League of Legends
League of Legends
The 16 teams for Challengers Uprising Season 3 are decided
William Davis
The North American academy and amateur circuit is in full swing for the summer split, and it all starts with Challengers Uprising Season 3. Challengers Uprising is the first of three tier 2 events in the summer split that lead up to the Proving Grounds qualifiers, where academy and amateur teams clash to show their skill and hopefully see players make it into the LCS. So far, the Challengers Uprising …
League of Legends
5-game thriller sends DWG KIA to MSI 2021 final, MAD Lions out
William Davis
World champion DWG KIA has secured the last spot in the 2021 Mid-Season Invitational final after beating MAD Lions in an intense five-game seriesames. To defend the MSI trophy for Europe, MAD Lions had to take out the reigning world champion DWG KIA in the last semifinal of the tournament. After facing off twice during the rumble stage, it was clear that DWG KIA would enter as the clear favorites …
League of Legends
Worlds 2021 final to be held in Shenzhen on November 6
William Davis
The League of Legends World Championship is headed back to China in 2021, this time with the final taking place in Shenzhen. After the 2020 World Championship was toned down a couple of notches due to travel and audience restrictions, Riot will look to make the upcoming Worlds event bigger than ever. The grand final will take place in the Universiade Sports Centre in Shenzhen on November 6. The stadium …
League of Legends
Watch this Nautilus secure a kill with a crazy trick recall
William Davis
The unexpected Dredge Line will always be the deadliest one, as one tricky Nautilus showed in a recent game. A trending clip on social media shows a Nautilus fooling the enemy bot lane into thinking he had recalled. With this simple trick, Nautilus stealthily remained in the lane and baited the enemy into a fight. This resulted in those enemies getting a bad surprise when Nautilus used Dredge Line (Q) …
League of Legends
RNG vs. PSG Talon MSI 2021 betting analysis
William Davis
The first semifinal of the 2021 Mid-Season Invitational is between two teams that have been closer than expected at the year’s first international tournament. With Royal Never Give Up still being one of the clear favorites to win MSI 2021, PSG Talon could make it hard for them in the semifinals after finishing the rumble stage with some impressive performances. Having to play with a bot lane substitute all the …
League of Legends
Is GALA the best player at the 2021 Mid-Season Invitational?
William Davis
Royal Never Give Up bot laner Chen “GALA” Wei has been a treat to watch at the 2021 Mid-Season Invitational so far and is rocking some of the best stats among all competing players. After joining RNG in June 2020, GALA has been on an upward trajectory individually. After just two splits with the organization, many would now consider GALA as one of the best bot laners in the LPL, …
League of Legends
Cloud9 Fudge lead top laners in kills after MSI 2021 Rumble Stage
William Davis
Despite not making it to the semifinals at the 2021 Mid-Season Invitational, Cloud9 top laner Ibrahim “Fudge” Allami is leading in kills among all top laners at the tournament. To everyone’s surprise, Fudge has been one of the absolute best performers for Cloud9 throughout the tournament. Some would even argue that Fudge has been the best player representing North America during MSI 2021, which makes the upcoming split even more …
League of Legends
Riot might shift jungle meta again on patch 11.11 and buff Teemo
William Davis
A new League of Legends patch is right around the corner, bringing nerfs to some of the new meta junglers. Teemo also has a rare appearance in the patch notes. In the recent preview for patch 11.11, gameplay design director Mark “Scuffy” Yetter reveals a detailed look at the upcoming changes. While all changes are still a work in progress, it seems that some of the strong AP junglers will …
Just how good is Ninja at League of Legends? We investigate
William Davis
League of Legends
Tyler “Ninja” Blevins is mainly known for streaming Fortnite and other shooting games, but he has recently been bitten by the League of Legends bug. And the question League players immediately want answered is whether he’s any good at the popular MOBA. After years of content creation mainly around Fortnite, Ninja has taken another step in his career and has started to stream League of Legends on the side of …
paiN Gaming’s brTT complains about lack of scrims at MSI 2021
William Davis
League of Legends
paiN Gaming bot laner Felipe “brTT” Gonçalves recently made a public complaint about the scrim environment at the 2021 Mid-Season Invitational. The Brazilian team participated at MSI 2021 during the group stage, where they competed against the likes of MAD Lions, PSG Talon, and Istanbul Wildcats. While the practice on stage was great for paiN Gaming, the same can’t be said about the practice between official matches. According to brTT, …
Low ping really does matter in League of Legends, and here’s why
William Davis
League of Legends
Quick reaction times and clutch decision-making can be the keys to success in League of Legends, and ping can have a big say in either attribute. But how big of a difference does a low ping really make? Professional League of Legends games are usually run with the lowest ping possible to make the games as evenly competitive as possible. This provides the players with the best chance to react …
Rift Herald refuse to complete its charge for DWG KIA at MSI 2021
William Davis
League of Legends
A rare Rift Herald bug had the match between DWG KIA and PSG Talon at the 2021 Mid-Season Invitational undergo a Chronobreak during the rumble stage. During the fourth day of the rumble stage at MSI 2021, a fairly rare Rift Herald bug happened after DWG KIA mid laner Heo “ShowMaker” Su tried to spawn it in the mid lane. Usually, the Rift Herald would charge the turret and grant …
MAD Lions vs. RNG: MSI 2021 betting analysis
William Davis
League of Legends
The 2021 Mid-Season Invitational Rumble stage is coming to a close and will have an important match between MAD Lions and Royal Never Give Up on the last day. Before the four best teams from the rumble stage move on to the semifinals, an anticipated rematch between LEC’s MAD Lions and LPL’s RNG has to be played out. RNG won the first match against the LEC champions, but it was …
Golden Guardians completes LCS Summer roster with Solo and Chime
William Davis
League of Legends
With only a few weeks before the 2021 LCS Summer Split kicks off, Golden Guardians has presented several roster changes. After a poor spring split, Golden Guardians is making some changes to make a better showing in the last split of the year. Golden Guardians will be promoting support Jonathan “Chime” Pomponio from the academy roster while signing Colin “Solo” Earnest as the starting top laner. Solo’s last appearance in …
RNG is 12-0 at MSI 2021, hasn’t lost a tier-2 turret yet
William Davis
League of Legends
The 2021 Mid-Season Invitational rumble stage is in full swing and LPL champion Royal Never Give Up continues to dominate the tournament. Over the course of 12 games, RNG has yet to be defeated. As RNG was placed in group A where only three teams played due to the absence of GAM Esports, teams had to play only eight games in total during the first stage. RNG swept the group …
Evil Geniuses replace Deftly with Danny in the bot lane for LCS Summer
William Davis
League of Legends
Evil Geniuses is preparing for the 2021 LCS Summer Split which has led to a change in the bot lane. In a recent announcement, Evil Geniuses revealed that bot laner Matthew “Deftly” Chen will be replaced by Kyle “Danny” Sakamaki who played the recent split on Evil Genius’ amateur team. The young 17-year-old bot laner can therefore look forward to his first split in the LCS after only one split …
Riot speaks on Tahm Kench and Sona reworks, item balance
William Davis
League of Legends
The Summoner’s Rift balancing team has their work cut out for them in the upcoming months with several projects in the pipeline. In a recent tweet by gameplay design director Mark “Scuffy” Yetter, a rough priority timeline of projects was presented to the League of Legends players. This list includes several projects that have already been hinted at, including changes to systemic mobility that will likely be worked on throughout …
New LoL bug can unlock 900-damage Smite in just 6 minutes
William Davis
League of Legends
Smite received a big change in the most recent League of Legends patch 11.10 and a game-breaking bug hitched a ride with it. A recent YouTube video showed how players can gain access to the 900-damage Smite after just six minutes using the Unsealed Spellbook keystone. In the recent patch Riot changed Smite to deal flat damage, starting at 450 before increasing to 900 after completing the Smite quest. The …
NRG acquires GAM Esports re-enters League of Legends
William Davis
League of Legends
An old face re-enters the League of Legends scene with NRG’s acquisition of GAM Esports. GAM Esports is the defending champion of the Vietnamese VCS and has been acquired by North American organization NRG together with the Vietnamese entertainment company CMG.ASIA. Acquiring GAM Esports is the first move by the newly formed NRG Asia project and it’s expected that the organization will provide quality training facilities and infrastructure to the …
Phase Rush nerf puts Ryze at lowest win rate in LoL
William Davis
League of Legends
Ryze is struggling like never before in solo queue on League of Legends patch 11.10 due to the recent nerfs made to Phase Rush. The most recent patch has already taken its toll on Ryze, even though the Rune Mage didn’t receive any direct nerfs. Instead, Riot chose to nerf the Phase Rush keystone by adding a longer early-game cooldown and decreasing the bonus movement speed from the rune. This …
League of Legends
is among the most popular widely-played video games in the world. It has been a consistent trendsetter in the gaming industry, whether as a model for other free-to-play titles looking to monetize their players or as a guiding light for how professional esports can be both successful and sustainable.
It hasn’t always been so though. League of Legends was released in 2009 as an uncertain new project, a game with large aspirations but little proven. In the years since, it has developed into the dominant title that it is today, and one of the biggest games on the planet.
League of Legends drives success of MOBA genre
League of Legends stands out in part because it may arguably be the very first original game released to truly fit into what we now understand to be the increasingly
popular MOBA genre. Multiplayer Online Battle Arenas are a very particular type of game genre that carry out competition between two opposing teams of players on a map. These games test a mix of competition, tactics, and quick reactions, a potent combination that has proven equal parts popular and durable over the years.
While League of Legends was certainly among the first full releases to focus on the genre and its new ideas, it wasn’t actually the origin point for any of it. That distinction belongs to
Blizzard release WarCraft 3,
and more specifically a modified game mode titled
Defense of the Ancients.
WarCraft 3 was a real-time strategy game that featured prominent hero units who could gain in power as they accrued experience points to level up their abilities, and gold to purchase powerful items. Defense of the Ancients was a
user-made game mode
which emphasized these heroes by giving each player control over one such character and teaming them up against an opposing squad of players. It was a dynamite success, inspiring myriad clones and, eventually, an entire genre of games.
But while League of Legends wasn’t the first to bring about these concepts, it was certainly
effective in executing on them. Early developers at publisher Riot Games had a clear idea of what they wanted to accomplish with the creation of League of Legends, and it would be hard to argue against their success given the runaway popularity achieved by their iteration on the MOBA formula.
LoL incorporates esports sustainably
Just as impressive as the long-term success of League of Legends as a game is the continued success of the title’s esports scene. While esports has known multiple peaks and valleys over the years, Riot Games has consistently managed to maintain the prominence of LoL esports. This has been accomplished through an emphasis on
regular regional play
and
sustainability.
Most esports and competitive games at the time used a circuits system, scattering major tournaments for the best teams across the year. Instead, Riot divided the world into separate playing regions. Each region has its own
competitive league
in which the best professional teams play weekly. The best teams in each league are then brought together for an
annual World Championship event
at the end of the competitive year. This allowed for domestic fan followings to develop across such regions as
Korea,
China,
Europe, and
North
and
South America. Fans would closely follow the teams in their region, and from that familiarity would feel invested in cheering them on when they clashed with teams from other regions at the game’s biggest international event.
This basic blueprint has continued to prove successful for Riot Games over the years, though it has expanded and been modified with time. In response to the success of the World Championship, Riot introduced a second international tournament in 2015, the prestigious
Mid-Season Invitational. In 2025,
First Stand
was added to bring LoL esports to three international events per year. Once again the scene was enhanced and this indirectly expanded the opportunities for
League of Legends esports betting. In the meantime, the regional leagues have spread out to include
more regions and lower levels, solidifying their identity.
The basic formula remains the same, however.
Encourage fan support on a domestic level, and then carry that support and interest over to
the global stage. It’s a formula that continues to power League of Legends esports, and looks set to enable it for many years yet to come.
At Win.gg, our coverage of LoL esports spans from the broader competitive updates and their impact on the scene to in-depth high-profile match previews with team analysis, head-to-head analysis,
LoL betting odds
sense-makers and predictions. All of these based on the insights of our experienced esports journalists.
