If you've paid any attention to fighting game fans, influencers, or gamers over the past year, you know that Project L is a looming presence thundering toward us from the dim future. It is the elephant in the room in the purest sense of the word, a presence around which every new release, every new announcement and every new development in the genre is measured.
People from Riot Games they seem to understand the environment they find themselves in; R&D projects that eventually get the green light and come to the fore. The first news of Project L involved respected and experienced staff leading the development, a strategy that Riot had used previously with Legends of Runeterra and Valorant, which featured big names in their respective genres. This, as it obviously should have done, made every 30+ year old buster with an arcade stick a little white hot. After that, free-to-play, great netcode and 2v2 format were announced and the pants came off.
But while Riot may be able to excite the crowd with boxed copies of Street Fighter 4, winning over the non-fighting game crowd is much more important to Project L's long-term success. The League, Valorant, Runeterra, and Wild Rift communities not only outperform the FGC, but are likely the first group of truly fresh players to also be the first to pick up Riot's fighting game. The main question I'm wondering about Project L right now is: "Do League of Legends players even care about this?"
To find out, I took a plane to Copenhagen and changed trains to Malmö, Sweden for a summer League of Legends LEC final. The first event with a live crowd in two years, and a hot spot for competitive-minded Riot fans who - in theory - should buy what Project L is selling.
“I don’t really like the Street Fighter games,” admits Alex, who traveled to Sweden with three of his longtime gaming friends Kate, David and Owen to watch the finale. “I'm more of a role-playing gamer, and League has some RPG elements to it.”
“I think it’s just easier to play together!” - Kate echoes. “In a fighting game you can’t play together, but in an MMO you can. We often play WoW, New World... games like that together." Of the entire group, no one was particularly excited about fighting games based on the genre itself or its connection to the broader LoL universe, regardless of their long-term experience with League and competitive online gaming.
However, there were some "What Ifs" that raised the level of excitement among the group and which obviously could go a long way to winning them over. Alex came up with an idea that in turn made his group of friends nod in agreement: “Maybe if they had a feature like in Tekken Tag Tournament where you can swap between players and put others in line - if we we could line up with five or four of us and put each other in line, that would be cool.”
It is worth noting that among the Riot Games catalog, the vast majority of games (with the exception of Legends of Runeterra, which we will return to later) allow groups of friends to actively play together, simultaneously, at the same time. Fighting games like Mortal Kombat have tried to get the whole gang involved with King of the Hill modes, but even that still leaves the vast majority of players in the position of spectators, more often than not. The vast majority of the participants in the LEC finals, which took place over the weekend, said that they would rather go into battle. Near Some of them emphasize that it is the ability to play with friends that makes them play certain Riot games.
One of the exhibitors, one of the few die-hard Rogue supporters I found standing in line for merchandise at the show, had been following Project L since its release. He thought it was "really brilliant" that the game fixed the problems that other big action games had, but he still expressed concern. “From what we know so far, there is not a single unique feature that is not present in other fighting games, right? Legends of Runeterra has a large single-player game similar to a rogue, League has seasonal events and Urf. I'd like a fighting game to really surprise people with a new idea."
However, not everything is so gloomy, not everything is so tragic and indifferent. Not a single person I spoke to said they were opposed to Project L for two main reasons: free-to-play and connection to the League universe.
“I’ll give it a try because why not? All the games that Riot has released have been good - I played TFT, I played Legends of Runeterra, and obviously I really like Valorant now, and not having to spend money was what was important to me in the beginning,” Teo said. who flew in from France to support G2. “I mean, I play a lot of games that you have to buy, like big single-player games, but I'll play anything that's free. I've played crap, but as long as I don't lose money trying it, I don't mind!
Walking around the expo and outside the arena before the games started over the weekend, it was a little wild to see a crowd of people who I previously thought would be against a Riot-created fighter on day one support the game, but with some serious reservations. However, several League of Choice players also brought up the aspect of competitive fighting games that they hoped Project L would capture. Bogdan from Romania, dressed head to toe in Fnatic merchandise, hoped the game would have an old-school community feel. "I'd love to see the excitement that Street Fighter had back then, that's what it takes to create a really dedicated community."
Another participant, Stefan from Germany, looked like a teenager out of time. He got visibly excited when I started talking about Project L, saying that he had watched and read the recent Illaoi update and wanted to see "those great moments from Marvel vs Capcom 3" and stated that he really liked the raw stuff. moments he remembers seeing back then. A League of Legends fan with a deep love for the fighting game events of early 2010? It felt like the unicorn was talking to me before entering the arena in Malmo.
All of the above, of course, applies to a small number of participants in the massive event, but being hardcore League fans - hardcore enough to spend serious money on flying abroad for the League - it is impossible to argue that they do not hold opinions that reflect the thoughts of a wider circle of players . From what I saw in Sweden, Project L may have won major points with fighting game nerds like me, but they have yet to win over Riot's loyal following.
To learn more about Project L, check out our articles on the five Leagoe of Legends characters we want to see in Project L, and why Project L has what it takes to succeed.
