After Nexus Blitz sees decline in popularity, will it return?

The excitement was great when Riot Games announced the return of Nexus Blitz, but the game mode is seeing a decrease in popularity after its first weeks back in play.

The action-packed game mode was reintroduced together with the Spirit Blossom event, with new in-game Nexus Blitz events and an updated look to the map. That map was turned into an Ionian Forrest, matching the Spirit Blossom event’s theme.

Despite the new additions to the game mode, the hype has taken a sharp dive for many in the League of Legends community. According to Lolalytics, the game mode has seen a 70% drop in players compared to its peak during the first week of its reintroduction. That decrease in popularity is a concerning trend for those who wish to have Nexus Blitz made into a permanent game mode. 

Why are Nexus Blitz player numbers lower?

There are probably a lot of reasons why Nexus Blitz is decreasing in popularity. Some of it might just be a natural decline as the initial hype fades out, but all of the in-game bugs might also be a contributing factor.

During the first weeks of Nexus Blitz, social media has been filled with clips of weird bugs. While many of the bugs are funny at first, some might hurt the in-game experience if they happen continually.

One of the bugs that seems to continue to occur is when a team pulls the enemy golem towards their own catapult, making it unable to move out on the map for the rest of the game. This means that the enemy team will have one less jungle camp to farm throughout the game. This bug has seemingly existed since the very first iteration of Nexus Blitz.

Met a 4-man party and this is their tactic/strategy every Nexus Blitz game. The enemy golem never moved/attacked us when we are in their side of jungle. from r/leagueoflegends

Other bugs have also been reported by the community, such as the slay/protect bots that act strangely during in-game events. The new “Protect the Soraka” event spawns a Soraka bot that your team has to protect while trying to kill the enemy Soraka at the same time. Several clips have shown inconsistencies in the bot’s movement, which has lead to unfair results.

Riot Games is also experiencing difficulties balancing the game mode. Buffs such as the Elder Dragon buff and the Lightning Chain buff have been overtuned and represent big win conditions, arguably too big. Some items and champions are also too strong in Nexus Blitz, so a lot of adjustments will have to be made before the game mode is considered even somewhat balanced and fair. And it might not stick around long enough to get to that point.