Riot Games needs to pay more attention to money now. Therefore, they’re cutting back on esports. The community of League of Legends sees this critically, especially since Riot Games is currently under fire.
Fans of League of Legends are excitedly discussing how Riot Games is handling the budget for LoL.
It was first reported that the shoutcasters would be moderating the World Championships from Los Angeles instead of on-site in Korea. Then it became clear that Riot needs to save money on productions over the next few years. This makes fans skeptical. Will the quality of LoL have to suffer?
Casters moderating from L.A. for now
Casters not on-site: The shoutcaster of EU-LCS, Andrew “Vedius” Day, explained in a stream that a large part of the NA broadcast team will not be on-site in Korea for the World Championships from the beginning. They will only come to Korea for the finals. Moderation from Play-In to Semi-Finals will happen from the studio in Los Angeles.
The exceptions are Eefje “Sjokz” Depoortere and Ovilee “Ovilee” May, who will conduct interviews with players in Korea throughout the event.
Why are the casters only coming for the finals? “It’s cheaper,” explains Vedius in his stream. The Play-Ins have always been moderated from Los Angeles. What’s new now is that the group stages, quarter-finals, and semi-finals will be broadcast from America.
Less budget already noticed
Riot has to save: This news worries fans, as even the MSI (Mid Season Invitational) was held unusually small in the studios. The Spring Finals of the NA LCS also took place in a small location that could barely accommodate 1000 people.
Here fans had already suspected that Riot is scaling back the budget for LoL esports. And they were not wrong.
Riot says it needs to pay more attention to money now
This is what Riot says: Addressing the fans’ concerns, Riot’s Head of Global Esports, Derrick “FearGorm” Asiedu, stated on Reddit that Riot does not want to simply reduce esports spending. They just want to be more disciplined about financial limits now.
Riot is still spending a lot of money: In his Reddit post, FearGorm states that Riot spends over 100 million dollars annually on esports. However, they are no longer a small startup and have to responsibly ensure that costs align more with revenues.
So is the budget being cut now? That now entirely depends on how the next 3 years develop. If they generate enough revenue, everything could stay the same. Should the earnings not meet their target, they will have to cut the budget.
This year they have already cut: This year, Riot Games has saved in some areas and listened to fan feedback. Yet, the 2018 World Championships still had the second-highest expenditures. The most expensive Worlds were in 2017.
More revenues needed
On Reddit, FearGorm also explains that they now want to do more to generate more revenue. This should also happen through “Digital Experiences” and traditional sponsors.
They do not want to spoil the player experience. However, they must first try things out. How these experiments will look in detail is still unclear.
What is going on at Riot right now?
What’s behind this? The news that Riot has to save comes at a time when League of Legends and Riot are already under fire.
There are three major areas that may worry LoL fans:
- There are sharp allegations against Riot, with claims of a culture of sexism – these allegations are escalating. After an article from Kotaku, other victims are also speaking up (via Barry Hawkins)
- The current “Battle Royale” hype and the previous “Hero Shooter” hype could be hitting LoL. Fortnite and Overwatch are both pushing into esports – this is younger competition for LoL for attracting new players
- The own publisher Tencent seems to be focusing on mobile. After Riot refused to build a mobile LoL, Tencent simply created one themselves (Honor of Kings). This is said to have led to tensions between Riot and Tencent.
This is what Riot says about declining player numbers (via dotesports):
“The numbers for League of Legends are lower than at their peak, but it is still one of the most played games on the planet and we are very happy with the numbers. We think some of the content we are bringing soon will help us with player numbers. Essentially: League of Legends is doing incredibly well by every measure of the numbers, except when compared to our own records.
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