MOBA

Multiplayer online battle arena, a subgenre of strategy games in which two teams, typically of five players each, compete on a structured battlefield. Each player controls one character with distinctive abilities that grow stronger as the match goes on, and a team wins by destroying the enemy's main structure: the Nexus in League of Legends, the Ancient in Dota 2. Computer-controlled units (minions or creeps) spawn in waves and march down set paths, typically three lanes, toward an enemy base guarded by defensive structures. The genre grew out of Defense of the Ancients (DotA), a mod created in 2003 by the Warcraft III modding community. Its designer IceFrog was hired by Valve in October 2009, and Dota 2 released in July 2013. Riot Games' League of Legends, inspired by DotA, released in October 2009 and is the world's largest esport. MOBAs also moved to phones: Honor of Kings (2015) had over 100 million daily active players as of November 2020 and is the highest-grossing mobile game of all time, and Mobile Legends: Bang Bang is particularly popular in East and Southeast Asia. Learning a large roster, items and team roles takes time, and the genre is known for a challenging learning curve for new players.