So where did LoL come from?! Its hit the esports world like a tsunami on Indonesia. I personally have played it on and off since beta and also have watched it blossom into this beautiful mature competitive moba. It has been no easy path for Riot. There has been numerous pitfalls reached that Riot have seemed to not simply jump over, but capitalise on and grow larger. How did they do it? Whats contributed to LoL's rise?

The early challenge for Riot was verse HoN. This rivalry I think has emphasised just how effective the free to play idea may be. But free to play is just not a brand new concept and it is crucial that you note how well Riot balanced it with paid content. The achievable content and paid content is so finely tuned that it dangles enough over casual players to keep them going and wanting more while dedicated players essentially pay throughout the nose to get everything they think they need to play their best.

The other element of this HoN rivalry is the fact that Riot marketed their game specifically to be as welcoming of all kinds of players as it can be, particularly the lay noob. You can see the idea behind HoN was to have an extreme competitive focus, perhaps in the ilk of how sc2 was launched. Additionally, it subsequently attracted a number of dota players.

Meanwhile Riot was noob friendly, community focused and had their 'summoners code.' The real life implications of this, imo, is pretty unsubstantial. People still behave like dicks as well as the communities attitudes etc are pretty similar. However people buy into it, they feel like their game has another attitude despite whether they practice what they preach. Its just like hipster politics that claim "save the world man" while voting republican.

Riot decided to OWN their competitions. Arguably the premier LoL event is what LoL itself owns/promotes/runs ingame. Now this is perhaps something never seen before within any other game. Most game developers to date release a game then allow the community run with it. Blizzard are one of the few developers in history that ever support a game after release.

Luck is a vital factor as well here, in a range of areas. The first is streaming went big around this time. sc2 came out and got things cracking on justin.tv> twitch and own3d. LoL quickly took this up and Riot ran with it. Conditions were perfect for Riot to capitalise on reaching their potential audience in a whole new way.

Another thing is how fracking aweasomley Riot invested in developing game caster talent. Was this an in-house decision? Since it has paid out handsomely for them. LoL itself is a technical/descriptive/ back and forth casters wet dream. To put simply, its an entertainers gold mine. Its like the cricket of electronic sports.

The other piece of luck has been South Korea as well as the transition from sc1 to sc2. It could not are already timed better for esports bet (visit the next site) Riot and I could be fascinated to know more about the amount Riot tried to promote LoL in Asia. sc2 came out as well as the whole of South Korea were stuck in this starcraft hangover rut, it was like a giant economy going bust big. sc2 just wouldn't take off and Koreans went searching for a new game. That new game was LoL.

So here we have been, LoL and riot are at the forefront of competitive gaming, on the precipice of a brand new era. They smashed HoN, have broken out of the successful game zone and also are now into the electronic sports changing zone. Just one challenge stands before them and it is dota2.

I am fascinated and excited to see how they handle this challenge. The game engine is the next battlefield I think. Right now LoL has a great balance between being super playable on all computers, but requiring enough to make people buy better hardware to run it. So it attracts the correct degree of sponsors to events.