League of Legends
League of Legends
Are Europeans paying too much for RP in League of Legends?
William Davis
It’s currently more expensive for European players to buy Riot Points (RP) compared to the North American LoL players, and this has some users complaining to developer Riot Games. After a recent post about RP prices on social media, fans are slowly starting to realize that the RP prizes on the European servers are exceptionally high compared to the North American server. Because of differences in currencies, EU players are …
League of Legends
TSM promotes Swordd to Academy roster, adds Babip
William Davis
Team SoloMid has begun building its Academy roster for 2021 and has started out by adding two interesting players. The young mid laner Rico “Swordd” Chen will be promoted to the Academy roster, after playing on TSM’s talent program. Swordd has been known as a very big individual talent and will now get to play on a bigger stage in the new 2021 Academy format. Joining him is the Australian …
League of Legends
AOC uses Among Us Twitch stream to raise $200,000 for charity
Olivia Richman
New York state representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez raised $200,000 by playing Among Us on Twitch earlier this week. The impressive fundraising effort went towards eviction defense, food pantries, and other support aimed at communities. “We did it! This is going to make such a difference for those who need it most right now,” AOC said. We did it!$200k raised in one livestream (on a whim!) for eviction defense, food pantries, and more.This …
League of Legends
Kayle, Malphite, others are dominating LoL patch 10.24
William Davis
Riot recently released the second patch of the 2021 preseason, with a lot of focus on the new item system’s overall balance. The changes have balanced a few strong champions, which means that the meta is already changing a bit once again. On patch 10.23, Summoner’s Rift was completely dominated by tanks. These tanks are still strong on patch 10.24, but the changes have made room for some other champions …
League of Legends
Fnatic finalizes its new 2021 LEC roster with Upset
William Davis
Fnatic has completed its 2021 roster with the addition of former Astralis bot laner Elias “Upset” Lipp. Fnatic is ready for 2021, as the organization finalized its 2021 roster and it’s looking like a strong contender. Two days after welcoming mid laner Yasin “Nisqy” Dinçer, Fnatic confirmed Upset as its new starting bot laner and the final piece to its puzzle. Upset is considered one of the best bot laners …
League of Legends
Game-breaking bugs on Ashe, MF still in the 2021 LoL preseason
William Davis
Even after a patch and several hotfixes, some of the first game-breaking preseason bugs are still in the game. One of the first big bugs that was discovered in the preseason was on Ashe. Since the release of patch 10.23, the Frost Archer has been able to cast her Volley (W) twice consecutively by using a neat level-up trick, and this remains in the game in patch 10.24. The trick …
League of Legends
SwordArt signs with Team SoloMid for $6 million over two years
William Davis
The rumors of former Suning support Hu “SwordArt” Shuo-Chieh going to Team SoloMid for the 2021 LCS season finally seems to become reality. According to The Washington Post, the veteran support has signed a two-year contract with TSM worth $6 million. This contract will likely go down as the biggest contract in LCS history and seems like one of the biggest signings in the offseason. Breaking: Hu “SwordArt” Shuo-Chieh has …
League of Legends
Riot Games addresses an upcoming Tahm Kench rework
William Davis
Fans of Tahm Kench might have to wait a bit longer for the upcoming rework, according to Riot Phlox. The upcoming Tahm Kench rework was teased over five months ago, but fans have not seen the River King’s rework just yet. This has gotten some dedicated players to wonder what the status of it is, and Rioter Phlox recently answered that question on Reddit. “So the [Tahm Kench] rework is …
Doublelift announces his retirement from pro League of Legends
William Davis
News
Team SoloMid bottom laner Yiliang “Doublelift” Penh has officially retired from competitive League of Legends. Doublelift surprised man of his fans by announcing his retirement. The star LCS players is exiting Summoner’s Rift after a little over a decade of playing at the game’s highest level. “I wanted to be a pro player who stands out incongruously, someone who speaks his mind and is “real”. It makes me happy to …
Fnatic potentially moving its academy team to a new region
Tokoni Uti
League of Legends
After four consecutive split wins amongst the UK and Nordic leagues, Fnatic academy side Fnatic Rising may soon be switching regions. In a recent live AMA held by the organisation’s League of Legends director Javier “Dardo” Zafra and CEO Sam Mathews, the pair explained plans to move both Fnatic Rising and the team’s main LEC roster into a shared training facility in April 2021. This will see the academy side move …
Johnsun completes promising new FlyQuest 2021 LCS roster
William Davis
League of Legends
Young bot laner Johnson “Johnsun” Nguyen is heading to FlyQuest for the 2021 LCS season. Johnsun joins the team after a successful rookie year with Dignitas, where the bot laner managed to show just how talented he is. Even though Dignitas didn’t make it to the LCS playoffs in 2020, Johnsun was by many considered the shining light of the team. Johnsun has previously played with Team SoloMid in the …
2020 All-Star rosters reveal featured players from T1, TL, more
William Davis
League of Legends
The last big tournament of the 2020 League of Legends season will be the All-Stars Event, and the rosters for three major regions have just been announced. Announcing the 2020 All-Star Lineup! #AllStar2020➡️ https://t.co/AQAse6gToG pic.twitter.com/gJkvk9FAtc — LoL Esports (@lolesports) November 25, 2020 Riot announced the 2020 All-Star Event at the start of November with a new format that takes the popular tournament to an online setting. This means that not …
Valorant First Strike Korea to have a live audience for finals
Olivia Richman
League of Legends
A handful of lucky Valorant fans will be able to watch the First Strike Korea action in person. Riot has rolled out the international First Strike event, allowing teams from all over the world to compete within their region for a piece of the $100,000 prize pool. Korea had 24 teams competing in the First Strike Qualifiers on November 12 through the 22nd. Now, teams are competing in the finals. …
Broken Blade will be the top laner for Schalke 04 for 2021 LEC season
William Davis
League of Legends
The former Team SoloMid top laner Sergen “Broken Blade” Çelik returns to Europe to play for Schalke 04 in the upcoming 2021 LEC season. Broken Blade will be replacing veteran top laner Andrei “Odoamne” Pascu, who was recently picked up by Rogue. For two seasons, Broken Blade has been with TSM in the LCS, where he made a name for himself after being picked up from the Turkish TCL team …
Golden Guardians completes its 2021 LCS roster with rookie talent
William Davis
League of Legends
Golden Guardians has finalized its LCS roster for the 2021 season, and it’s full of new faces. Golden Guardians started the offseason by releasing all of its LCS players, leaving the fans wondering what the roster would look like in 2021. Just a couple of days later, fans got their answer. Golden Guardians, unlike the other LCS teams, is betting on up-and-coming talent with three rookies and one player from …
Nisqy officially joins Fnatic as mid laner for the 2021 LEC
William Davis
League of Legends
Fnatic has welcomed Yasin “Nisqy” Dinçer as its starter mid laner for the 2021 season. Fnatic’s roster for 2021 is shaping up. The organization welcomed former Cloud9 mid laner Nisqy to its starting roster. It’s unclear at the moment what will happen to former mid laner Tim “Nemesis” Lipovšek, whose contract with the team expired on November 15. Nisqy is returning to the LEC after two years spent in North …
Deft and Chovy join Hanwha Life Esports for 2021 LCK season
William Davis
League of Legends
Hanwha Life Esports recently presented its 2021 LoL roster, including two big names: bot laner Kim “Deft” Hyuk-kyu and mid laner Jeong “Chovy” Ji-hoon. #Announcement #Deft #CaD #Arthur #Kor #Eng뛰어난 실력과 안정적이고 강력한 플레이를 지닌 봇라이너 ‘Deft’ 김혁규 선수가 한화생명e스포츠와 2021 시즌을 함께합니다. ‘Deft’ Kim Hyeokgyu, a bot laner who has excellent skills and stable and compelling play, has joined HLE. pic.twitter.com/dcayPYZ3Ch — HLE.official (@HLEofficial) November 24, 2020 Deft and …
LS talks about T1 drama as he joins team as content creator
William Davis
League of Legends
Nick “LS” Cesare recently made his first video in weeks, announcing that he will be joining T1 as a content creator. After breaking what had become an extended silence, content creator and caster LS has returned to talk about the recent T1 drama and to reveal that he will be joining the organization as a content creator. It has been a bumpy ride for both LS and T1 in the …
Cody Sun will likely play in Academy for the 2021 season
William Davis
League of Legends
After officially leaving 100 Thieves on November 9, the bot laner Liyu “Cody Sun” Sun is currently without a team going into the 2021 season. In a recent video, Cody Sun explained his journey through the offseason so far and how he has struggled to find LCS offers. He said that one LCS team was interested right after he became a free agent, but that it fell through because the …
Thorin blacklists Fnatic’s Bwipo amid ongoing League drama
William Davis
League of Legends
Duncan “Thorin” Shields has blacklisted Fnatic’s top laner Gabriël “Bwipo” Rau after a recent public disagreement. Thorin is making sure to never invite Bwipo back to any of his podcasts. The decision came after Bwipo publicly disagreed with one of Thorin’s take on The Crack Down. According to Thorin, the real reason why T1 refused to sign Nick “LS” De Cesare as its head coach is because the caster is …
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.
