Surely, if Dota 2 is such a "fantastically crafted video game", you should have no trouble in tearing through his arguments.

My posting history and his would suggest otherwise, both in our views, writing composition and style. Since you're accusing others of being "casual gamers", out of curiosity what RTSes do you play?

http://www.learntocounter.com/why-dota-sucks-prologue/

The quotes above should suffice. None of you have the attention span to read a 6-paragraph prologue, let alone critique it.

Mike Lowell, author and creator of learntocounter.com, has been releasing a series of chapters from his book tackling every aspect of the dota genre: its history, its esports phenomenon, its underlying systems...

With one intention in mind: to chastise and purge the dota player, who does not know any better than to frolic in a cesspool, content and unconcerned with finding better forms of entertainment!

Quite frankly, it doesn’t matter what you call dota games, it doesn’t matter who is developing them, and I don’t care what anyone else is saying about them. They suck. The genre is so fundamentally dysfunctional that it should have been laughed off the board the second it was considered anything more than a sideshow in the world of Blizzard RTS games. Dota is the Frankenstein of terrible game design concepts, the culmination of every damaging design trend in modern videogames. And yet, dota games—particularly Dota 2—are being held to the same regard as the most beautifully crafted videogames ever assembled. The ongoing narrative for Defense of the Ancients is that a series of amateur content creators with limited programming experience and few financial resources created a Warcraft III map that was not only better than Warcraft III, but surpassed the collective efforts of a billion-dollar videogame industry and its world-class game creators. A story that should set off red flags in the mind of any reasonable person has become a rallying cry for transformative change in the world of videogames.

Mike Lowell

You will not find a more systematic and comprehensive analysis of the dota genre anywhere else on the internet.

Prologue: http://www.learntocounter.com/why-dota-sucks-prologue/

Introduction: http://www.learntocounter.com/why-dota-sucks-introduction/

1: http://www.learntocounter.com/why-dota-sucks-chapter-1/

2: http://www.learntocounter.com/why-dota-sucks-chapter-2/

3: http://www.learntocounter.com/why-dota-sucks-chapter-3/

More coming soon!

If you wish to address the author, I suggest you do so on the 'Articles' section of his forum. Oh and before you start driveling on how "ITS JUST YOUR OPINIONS MANS" like a mouth-drooling idiot, I ask you read the following:

http://insomnia.ac/commentary/on_pluralism/

Your PC will want to hurl you for playing such a garbage RPG.

Call of Duty™: Ghosts, because it came after Call of Duty™: Black Ops II and before Call of Duty™: Advanced Warfare.

Half-Life is the birth of the modern day scripted-linear storytelling-driven action game, with an emphasis on "realistic gunplay" with a high-lethality weapon-set and smart enemy AI. Gone are the exploration, diverse weapon-set, speed, and level design of DOOM. It's both a blessing and a curse for the FPS genre and video games as a whole.

Cross's elemental system at least adds variation to the combat, forcing the player to adapt to different character sets and tactics based on enemy types and elemental fields. I don't recall ever deviating from a particular playstyle in Chrono Trigger. It's as simple as it gets. Also the standard attack options in CC add an element of risk. It's too forgiving and not as developed as the combat system in Fallout, but it's a nice addition.

Some birdbrain thought it would be a good idea to merge the PC technical forum with PC game discussion, just so people can pollute a once decent forum with "WILL THIS $1500 RIG PLAY THE NEXT SH*TTY MODERN TACTICOOL SHOOTER ON MAX SETTINGS??" Oh and how fitting are the two stickies which serve no purpose other than to propagate the PC hardware circle-jerk, sure to impress all the ladies out there! Sure it existed on the old forum, but at least it was mostly confined in the PC hardware section. But apparently creating a mess of a forum consisting of technical support, to peripheral discussion, and actual *games* is an improvement. You're sure to get more traffic from a PC hardware section then the pathetic mobile discussion forum.

Apparently there is a computer hardware forum, but it isn't included on the main page?

Why ask such a question unless you have a particular console in mind?  I can't possibly fathom the number of great games that exist across all platforms.

Dawn of War, Warcraft III, Forged Alliance, Airland Battle