The Manila Major 2016

The Manila Major banner.

The Manila Major 2016 is a professional esport tournament for the MOBA Dota 2. The main event was held from June 7 until 12, 2016, in the Mall of Asia in the City of Pasay, Philippines. The event was organized by the Romanian organizer PGL Esports and was sponsored directly by the game's developer, Valve.

It is the third major for Dota 2 and is part of the first competitive season since the major system was introduced in 2015.

It is considered by many in the community and by some professional players to be one of the best live tournaments in Dota 2 due to the high production values and the crowd experience.

These were the ticket prices for the event.^{[note 1]} The event setup took the entire floor space of the arena (similar to a basketball event), which meant that there were no floor seats and 360 seatings were available.

• General admission: ₱50
• Upper box: ₱100
• Lower box: ₱200

• General admission: ₱100
• Upper box: ₱200
• Lower box: ₱400

The Manila Major is one of only five majors Valve has directly sponsored. Valve provided a prize pool of US$3 million and provided an estimated US$2.5-3 million for its production budget.^[1] The event came after the disastrous Shanghai Major, which is widely regarded as the worst major of all time.

On June 12, Irish actor Kristian Nairn, best known for playing the character Hodor in the HBO series Game of Thrones, opened the entrance door for the players in the grand final. Nairn was in the Philippines attending ToyCon 2016 which was being held at the same time at the nearby SMX Convention Center.

A baby was brought in the event 'for the memes'.

During the event, a baby was brought to the venue as a reference to the meme "BabyRage". "BabyRage" is a popular meme emoticon from the streaming platform Twitch.tv. Many in the community questioned this move, as bringing babies to loud venues without ear protection is dangerous.

The crowd was understandably biased towards the only Filipino team in the game, Mineski. Mineski only played one game in the main event against Swedish team Alliance in a best-of-one elimination match.

This resulted in the crowd giving away crucial information to Mineski by cheering loudly whenever Alliance attempted to gank, or take Roshan. Peter "ppd" Dager, the team captain of the North American team Evil Geniuses, tweeted "Gl [good luck] smoking or roshing versus mineski".^[2]

The event is widely regarded as one of the best Dota 2 live tournaments of all time.

Former professional player Johan "N0tail" Sundstein has repeatedly claimed in various interviews that the Manila Major had the best crowd for a live event.

On the YouTube short video "Travel Survey - The International 2022" posted by the official Dota 2 channel, professional players were asked, "what was your favorite LAN?". Tal "Fly" Aizik, Martin "Saksa" Sazdov, and Akbar "SoNNeikO" Butaev all answered The Manila Major. Oleksandr "XBOCT" Dashkevych, whose team failed to qualify for Manila Major, stated that he was jealous of the people who attended the event.

Since the 2017 season, Valve has drastically scaled back on its esports expenses by making important non-TI tournaments become third-party tournaments. With the relegation of majors to tournament organizers looking to make a profit, it is unlikely that any tournament in the Philippines would reach the heights of The Manila Major again for the foreseeable future.

1. The low ticket prices are considered to be unsustainable, i.e., the event is more of a massive marketing expense for Valve. These prices should be considered as an exception and should not be compared with other events on Mall of Asia, such as ESL One Manila and The Manila Masters, for Dota 2 or otherwise.

1. Replying to /r/DotA2 post "What do you think about The Bootleg Majors?". July 7, 2023 at 8:37:57 AM, last edited July 8, 2023 12:16:31 AM (GMT+8). Ben "Noxville" Steenhuisen. Reddit. Retrieved on 2024-03-31.
2. @Peterpandam Twitter post on June 7, 2016. June 7, 2016 at 7:20 PM (UTC+8). @Peterpandam. Twitter. Retrieved on 2024-04-06.