League of Legends could possibly become the largest game of all time as its developers declare that it has no fewer than 100 million players logging in monthly worldwide. The figure is a significant increase to the 67 million players that Riot Games said played League of Legends in 2014.
The popular game, which is a multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) game where players compete against each other in teams, has been attracting gamers owing to its free-to-play model. This is similar to what drives the popularity of Dota 2, a close MOBA competitor.
"It's hard to parse, but at the end of the day, those things don't even feel real," Brandon Beck, co-founder of League of Legends' developer Riot Games, said in an interview with Polygon. "The coolest thing is actually when we're at the live events and get to meet fans face to face. Only then does it start to feel real. Otherwise, they're just numbers on a screen all over the world."
One of the unique aspects in Riot Games' approach to League of Legends, which could contribute to its continued success, is the level of the developers' commitment. The company aims to focus on the game and prioritize it through the years. This is different in the case of other publishers that develop games and then move on to another. For instance, Blizzard created Warcraft and after several expansion packs, it began publishing other games, which left the community of players on their own. This development has spawned the emergence of Dota, which is a player-created add-on.
To demonstrate the level of attention that developers at Riot Games provide League of Legends, one could only find the game's early iteration and compare it with the current version. The comparison could confuse people as the versions are radically different.
Developers have been consistently tweaking and updating with game-changing patches to that point that it already upsets some of its audience. But this strategy has kept League of Legends interesting while keeping players on their toes to ensure that in-game competition intensifies.
Given Riot Games' commitment, League of Legends' players could expect more exciting and interesting changes. This is highlighted by the company's decision to hire a team of writers to help define the League of Legend universe. These writers, who are collectively called "Foundations" are behind the recent reboot of the game's backstory. The details of the narrative has not been fully implemented into the gameplay but several insights are already available in the game's website.
