Wings Gaming: The young, talented, overnight millionaires of 'Dota 2'
Amid pyrotechnics and cheers from the surrounding crowd, the five members of rookie powerhouse Wings Gaming hoisted up the Aegis of Champions, the first place trophy of the 2016 International Dota 2 Championships. Next to the glory of taking first place at the biggest Dota 2 tournament of the year, Wings Gaming also took home $9.1 million in prize money.
After one week, four matches and one grand finals victory, every member of the Wings Gaming became a millionaire, earning over $1.8 million each. Even if the team has to split some pay with management, that's a big sum of money.
The International had a fan-funded prize pool of over $20 million
Before Saturday, the team had only made about $300,000 since forming in 2014. This was the team's first appearance in The International, which had a fan-funded prize pool of over $20 million -- the biggest in esports history.
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Wings didn't make it through the Chinese qualifiers in last year's International and didn't start to rack up the wins until April this year, where they took first place over Team Liquid in a huge upset at ESL One Manila.
Between April and August, the team performed well, taking second place at the Nanyang Dota 2 Championships and placing first at The Summit 5. These tournaments and a few others earned the team around $300,000, chump change compared to the $9.1 million from TI6.
Not only is Wings Gaming a new team in the Dota scene, they're a young team. The oldest player Blink is only 24 years old, while captain Y'Innocence and Faith_bian are both 18 years old. Most players in the tournament were at least 21.
Wings won't have to worry about any sort of student loans as long as they don't spend it all before the next big tournament.
