Steve Feak

Not to be confused with Steve Feke, writer of Mac and Me.

Steve Feak, also known by the nickname of Guinsoo, is an American game designer, and was the previous designer of the popular Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne custom map DotA: Allstars.^[1] Currently he is employed by Riot Games in the making of League of Legends, a video game inspired by his previous work. Using the original DotA created by Eul (the original Defense of the Ancients map for Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos) as a base, Feak made DotA: Allstars by adding his own mix of content.

Among the DotA variants created in the wake of Eul's map, Allstars became the most popular version of the map. Feak said when he began developing Allstars he had no idea how popular the game would eventually become; the emerging success of the game type inspired him to design a new title around what he considered an emerging game genre. Feak added a recipe system for items so that player's equipment would scale as they grew more powerful, as well as a powerful boss character called Roshan (named after his bowling ball).

Feak used a Battle.net chat channel as a place for DotA players to congregate, but DotA:Allstars had no official site for discussions and hosting. The leaders of the DotA: Allstars clan, TDA, proposed that a dedicated web site be created to replace the various online alternatives that were infrequently updated or improperly maintained.

Towards the end of his association with the map, Feak primarily worked on optimizing the map, then he left development with version 6.01, passing it on to IceFrog.

In DotA Steve received an honorary item name: Guinsoo's Scythe Of Vyse. In Dota 2 his name has since been removed from the item, it now being called "Scythe of Vyse". In League of Legends, Steve Feak also received an honorary weapon name, Guinsoo's Rageblade.^[2]

Feak is currently a game designer for League of Legends.

References