League of Legends
League of Legends
Viego won’t be available for week 3 of the LEC as planned
William Davis
The newest League of Legends champion Viego won’t be available for Week 3 of the 2021 LEC Spring Split. According to LEC commissioner Maximilian Peter Schmidt, Viego won’t be available for the LEC teams to play during the upcoming week even though that was the original plan. The original rule states that new champions are disabled in the LEC for the first two weeks after its release, but due to …
League of Legends
Team Liquid utilizes Kai’Sa, Udyr to secure LCS Lock In trophy
William Davis
The LCS Lock In gave a great sneak peek of what the 2021 LCS season has to offer, both in terms of the team’s strength and champion meta. Here’s a look at the most dominant champions during the LCS Lock In and which players best utilized them. While the new competitive season has just begun, the meta is already starting to develop and change from game to game. A total …
League of Legends
Team SoloMid still most popular LCS team, per Lock In viewership
William Davis
Team SoloMid was able to pull the highest average viewership during the first-ever LCS Lock In tournament. Even though TSM didn’t make it all the way to the finals of the LCS Lock In, the team was the most popular when looking at the viewership numbers. On average, TSM had 253,520 viewers over the course of seven matches in the LCS Lock In according to Esports Charts. TOP teams of …
League of Legends
Udyr is getting a new rework and VGU after winning fan vote
William Davis
This year’s champion update and skin thematic fan vote results are in, with Udyr and Crime City Nightmare winning out globally. During a recent fan vote, Riot Games gave the League of Legends community the chance to decide which champion will get an upcoming visual gameplay update. Riot also gave fans a chance to vote for the upcoming skin thematics, where Crime City Nightmare came out on top followed up …
League of Legends
Top Esports beats rival JD Gaming in first LPL clash of 2021
William Davis
For the first time in the 2021 LPL season, Top Esports and JD Gaming clashed on Summoner’s Rift, and it was Top Esports who ran away with the win in 2-0 fashion. The match between the 2020 LPL Summer Split finalists was highly anticipated among fans. Both teams have gotten off to a shaky start this season, with other squads currently sitting at the top spots of the LPL table. …
League of Legends
Team Liquid vs. Cloud9 booked for LCS Lock In finals
William Davis
Team Liquid destroyed Evil Geniuses in the 2021 LCS Lock In semifinals and is advancing to face Cloud9 in the finals. Team Liquid showed no mercy to Evil Geniuses in their semifinals match. Evil Geniuses, which had a good run in the 2021 LCS Lock In, didn’t stand a chance against a relentless Team Liquid. At no point in the three-game series did Evil Geniuses look like a challenge for …
League of Legends
Cloud9 reverse sweeps 100 Thieves, reaches LCS Lock In finals
William Davis
Cloud9 is advancing to finals of the 2021 LCS Lock In after completing a reverse sweep against 100 Thieves. Cloud9 put on a show on Friday and secured its spot in the finals. The team completed a reverse sweep that included two pentakills by bot laner Jesper “Zven” Svenningsen. Cloud9 knocked off the tournament favorite 100 Thieves and is looking now like the frontrunner for the title. PENTAKILL FOR @Zven! …
League of Legends
What happened to Quas after Team Liquid?
William Davis
The North American collegiate and the amateur circuit are giving a second chance to compete to former LCS players. One of the players to come out of retirement and join one of these teams is former Team Liquid top laner Diego “Quas” Ruiz. Quas started his career in 2013 with New World Eclipse in the North American Challenger League. Later that year, Quas joined Team Curse, an organization that would …
Doublelift pulls off impressive Vayne pentakill on stream
William Davis
League of Legends
The newly retired bot laner Yiliang “Doublelift” Peng proved that he still has some world-class mechanics after pulling off a pentakill on Vayne in solo queue. During a recent live stream, former Team Liquid and Team SoloMid bot laner Doublelift made a crazy outplay that resulted in a pentakill. The outplay was made on his signature champion Vayne and definitely brought back some old-school Doublelift vibes. The pentakill proved that …
Game-breaking bug with Galio and Camille hits in iG’s LPL match
William Davis
League of Legends
A game-breaking bug involving Camille and Galio recently occurred in an LPL match between Invictus Gaming and Rogue Warriors. Camille and Galio is a classic combo in professional play, as their ultimates synergize very well together. In a match between iG and Rogue Warriors, the combo wasn’t so optimal as the interaction between the two ultimates resulted in a bug. The bug has since then been investigated by players in …
Riot Games refuses to settle its gender discrimination lawsuit
Steven Rondina
League of Legends
One of the ugliest stories around esports from 2019 is likely making a comeback in 2021. Riot Games is once again looking to force plaintiffs in the company’s ongoing gender discrimination lawsuit into arbitration. This legal tactic by Riot led to the mass walkouts in the company in 2019. Due to previously signed agreements, some of the plaintiffs involved in the case will be forced into private arbitration with Riot. …
League client still a problem, causes Doublelift to lose promo
Olivia Richman
League of Legends
Peng “Doublelift” Yiliang had some very bad luck during a promo match that was set to be streamed live, highlighting how Riot Games’ League of Legends client continues to have issues for many users. The retired LCS veteran began queuing after seeing he was up for a promotion series to Master. He accepted a match, but soon realized that his League of Legends client was having issues. The client became …
Alphari is already dominating in the LCS with the highest DPM
William Davis
League of Legends
Team Liquid’s new top laner Barney “Alphari” Morris is already proving himself as a great pick up after dealing the most damage per minute in the LCS Lock In so far. After leaving Origen in the LEC to join up with Team Liquid for the 2021 LCS season, Alphari has lived up to all expectations so far. The British top laner is already showing why he was considered one of …
Can T1 return to greatness in 2021?
William Davis
League of Legends
T1, formerly known as SK TelecomT1, is indisputably the most popular team in competitive League of Legends. The South Korean organization holds several records, including being the only team to win the World Championship three times. T1 is home of the player who could be considered the face of League of Legends esports, the unkillable demon king, Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok. T1 won its third World Championship title in 2016 and …
DWG KIA tops the LCK standings with win over Gen.G
William Davis
League of Legends
The defending world champions from DWG KIA are back in form after taking down one of their biggest contenders, Gen.G. The third week of the 2021 LCK season started out with a banger. So far, Gen.G has been looking like the biggest threat to take down DWG KIA so there were a lot of expectations going into the match. As predicted, Gen.G was able to compete with the world champions, …
Riot will nerf heavy hitters in Patch 11.3 including Olaf, Ivern
William Davis
League of Legends
With LoL Patch 11.3 fast approaching, Riot has revealed nerfs to several champions who are currently seeing a lot of play in both professional and solo queue. For the third patch of Season 11, Riot will still be focusing heavily on balancing the new item system, but more and more champions are also being touched upon. With the professional season starting back up, Riot has realized that quite a few …
Ranking all of the best top laners in the LCS and LEC
Nicholas James
League of Legends
With the LEC kicking off its 2021 split and the LCS going into the final stages of its new Lock In preseason tournament, fans and analysts alike have been nailing down their rankings and ratings as the season gets underway. With that comes role rankings, and the most impactful role for this early meta seems to be the top laner. The champion pool for the role this year is very …
This is what the new Dr. Mundo rework might look like
Nicholas James
League of Legends
Riot Games announced that Dr. Mundo would be up next for a rework come Season 11. The beefy top laner has been in need of a rework for a while now, not seeing much play in either solo queue or in the competitive meta for some time. The champion has become very item dependent, relying on statistics and a gold lead to win a game in lue of skill and …
The best top laners for solo queue in patch 11.2
William Davis
League of Legends
The meta in top lane has been developing a lot over the preseason and is looking a lot different in solo queue compared to professional play. So which champions are best? With the item system completely changing for the 2021 season, it took a few patches for everything to settle and for players to understand the best ways of building. Riot has been adjusting the items on every patch, especially …
Rekkles ends first LEC week at G2 Esports with huge KDA
William Davis
League of Legends
G2 Esports’ new bot laner Martin “Rekkles” Larsson dominated the first week of the 2021 LEC Spring Split with some impressive stats. After only three games with G2, Rekkles is already showing promising signs that he was the right man to replace Luka “Perkz” Perković. Not only was Rekkles a big part of G2’s first three wins in the 2021 LEC season, he also knocked every opponent out of the …
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.
