Dota Pro Circuit Cancels Winter Major Because of Increasing COVID Restrictions

This year's Dota Pro Circuit Winter Tour comes to an unfortunate close with a canceled first Major. Valve claimed that the "discovery and spread of new strains of COVID-19" and the "resulting increase of travel restrictions" made it difficult to gather all the qualified teams from across the globe for a proper LAN tournament.

The Dota Pro Circuit consists of three Tours, all of which pit teams against each other in Regional Leagues before advancing the top performers to Majors. However, the canceled Major means the Winter Tour will end without any advancement to an international stage. As a result, points from the first Major have been redistributed between the other two Majors scheduled later in the year.

In its blog post about the cancelation, Valve promised to monitor the global health situation and travel restrictions to gauge whether or not future Majors can take place as planned. Unexpected variants such as Omicron and spikes in COVID cases, like that over the holidays, might further interrupt the DPC schedule.

Dota 2 has managed to stay one of the most popular esports since its release in July 2013. The Dota Pro Circuit is the most recent iteration of its esports league, which evolved from the Dota Major Championship series. The Winter Tour is currently ongoing, and the latest Spring Tour passed earlier last year. Competing teams hope to earn enough points to enter The International for a chance at becoming the Dota 2 World Champion.