League of Legends already has an interesting history. Stemming from a Warcraft III Mod, now turned into a full game, and resting in the hands of Riot Games, the title logged yet another entry into it’s history books yesterday, when LA based Riot Games announced yesterday that LOL is going free to play. A bit of a turn on a dime, as Riot had only just month prior at E3, announced that the title would be available via download and retail stores in September. Looks like that download isn’t going to cost you a cent. w00t!
In a nutshell, League of Legends is an action-strategy title with some strong RPG elements. Initially based on the Warcraft III ‘Defense of the Ancients’ type game, players take on the role of a Summoner, who then in turn calls forth a Champion to fight for him against other players.
The game will be completely free-to-play, but as is the de facto method of today’s genre, microtransaction upgrades will be available. Likewise, Riot still plans on a collectors pack edition that will be available for $29.99. This collector’s edition comes with unique skins, pre-unlocked champions, runes for enhancing characters, and $10 worth of Riot Points.
League of Legends will offer two distinct forms of in-game currency. Influence points are most similar to experience points in that they are earned simply by playing the game, and can be used to purchase runes that enhance player’s powers. Conversely, Riot Points can be purchased for real money and may be put to use towards new Champions and cosmetic enhancements. In the spirit of fairness (and overall game design), Riot states that the items made available through Riot Points will not give any one player (or players) a distinct advantage over any others.
“One of our goals at Riot has been to set a high quality bar for core games that are available for free online as we believe that a relentless focus on delivering tremendous value to online communities will earn player loyalty,” Brandon Beck, co-founder and CEO, Riot Games, said. “League of Legends is being built as a highly competitive core game that we believe will change many people’s minds about the type and caliber of games that can be offered for free.”
League of Legends has a scheduled release date for sometime in September. In addition to the initial release, Riot is already prepping for the games’ post release phase, in which the company plans on “new features, Champions, maps and additional content as suggested by the community.”
Stay tuned and keep up to date with League of Legends at: http://www.leagueoflegends.com/
Tags: Brandon Beck, league of legends, microtransaction, riot games, warcraft iii
