into Dota 2. This multiplayer fighting game – MOBA (multiplayer online battle arena) is not plot driven. There is no story that you learn by playing through the game. Yet, there are little clues to the world’s lore scattered through the short background notes for each of the heroes, the heroes voice lines and the fluff tags attached to items. From these cleverly written short bits, you get a feel for the world and the heroes you play. There are comics that I haven’t read, which delve deeper into the world. And they were even going to explain some of the world with their (now dead) digital card game, Artifact. So, while story and plot are not driving forces, the artists at Valve have been able to create a cohesive world filled with multiple races, beings and conflicts. 

There is a lot of potential for a story scattered throughout this game. So, I was excited to learn about the animated netflix series – Dota 2: Dragon’s Blood. This TV series was going to set a story in the Dota universe. I watched the sanctioned hype videos, which helped to create some interest. That said, on a scale of 1 – 10 (one being no interest and 10 being super excited), I was sitting at about 7 when I sat down on the couch to watch some TV. The intro raised my excitement to a 9, which then plummeted to a 5 by the end of the first episode. 

Dragon’s Blood may be set in Valve’s world. But this outsourced production lacked the Valve touch. The best I can say is the 8 episode season was generic. The dialogue was bland and the animation was washed out. It was very surprising how many shots were still images, no movement. There were crowds cheering in the background while the audience stared at a stationary image. Everything about the series was flat. The key plot points were either entirely too predictable or so obtuse I couldn’t follow the show’s explanations. Honestly, I don’t get the ending. It doesn’t make sense, which must be off putting to those not familiar with the Dota 2 universe. 

The video game is full of movement. One of the things I struggle with as a player is how many things are happening at once. Battle scenes are a swirl of chaotic movement and particle effects. It is very action focused, even during the ‘quiet’ moments of the game. So, an animated series that spent one third of the time used stationary images didn’t ring true. The animation was a bit better during fight scenes – during these moments they pulled more directly from the video game animating the skills of the heroes. 

The character lines in the video game are fun, witty and convey a surprising amount of information considering they have nothing to do with a plot. The dialogue in the animated series used cussing to seem edgy. Something Valve doesn’t need to resort to because they are better writers. As it was a Netflix series it also felt the need to incorporate orgies into some of the visuals, presumably to compensate for the lack of well developed characters and plot. Finally, the visuals were very white-washed. While this may be a common feature of anime, I feel like it is counter to the Dota vision that was trying to be more diverse with its character design. 

While I feel like there is potential to pull stories out of the Dota 2 world, I found this first attempt underwhelming. As I am not an expert in the lore of the Dota 2 world, I cannot speak to the accuracy of the story. However, with generic dialogue and bland animation I cannot say I was impressed with this attempt to expand the franchise.