Player peak coincides with eSports tournament.

Free-to-play MOBA Dota 2 has topped its own record for the most concurrent players active on Valve’s digital distribution platform Steam.

Dota 2 peaked at 329,977 players on Saturday, May 18, according to player tracker Steamgraph, beating its own 297,000 concurrent player record set in March.

The player peak took place during the Western Qualifiers for Valve’s upcoming eSports tournament The International. Valve has been incentivising players to tune into The International matches through the Dota 2 client itself by offering potential in-game item drops and an interactive compendium.

German team Mousesports won The International Western Qualifiers on Sunday with a 3-1 defeat of French team dd in a best of five final. The team previously lost to dd in the upperbracket semi-finals of the double elimination tournament.

The Eastern Qualifiers for The International 2013–which takes place in August and now has a total prize pot of over $2 million–are running until the end of this week.

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