International Dota 2 Championships to be presented on ESPN 3

Valve has announced that coverage of The International Dota 2 Championships will be presented in collaboration with ESPN.

While the tournament will be broadcast on ESPN 3 (the très), an exclusive show previewing the final match will be presented on ESPN 2 on Sunday at 8:30pm Pacific. According to Valve, fans will be able to tune in and watch all of the matches, interviews and analysis on ESPN3, accessible online at WatchESPN.com, on smartphones and tablets via the WatchESPN app, and streamed on televisions through Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Chromecast, Roku, Xbox 360, and Xbox One.

"From the success of the Compendium to the collaboration with ESPN, this year's International really demonstrates how much competitive gaming has grown to rival traditional sports," said Valve's Erik Johnson. "We believe the teams have also pushed to a new level of play this year and will further demonstrate the incredible advances made across this tournament since it first began three short years ago."

This year's Dota 2 Championship will be held at a sold out KeyArena in Seattle, Washington this Friday through Monday (July 18-22). It features a record-breaking prize pool of over $10 million, the largest ever for a competitive gaming tournament.

Great news and all, but does anyone even watch ESPN 3? Might as well be broadcast on ESPN 8: The Ocho.

[Valve]