Riot Games drops League of Legends champions into its new fighting game

Riot Games unveiled its Project L that pits the League of Legends champions against each other in a new fighting game (via Polygon).

In Riot Games livestream celebrating 10 years of its incredibly successful MOBA League of Legends, it revealed that the rumoured fighting game is no longer a pie in the sky. We first learned that the developer was rustling up a fighting game at EVO 2019, though with the qualifier that we wouldn’t get our mitts on it for quite some time. Yesterday, Riot Games was able to show off a snapshot of gameplay of Project L. 

The champions Jinx, Katarina, Darius, and Ahri were confirmed as they duked it out in 2D environments. We don’t know who else from League of Legends will join them, or how large the roster will be, nor when the game is set to release and for which platforms. ‘What, I think, League of Legends players expect from this game is different but in some ways harmonious with what I think fighting game players expect from this game,’ said Riot employee and EVO co-founder Tom Cannon. 

‘Everyone wants a great game but what we’ve been seeing is that people are really excited to see Runeterran champions in a new light; even from a new camera angle,’ he continued. From the brief glimpses we got, it looks a little like Street Fighter but with its own twist. Cannon used to work for Radiant Entertainment before it was acquired by Riot Games. Its game, Rising Thunder, was a free-to-play robot-fighting game for PC that used a simpler control scheme compared to other fighting titles. Project L could follow suit which would attract a greater audience than just League fans and just fighting game fans. 

Project L is in development at Riot Games and will be released in the future.