Developer Riot Games has a lot in the works, including a 2D fighting game and an RPG, but there are some changes that will be taking place immediately.
Riot has announced that Riot Points won’t be used in present or future titles. Instead, in-game currency will be known as RP and it won’t be shareable between games. In the press release, Riot developers explain that the company’s newly announced mobile titles will be available on the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store, which do not allow different games to share the same currencies.
“This restriction and other logistical complications of having multi-platform game currencies pushed us towards having a different one for each game,” explained Shio Shoujo and Riot Beernana.
This gets a little tricky for Teamfight Tactics, which will soon have a mobile version as well as its PC counterpart. Both platforms will have their own independent game currency, but the two versions will maintain shared inventories for players.
For Teamfight Tactics and League of Legends on PC and Mac, any RP cards players have or previously purchased will still work, and the price structures will not change for the time being.
Riot’s new mobile games signal change
One big reason for the change of in-game currency is because of the game developer’s new titles for mobile devices, most of which were announced during League of Legend’s 10-year anniversary. This includes Legends of Runeterra, a free-to-play strategy card game set in the same world as LoL.
Building upon League’s rich lore, each champion will have their own style and abilities in the card game. The game will initially have 24 champions to pick from in building new decks. Executive producer Jeff Jew noted that this new card game should address many of the issues gamers have with other titles within the genre.
“We’re all huge card game fans on the LoR team, so we know the issues with the genre: things like excessive cost, over-the-top randomness, and seeing the same decks over and over,” Jew said. “We’ve spent a lot of time thinking about what we’d do differently, and now we have a chance to shake up the genre by keeping what’s great, improving what’s not, and adding some new twists of our own.”
Runeterra also shakes up how card games are played. Instead of a turn-by-turn playstyle, players will have the chance to respond to their opponent and interact with their cards. This should create more variety in deck builds in any given meta, since there will be more room for strategy and experimentation.
League of Legends: Wild Rift is another new mobile game introduced by Riot. While it will also be available on console, Wild Rift is hoping to attract more players from the Asian regions by also coming to mobile devices. It’s set to be released by the end of 2020.
The new MOBA title boasts a dual-stick control scheme and a 5v5 map based on League of Legend’s Summoner’s Rift. Much like their other titles, this fast and action-packed mobile game will take place within League’s world of Runeterra, initially featuring 40 champions from LoL.
