James is an ass - By James Harding Yesterday I was let go from the Shangahi Major for entirely my on camera segments I can only imagine. This as you know is the news. Followed by a string of surreal events. I decided I should release a statement. I wasn’t sure what kind of statement. Because there are various parties involved. So I slept on it and Valve asked me to ‘Put it on ice’ yesterday, so sleeping on it seemed a good idea. But now, upon waking. I read today on reddit: “James is an Ass’ - GabeNewellBellevue This is a small quote from Gabes statement. But since I work a lot with various other companies, this also highly affects my business reputation. So after Valve asked me to put my statement ‘On Ice’ last night. Which I obviously agreed to do. Since resolving this situation privately would have been a lot more professional for all parties involved. I am in the mind where I wish to release the most honest statement I can. With history, emotions, facts, more facts and maybe even heroes and villains. guaranteed to be a rollercoaster of a read. complete with spelling errors by your very dyslexic Host. Disclaimer: I do not know Gabe well, and to my knowledge he does not know me well. Infact we have only meet twice. Once, Where Bruno and myself took a picture with him at TI2. No words were spoken between us, Other than my Thank you. Second, Where I sat down briefly with Gabe and his Son for 2-3 minutes. Where I congratulated him on his company, and surrounding himself with amazing people (mainly referring to the Dota2 team who were kicking ass with the product back then). Valve at the time were very impressive to me. Myself as an indie game developer and a long time esport player/fan/worker look up to them. So with that out the way. Let us begin at the Shanghai Major (but trust me, there is more) I was approached 3-5 weeks before the Shanghai Major to host. I was asked by Bruno If I was interested in the gig. I was told I needed to give an answer that day. So, after some talks, I agreed it can work. Since even before going to the Shanghai Major, I had a feeling that the event would be riddled with problems from delays to lack of production value from previous events put on by the production team. So I figured I was asked to Host since I’m an very improvon camera personality who can keep the customer (twitch.tv - dota 2 fans) entertained by getting more out of the paneliest. and keeping conversation flowing. I was mentally prepared to go! and do a great job no matter the problems I would face. Upon the news returning to other Valve employees that I have accepted. I got a message from Icefrog himself. This is 100% Real. It pains me to bring a private conversation in to this post. Due to I think Icefrog is an absolute amazing person, who has done amazing things with the game. He’s somewhat a design idol of mine. and his methods of design I have adopted into my current development of the game I’m working on. and now here I am pulling him into this shit show. You have my apologies Icefrog. So, I’ve been hired. I’ve been told by Icefrog to be myself. And Bruno was NOT in the process of hiring me. Bruno did lobby for me to host ti5. But they decided to go with someone else (I will explain why later after I get through Shanghai). Apparently when I was mentioned as a Host. Bruno put his hands up and said you cannot involve me in this. He knew, it had to be Valve. Bruno for the record is my best friend. So he knew, this had to be a business decision, despite he probably thought I was the best host for the job. So, As a host I start to prepare for this event. I decide the best way for me to host. Is learn about the current state of the meta live on camera. why? Well because for new viewers. If the host isn't an expert. I can learn with them. Why is this hero good now? Why is this player picking these items? etc etc. So I prepare other segments to help break up the staleness of a potentially delayed event. A way to add texture and start talking points. I design: Hero Forecast Prop: White board Segment concept: A Type of weather report. We have 4 teams playing a day during group stage. So I will ask the panel what heroes are we likely to see because of these teams? After the panel has given me their list. I ask them what heroes would you like to see picked to counter these heroes. Motivation: It’s important to use visual reference to help explain what might happen today in a fun weather reporting way. I want the customer/viewer to get excited about seeing their favorite heroes! and also learn about each hero before they are played, and of course the meta. This will help aid the viewer in following the games/tournament. Also the visual prop helps break up the staleness of 5 panelists talking on the couch. Team Pros and Cons Prop: White Board Segment Concept: List pros and cons for each team. Though the panel may give me quite boring pros and cons. Try and write them up in memorable ways that stay with the viewer throughout the day Motivation: I want to teach the viewers why they should care about players, teams. Understand their strengths and weaknesses before the match. and then refer to it after the game as an on going story line. I want to sell you the players… the people behind the heroes. because they after all are the most interesting thing about esports. So I prepare this and even more, including panel mmr with scoreboards with a mini game attached to it. That I will not get to perform. I’m ready to spice up dota my way and sell some great story lines! I Arrive in Shanghai Upon arrival in Shanghai, We get great treatment. Picked up and taken to the hotel. Upon checking in I realize I’m sharing a room. Sharing a room isn't great when you are hosting over 10 hours a day and you know you will have to push your energy levels on camera to keep things entertaining, Plus I’m too old for that these days. 33, ok not old old. But I want my own space. So I ask Perfect World If they can upgrade my room and deduct it from my pay. Which is 12k USD for the whole event. Perfect World relay this to Valve and suggest i'm demanding a suite. Bruno messages me WTF? I reply no no no. and explain it. We laugh about the situation when we meet the next day. Here’s the skype log before we met. Sorted. It’s important to me I explain these events, due to I really think this whole thing is personal. And If I am a complete cunt off camera. I should be fired. But I am not. I got my own room, So I can do the best job for the dota 2 fans at my own expense. Ontop of spending 2k dollars for new clothes for hosting. And accepting a lower rate for my work. I’m still happy and just want to do a good job. Day 1 Lets skip forward to day 1. We can really ignore any external problems from here on out from production. Lets focus on why I was fired. On day one I open up the show with a joke about pornography 10 minutes within the show. It goes something like this: Ask guests how they are. after they all respond Me: That's Great, But no one ever asks how the host is. Panel: Well, how are you? Me: well not great actually... Well I’m ok now. But I had a bit of a scare last night. You see my pre hosting ritual was almost un successful. Last night you see I was perusing the tv channels at the hotel for some… Adult entertainment. But It turned out the Chinese hotel had disabled pornography! Panel: Awkard Silence Me: I know, China! But I still watched Mr Wangs Amazing Wheelchaired adventures, And I have to say he was amazing. And now I’m here, all good and ready for some Dota! *This was the joke, probably not word for word. But getting the vods ain't easy on this hotel net. Afterwards we focused on Dota2, Our guests, I busted out my whiteboard thingy! Did some hero forecast and pros and cons for teams. The segment was meant to be 15 minutes long. But due to delays we were on camera 1h30m ish. But I didn’t care. The segment was entertaining! After getting off the Panel. Bruno told me. Hey… no more porn jokes (This was pretty much Gabes feedback). I agreed and explained I had to open with something strong due to I haven’t been hosting for some time and my fan base expect this. And I just needed to do something high brow once, to appease my fans and loosen up the panel. And now we can continue onwards. Though there was more feedback. This time from my arch enemy Ali! *DUM DUUUM DUUUM* Who is Ali? Well I can explain our interactions later. But let's just say his feedback was somewhat in the line of this. I repeat… why am i watching someone use a whiteboard on a 3 million dollar tournament!?!?!? Basically he is like fire this guy! Oh Ali… Yes my whiteboard is the problem. I am so sorry for cheapening your so far amazing event. My bad. The day goes on. We continue. I get no more feedback from the Valve guys at the event. I focus on dota2 and things go well. Even some nice reddit threads about my hosting <3. Day 2 - Dooms day! We open up the show with professional gamer Swindlemelonz, Hes great. He's giving strong statements. ‘These teams are good, these teams are bad’. He;s selling story lines. This is perfect I’m thinking. People are getting sold on the players and teams. and have more reason to watch. I bust out my trusty whiteboard and have Swindle almost lead pros and cons. Nothing up there is player negative. It’s entertaining and as you can imagine we have delays so this segment really helps add texture to the panel. Finally we have some games but then lose some internet, some more delays. then the segment that got me fired… We had internet which we didn’t have for most of the day so far. So I want to keep the panel going to entertain the customer. I suggest we talk or play games like, what player would you replace if you could to be in this tournament. Who is your dota 2 significant other. Top 3 best captains, Who's the best from these super stars etc etc. Here is a youtube clip of that segment. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-7GmWF4cmQ So, The segment finishes. I go to production room to ask Bonni the producer when she thinks we will start again. She doesn’t know but tells me she will come get us from the dining room when she knows. Then rushing around the corner comes Bruno. Bruno: James… You're fired James: What? I peer at his phone he is holding, He has an email open, I can quickly read The mail is from Gabe Newell, That much I saw. I cannot read it, but it appears to be about 3-4 sentences. I ask why? Bruno: Bottom Bitch Joke, Disrespectful towards players... It’s hard for me to remember what we talked about it next. It was surreal being fired by my best friend on Gabes orders for doing what esports has done for years. entertain the audience no matter the problems. The other lady from Valve with Bruno offered me a hug. She was lovely and kicking ass at her job there. All 3 Valve employees were solving problems left right and centre every waking second. Her face was sad and she seemed to show real empathy. Thank you for that. So I’m fired. But honestly I doubt Gabe even knew that I was told to be myself. And just didn’t like how i was representing his event and my style, so probably thinks… I am ‘an ass’. Plus on top of all the other problems they were having, I can only imagine that things were quite stressful for people at Valve. But they… put themselves in this situation. It’s no ones fault but theirs. They agreed to the contractors and so on for this 3 million dollar prize pool tournament. ultimately It is their responsibility at the end of the day. I Tell the other employee from Valve there. That I’m so sorry for this. and I will try stay out of the way. But since i'm here and I don’t know what to do right now. I’ll just chill on it until my mind clears. I even offered to help with other off camera stuff if they wanted it. I'm not looking for conflict. I’m just sad. I was having a blast and people working with me seemed to be also. Reddit Explodes: The Aftermath I made a few tweets, basically saying i'm let go. I asked Valve there if it's ok. I explained I have the right to tell my fan base I won’t be on. It seemed fine. Later though the net was blaming perfect world for my letting go. The whole event staff there never had a problem with me. Bonni the producer even came up to me in the dining room and explained she was sad, and she really enjoyed working with me. But these comments of finger pointing did anger me. I wanted to at least clear their name in this decision. I point out its Valve. People then continue to speculate the situation. So I’m like fuck it. I will release a statement. Outlining potentially the miscommunication within Valve. They didn’t all really know what they were hiring. I was told this but you wanted that. blah blah Well either way, As i'm mentally preparing to write this statement that should just clear things up. Then Valve employees pull me aside. They ask me to put this situation ‘On Ice’. I agree because as previously mentioned. If we can resolve this privately that would be great. But then as you saw. I wake up to Gabes post. So here I am tapping away. Giving you the honest play by play run down. But let’s return shall we to Ali and the Statement as a whole. In our next segment entitled: It’s personal. There is History https://www.reddit.com/r/DotA2/comments/47sc46/update_from_the_shanghai_major/ Two things: 1) James. We've had issues with James at previous events. Some Valve people lobbied to bring him back for Shanghai, feeling that he deserved another chance. That was a mistake. James is an ass, and we won't be working with him again. 2) As long as we're firing people, we are also firing the production company that we've been working with on the Shanghai Major. They will be replaced, and we hope to get this turned around before the main event. As always, I can be reached at gaben@valvesoftware.com. Gabe So Let's explain this. Am I an ass because my on camera appearance? Yes to some I am. That's my hosting style. And if generally someone thinks something of you, they are from their point of view correct. feedback is never wrong imo, there is always some truth in it. But he also explains We have had issues with James at previous events. Now this gets juicy. and we can start to reintroduce our Villain. It’s not Gabe. It’s Ali and his whispers. (Ok, I’m over selling this, maybe he's super nice. maybe i'm reading into the situation too much. you can decide) So History Time. I host TI2, Valves second international. I was hired as a host. I knew some about dota2 but not much. I turned up, No one at Valve had much of a vision of what the hosting would be like apart from Ali wanted sports broadcasting. He didn’t really push for it but you could tell every segment if we had too much… fun? He was asking us to tone it down a bit. Despite the huge reception myself, Godz, Bruno, Nebula were getting for our hosting roll. I should also point out Valve weren’t controlling back then with our input, they didn’t act like they knew best. Infact they were very receptive of feedback. Bruno wasn’t even meant to be on the panel. But I asked if he could join because I feel inlove with the guys style of humour. We put him on the panel and it was a blast. The whole event was a hit. The only small problem I saw while there after talking with others was... no one was getting paid….. Only me? I’m like wtf… So you're paying me because I’m not involved in dota 2. but your dota 2 casters are not getting paid. Owning my own agency and working with countless talent over the years. This for me is a big no no. And i'm a problem solver, I don't shy away from trying to help even If i am the ‘annoying guy’ you have to deal with. So, I start conversations with Valve during the evening over drinks. Explain that, These people make very little all year round atm. But they help build your community, they help market your game. If they leave this event paid they can continue to put time and effort into Dota 2, Also they get to tell their families and loved ones, this is their job (it's hard to sell your parents on this type of job. you want to shout about video games for a living, but once you get a pay cheque, things do change!). If they don’t have this income, they might stop due to financial restraints. I sell them on the idea of payment. Maybe they were going to do it themselves, but the talks they gave me was it's good for their brands to be here. The one Valve employee I spoke to the most who kicks ass obviously talked with the team and by the end of the event and EVERYONE got paid! Thank you for helping fight for us! I don’t think I could have done it without your influence. Either way, We finish the event. Its a hit. everyone is getting along well and we are all happy, including Ali! TI2 10/10 I host TI3, One year later I’m invited back. Talent turn up. We all have payment sorted before the event. Life is good. we nail the event. There are of course small problems, but overall everyone is great to work with. Valve upped the production. Best TI Finals ever! I come away from the event very happy, we all get on including Ali! TI3 10/10 I host Ti4, Group Stage I am in a weird mindset for this one. Valve have made a lot of decisions that has taken the event backwards in my opinion, further away from esports and more into sports. including these problems we do not get paid for our time as hosts only signatures… Remember those? Well basically our pay was 0. but we got money every time someone would buy an item and add our ingame signature. So if you added my signature for a dollar. I think I got 50c or the whole dollar. I cannot remember. So valve turned the talent into signature salesmen and women. Everyone is in a bad mood. Though luckily a lot of talent talk to Valve and we got this changed and had a base payment no matter what signatures we sold. but If we sold a lot of signatures we get more than our base salary. If we do not they will give us our base pay. So…. they outsourced all talent costs :) gg. But to explain. if I’m paid 10k, and I sale 11k signatures for 1 dollar each. I am paid 11k. If the sigs gave us 1 dollar. If I’m paid 10k and sale signatures for 2k. I am paid 10k. got it? good! So, Problems. There is a new producer who is awful and making my job very hard during the event. I miss Caroline. Oh Caroline I’ve worked 10 years on camera or more, with MTV, SkyOne, and you are absolutely the best! But someone else is here and it's not great. I’ve also got personal problems too i'm trying to keep out of my mind, A family member has a rape case against them, by a girl who apparently came out 7 years later. So I am in America, when I just feel I should be at home at his case. He’s waited 2 years for this trial. It’s fucked us all up in many ways. He cannot get jobs because it goes on your record until you are cleared. And I am in two minds at the event. It’s not going well. But im trying to manage. Just keeping myself to myself mainly. Not my normal social self. Day 1, I ask Sheever to host the panel with me. She does mornings and I do evenings. Because 12+ hours a day hosting is too much. We agree this is great. She was also at the event to host. The event starts, Sheever turns up and hosts, the panel isn't bad because the guests, It’s Valves underpar group stage production. I get a message from Valve in some light of ‘wtf, get on the panel!’ I’m like ‘ok!’ I proceed to turn up to the panel and I do not remove myself for the rest of the event. I do the 12+ hours a day. (Myself and Sheever shouldn’t have arranged the talent, Thought for the remaining group stages. they did let me pick the talent that sat with me). The group stage ends, but not before the final day of groups where my brothers case was thrown out within 20 minutes (she had a fiancee, We think she convinced herself when she slept with my brother that it wasn’t consented, despite turning up the next morning because she left her mobile phone… I guess someone would do this to be able to cope with the situation, to be able to live with her now Husband *same guy guilt free). I cry on panel between the games with joy. I can clear my head. And focus the best I can on work. Let's nail the main event! Main event, They put the Panel in the arena, this is a huge no no for hosts that work a long time. Having to sit in a non talkable arena (It’s loud). Means we cannot talk about stuff during games easily, and the atmosphere is energy draining. But we proceed, the event is hard work but fine overall, everyone is a bit snappy about how it’s going within the talent. The work is very very challenging and it's getting to us. There are small problems I’m trying to fix. Firstly they have us stay super late for rehearsals, I explain kindly to Gloria(who is amazing!), We cannot stay this late (midnight) We have a bus probably around 7-7.30 tomorrow, and a loooong day. We sat on the panel ready to rehearse for over an hour before I went to talk to her. Everyone always looks at me when there is a problem. The James… Please go fix this look. and because normally do, I naturally become the annoying and to some people bad guy (some people hate problem finders, because it points out they have problems with their work). So throughout the event spirits are quite low. everyone is a bit ‘mmmm’ but we are all trying to get along. Though I will say the person with the most attitude is me. Why? Because I am like… I’m never doing this again. And I told people at Valve… I think this is my last one. Now this is interesting but here's why.? Valve Valve… from my opinion treat all their employees amazingly. Infact so much so, some of them, may think they are... I hate to say it... better than you. Almost like they are somewhat conditioned over time. weird eh? But let’s look into how this might happen Example 1 From talks with Valve employees. It seems easy to recommend your friends for a job interview. Many friends take this. These friends percentage of getting hired is probably overall quite low and thus more do not get hired than hired. Now you are drinking with your friend at the bar and He/She wasn’t good enough for Valve. You see? Little things like this. and they add up. And I spot it on people. Not everyone, within every company there are the self aware and then there are the koolaid drinkers. For the record I’ve never interviewed at Valve or been asked. Example 2: Valve employees are known to be very highly paid. You are the elite! are you? Do you believe your financial income is your worth? and do you compare that to others? Some… might. Example 3. You work at the coolest game company.. on paper? maybe. I dunno it's hard to say. But lots of fans think you are cool! and you are there because you are great! which is fine. or… are you there because you are so much greater than the rest? Don’t get me wrong, I cannot talk about Valve like I know know, Because I do not work there. But I have been in and out of their offices enough and meet enough people to see some traits and understand in my opinion (which could be wrong) how some things work. Overall they are kick ass and do a great job. But every once and awhile you may bump into a koolaid drinker. So, I most definitely said I wasn’t going to host again, Probably with a bit of attitude. And the attitude is my bad. No matter how hard people make your job. You don’t need to be short or blunt. And I most definitely said this to Ali. How did Ali take this? Well there is one of two ways imo James isn't having fun at this event, we made his job way harder than it needed to be. It’s understandable he might not want to come back. Lets see if we can talk to fix this (I actually stayed in Seattle for a few days to try talk to someone at Valve about this situation later down the road, but they were on holiday) James is telling me. He doesn’t want to host the event that I work really really hard on. Because he thinks he is better than me. Above this and even the event. But I’m a Valve employee.. Surely I am the best! This guy's an ass! (or maybe dick, not sure what he prefers) Ok this is very general and I cannot read people's minds. But either way this guy got rubbed up the wrong way. And I heard it did tilt some Valve people that I said that I publicly wouldn't be back so shortly after the event ended. The Ti4 Grand Finals Next up. We host an 1 hour 45 minute intro. With the wrong panelist in my opinion. Because well they want to put sheever on with me because she is ‘a girl’ (privately told why) and we are on ESPN2, and of course it looks good if we have female presenters for the main stream. Though me and Sheever do not work well on the panel together, We are both hosts, But I’m slightly stronger due to experience and together our dota 2 knowledge is quite small. So from the get go, we have to fill 1 hour 45 minutes of airtime till the grand finals start with a talent pool that isn’t really top notch at dota 2 analyzing to do so. Especially when we have to keep it very very professional for ESPN2. So, 20 seconds before the show starts I figure out a solution… There is no way this panel will work for this long… The show rundown is stale and we need help. I call Sebastian onto the panel. He comes up after an approving nod from a Valve employee (Maybe even Ali, cannot remember, he probably didn’t think I was a massive cock at this point yet). And gets mic'd up 5 seconds before we go live. And boy, this kid saved the panel. for 1 hour 45 minutes I had the producer in my ear who was throwing me to wrong videos *we only had maybe 3 videos for the finals If i remember and maybe 4-6 full screen overlays. In my head it was going bad. Everyone was exhausted, but Sebastian was killing it. Explaining each player in depth. But you could tell the audience mood was like… stfu give game. The game starts. We made it. It was the hardest hosting I did in my career. I take off my headset go out for a smoke backstage. I’m internally furious, I’m so angry people are making my and others jobs harder. I’m angry we are pretending to be sports when we are not. I’m angry that I wanted this segment to be amazing. We were live to so many new viewers. It was our money shot. I’m angry we worked extra hard for ESPN2 stuff in our evenings. I’m angry I did their voice overs for TI4 with no talk of payment amount (still didn’t get paid for that btw) I’m just on tilt. Outside I meet Ali. He's like ‘how you doing?’ James “That was shit… That was ass. WE FUCKED UP… we fucked... this.. up. this was our money shot man. who the hell thought it was a good idea to do an almost 2 hour introduction with maybe 6 assets total. It was a disaster! We had ESPN2 watching. We blew this opportunity!” I ranted… this is all I really remember saying. But I’m sure I said more. Ok… It was bad but I overreacted. I watched the vod when I got home. and It was ok, acceptable. But you could tell it wasn’t great. But what did I do? I just complained to Ali, Who worked harder on this event than anyone there. I complained about his quality of work, his decision making. unknowingly because at the time I didn’t know how much he did or what he was responsible for, I didn’t know at the time how involved he was, and today I still do not know. But I basically told someone that he was bad at his job. And on a personal level, This Valve employee didn’t take that well imo. Sure I gave attitude. But I did my best on camera by the fans and by Valve. I was angry… but I never publicly said anything bad about Valve as a company. Other than it was probably my last. and I did have some production problems that made my job harder. But the worst outcome of this. Is that from one or a few small conversations with Ali during ti4. He, I felt started to build a vendetta against me. I could be completely wrong on this. But this is where I think it's personal. Ali, You bitch about me to my best friend. You gloat that it's a shame I’m not doing more in Dota 2 to my best friend. and follow it with a smile. You write emails asking for me to be fired day 1 for having a whiteboard on your tournament, sure and maybe more. I donno. I don’t want to know. I hope you are not affecting others opinions of me within your company. But I fear you are. So... Gabe, You are not an ass. I’m sorry If you don’t like my on camera hosting and if that is why you let me go, fine. But understand I try to entertain the customer. Something you at Valve taught me. Focus on the customer. If you want me off that's fine, It’s your show. but next time please do it professionally. I think it was the wrong decision to do so either way. I have done nothing here I haven’t done before with the Dota2 community and they were enjoying it, maybe you are slightly disconnected from your own community? If you wanted something different don’t hire me or tell me in advance what performance I am meant to give. Did you notice the difference between this performance and the ones I gave at TI? because your company gave clear instructions. Gabe, you did say I am an ass, this might be true overall but that's for me to decide. But also that you’ve had problems with me before. You really haven’t. You’ve had some attitude at one TI where your guys weren’t kicking ass and sometimes not that pleasant either. But overall and at this event I’ve always been professional off camera. I am sorry for that attitude at TI4. But your opinion seems to not be yours and that of others. Ali, I am sorry I had at times ‘attitude’ at Ti4. That’s my bad, I have no excuse. I know how hard you work on the events. But at the end of the day you really seem to have something against me. I personally don’t know you that well or how good you are at your job outside of what I see. But the stuff you’ve done is appalling and upset a lot of external contractors. I won’t include this stuff here. Because there is no gain other than an eye on your work ethic and morals. So, If I’m wrong Gabe, and you just fired me because i’m not your cup of tea as a host. That sucks, you fucked up. And now I seem to be paying for it kind of. I donno. It’s a weird situation to process. Summary So… There you go… This event like normal I was very good to work with off camera. I was pushing entertainment on camera. Sure with some edgy jokes here and there. I was told to be myself. Then maybe someone said ‘nope’ that's not what I want. Which is fine I guess, But handled very unprofessionally. This sucks because the community seemed to be enjoying it. Or maybe someone is like I hate him. How do I get my way, This is personal. Maybe someone is whispering in your ear Gabe. Maybe not. I do not have a personal relationship with you Gabe so it is hard to imagine you think I’m an ass personally. I personally think you are nice, but I don’t know you that well. Best of luck to all the teams, Sheever and Kotl for taking over the hosting roll Bruno If I got you in trouble because I know you well. I donno how I will make it up to you. If you get fired I will go ham! But because I know maybe too much about one person's personal opinion of me. I can see how this can cause you problems. I’m so sorry if it does. We’ll do what we always do though which is solve it So… I’m done. Gonna go try book my own flight now. Not sure If I’ll get paid which sucks, cus I planned to put that money into the game. Would quite like to continue this privately with Valve if they want to talk more. I took time off to come here from doing a kickstarter for our companies (The GD Studio) first game. A hopefully awesome fps game called Diabotical! Will it be on Steam? I guess… I mean I’m sure it will be right? One Thing I know it will be is community focused, and we as a company will be in touch with our audience. I’m going to use some Valve advise now I was once told. If you are ever in decision that involves other parties and you cannot figure out what to do. Ignore all other parties and do what's best for the company. God it all business business business with you guys. But lets try this? So If you guys are interested I will try push our kickstarter campaign for my game now? Fuck I’m too tired to do it now. But yeah soon. but not Valve soon. The PR was fun. Just not how we got it. Maybe our next steps together will be more enjoyable. Thank you so much everyone for the kind words over today. Especially the Dota 2 community for making some noise for me. I really hope you appreciate my honesty. Even If I am wrong, right or misguided. I felt I needed to tell it. I owe you a lot Dota 2 fans. Don’t feel bad for me. I’m not right now upset. It’s just bizarre and sucks. but such is life sometimes. Lets hope it gets awesome again soon! :D I’ll finish our game and do our own esports… with Blackjack and hookers! Peace James ‘2GD’ Harding Everything I type under here will be new stuff If I have to continue defending myself. Otherwise I will not correct the above. not even the spelling errors and grammar! mwuahaha. Oh I could go on and on btw, there is so much more. but that is even too personal for me, plus I am le tired. Also, I hope you continue to support Valve. They have done more for the Dota 2 community than anyone else. But they are not perfect. Hopefully this is maybe a bit of a wake up call about what the community wants from its esports and how to move forward. Those who I’ve helped along the way in esports, and know me the best. I know I threw out a lot of information that hopefully attributes to my off camera character and non ass personality. Hopefully you feel I have done myself justice here. and enjoyed working with me.