What’s up guys it’s me Jeremy.
Whether you’ve been playing League of Legends since beta, or have picked it up more recently,
we can all take a trip down memory lane or for some of you, the history books, to see
how league of legends came to be as it is today.
Our journey begins in 2006 when Brandon Beck and Marc Merril, also known as Ryze and Tryndamere,
founded Riot games together.
A short while after, they partnered with Steve Feak and Steve Mescon, also known as Guinsoo
and Pendragon to cement the start of the team.
In September of 2006, production officially began on League of Legends, inspired by defense
of the ancients, which was a popular mod for warcraft 3, with the idea that the game was
so innovative and fun, that it could create its own genre worthy of a full engine and
enhanced features.
In 2007, production of the game continued, as the small team of Riot Games worked to
improve upon dota and revolutionize the genre that became known as MOBA, short for multiplayer
online battle arena.
In 2008, production continued and on October 7th League of Legends: Clash of Fates was
announced to the public.
This was the first mention that we saw of the game publicly at the time, and it was
initially announced with Clash of Fates in the title.
Fast forward to 2009, and on February 21st the close Alpha test of league of legends
bega.
Around this time we also saw the first trailer for the game released to the public.
On April 10th, the game exited the alpha stage, and Closed beta began.
This is where the game started to truly develop, as 8 days later we saw the release of the
first new champions, Singed and Zilean, who were added into the closed beta.
On May 9th, the first ever version of the Summoner’s Rift Winter map became playable,
and was added to the custom game option.
At the the time, custom games were the only way to play, as the closed beta remained relatively
small.
On may 29th, normal game matchmaking was added into the game, and players became able to
queue up and be paired with both a team and opponents for the first time ever.
On october 10th, the store was added into the game, and Xp and IP Boosts, Runes, Champions
and Skins became locked behind a paywall, which were previously entirely accessible
for all beta testers.
This was when we saw Riot’s free to play business model finally released, and eventually,
it became a huge boon to the initial growth of the game, when it competed with other pay
to play titles of the same genre.
And shortly after on October 22nd, Open beta began, and the game slowly transitioned into
release on October 26th, when the game dropped the clash of fates suffix, and was released
as League of Legends, in North America and Europe, with a Free to Play business model,
and 40 champions.
Heading into 2010, on March 29th, Twisted Treeline left its beta stages and was released
to the game with a normal matchmaking queue.
This was the first new game mode that we saw, and set the stage for Riot to develop other
maps.
On June 1st, Spell Vamp was added into the game, alongside a few items with the newfound
stat.
On July 6th, the very first champion rework took place, which happened to Kayle, and set
the stage for the continued redesign of champions.
On July 13th 2010, Season one officially began, and a solo ranked, 3v3 premade, and 5v5 premade
ranked queues were added into the game, with the new draft mode being added and implemented
into all ranked queues.
The game used an ELO based rating system to match players against each other and record
ranks across the board.
As well on the same day, the all random mode was added to custom games, and the community
formed around playing All random all mid on summoners rift as a much more casual way to
mess around with the game.
And also on July 13th, the Journal of Justice began periodic publications.
This web newspaper served as a way to showcase the lore and story behind League of Legends
in a way that was built into the client to be easily accessible.
And on October 19th, the first Autumn or Halloween Summoner’s Rift map was added into the game,
marking the second official summoner’s rift map skin that was implemented.
Now moving into the year 2011, on February 16th, Co op vs AI was added into the game
as a matchmaking queue, and greatly improve the experience for new players.
Later on May 23rd, the Tribunal was added into the game, a system where players could
discipline other players who received multiple reports, at the benefit of being rewarded
with some IP.
Anyone above level 30 at the time could participate, and you got to review cases of chat logs and
match history in order to decide if a player deserved a ban.
On June 17th, the first ever world championship was played in Sweden, and was won by Fnatic,
over against all authority, who at the time had the roster of Xpeke top, Shushei Mid,
Cyanide jungle, and Lamia and Melissan bottom.
The european teams innovated the meta and came up with the ad carry with a 0 cs support
in the bottom lane.
This tournament defined the current meta that we still see today, in terms of the lane setups.
On september 12th, the first ranked season came to an end, and the preseason to season
two began.
And shortly after on September 26th, Dominion was added into the game.
This marked the third map produced for League of Legends.
It was initially met with a lot of hype and promise, but the balance and pacing of the
game mode proved to be lackluster, as the game mode lost hype and eventually became
all but forgotton on the competitive scale.
In november of 2011, Riot announced that League of Legends had hit 11.5 Million active monthy
players across the world.
This marked the first milestone of many of League’s explosion into the gaming world
and at this point the game had become quite popular as the MOBA genre flourished.
On november 15th, season two officially began, and launched with a major update, involving
new masteries and a complete overhaul to summoner spells.
This was the first of many major updates that took place at the start of the season, and
eventually would lead to the trend of massive changes taking place in every preseason.
On december 12th, League of Legends officially launched in Korea.
The game quickly exploded in that reigon and saw massive success on both a casual and competitive
level.
It had been launching in other reigons, and would continue further launches around the
world, but Korea was one of the most notable and impactful for the game as a whole.
Heading into the year 2012, on January 17th, Colorblind mode was added into the game, an
awesome feature that at the time many had thought was long overdue, and finally allowed
most colorblind people to play the game effectively.
As well on the same day, dodge was finally removed as a stat from the game.
Dodge had been a big part of notbale items such as phantom dancer and ninja tabi, but
the stat was considered a bit too RNG based and unhealthy for the game, so it was removed,
and Jax, who at the time had a kit heavily reliant on the dodge stat, received a rework.
On may 1st, the official spectator mode was added into the game.
Before spectator mode launched, the spectate feature was located in a summoner spell called
Observer, that would clear the fog of war from the entire map, and you would form a
custom game of 6 players on each team, that was only possible from the Riot-based client,
and you would have one observer on each team in the game, who would use the summoner spell
and be able to spectate the game that way.
It was an interesting situation as many times the people playing the observer would impact
the game by accidentally picking a champion with a global passive, or dying to something
like a karthus ultimate, and so it was eventually replaced by spectator mode.
On may 3rd, Dr Terrible publicly abused an exploit involving masteries to change the
cooldown of his summoner spells to 0 seconds.
He was permanently banned for abusing this exploit in ranked games, but it’s definitely
one of the cooler bugs that took place in League history.
On may 23rd, Summoner’s Rift received it’s first graphical update.
It consisted mostly of minor tweaks, but at the time it was a very nice change, and made
the game look a lot better.
A month later on June 29th, Pulsefire Ezreal, the first ultimate skin ever, was released
to the game.
The skin had been hyped up with teasers and hints for about 6 months, and was unlike any
skin the game had ever seen at the time, and showed what was really possible to add to
a champion in just a skin.
On July 7th, the 100th champion, Jayce was added into the game.
League of Legends initially launched with 40 champions, but in season one and especially
early season two, riot was putting a ton of focus on producing new champions, and was
putting out as much as two every month quite consistently, and eventually Jayce was released
as the milestone 100th champion in League of Legends.
On september 12th, the Diamond tier was added into the ranked system.
Previously, the highest tier possible had just been platinum, but the player base had
become large enough to where the highest elo rating was a long way above what it took to
get to platinum, so the Diamond tier at 2200 elo was added into the game.
On october 12th, the season two world championship took place in the united states and was won
by the Taipei assassins in an upset run over Azubu Frost.
The roster of Stanley top, Toyz mid, Lilballz jungle, bebe ad carry, and mistake on support
beat out the competition for the $1 million prize, which at the time was one of the biggest
prize pools esports had ever seen.
Later on October 25th, the Twisted Treeline received a full relaunch and update, at an
attempt to change the dyanmics and game flow of the map.
It was exciting at first, but would eventually prove to be fairly uncompetitive, despite
Riot’s best attempts.
And on November 12th, Season 2 ranked officially ended, marking the end of the second competitive
season of the game, and the start of the new preseason.
On December 3rd, a huge preseason update hit the live serves, with updates to the jungle,
massive changes to items, and updates to masteries, runes, and summoner spells.
Some of the more notable items changes were things like Heart of gold being removed, the
nerf to boots of speed, where at the time boots was a 100% starting buy on every role
except for support, and the buff to black cleaver and warmogs which would cause what
was known as the league of black cleavers and the league of warmogs, and led to a pretty
chaotic preseason with some of the most unbalanced game states league has ever seen.
Heading into 2013, on february 1st, season 3 officially launched with an updated ranking
system, getting rid of the elo ratings, and added divisions, tiers, and promotional series,
as well as the challenger tier to allow the best of the best a better chance of distinguishing
themselves on the ranked ladder.
On february 7th, the first league championship series started in north america and europe,
marking the death of the open circuit of tournaments, but a much more secure competitive scene for
the professional players and orginizations.
Here’s a fun one, on february 14th 2013, Riot announced there official replay system,
and implemented it on the PBE.
It was met with a lot of promise, but eventually fell through for a multitude of reasons, and
to this day, seems to be nowhere near hitting live servers.
On march 1st, smart ping was added into the game, allowing you to ping danger, on my way,
missing, and assist me to your teammates, greatly improving the communication for the
average soloqueue match.
As well on march 1st, the official mac open beta began for league of legends.
Previously, mac users had to use a thrid party software called iLoL that was promoted by
Riot, in order to be able to run the game properly on a mac.
The software was a little bit buggy, and would occasionally take extra days to launch patches,
and so the official client was long overdue as mac users rejoiced.
On march 28th, the first full relaunch of a champion happened to karma and was added
into the game.
Karma had been one of the weakest champions in the entire game for over a year, but had
a kit that was a bit too unhealthy to buff, so a full relaunch changed her kit completely,
and set the stage for riot to be able to completely change champions to be much more well designed
and easier to balance.
On april 29th, Howling abyss launched and aram became the 4th official game mode for
League of legends.
By this time, the aram community was gigantic, and was a reasonable part of the player base,
to the point where riot made it an official game mode due to feedback and community desire,
and on that day the map gained a matchmaking system equipped with rerolls and new items.
In october of 2013, League of Legends hit 32 million active monthy players, and had
established itself as the biggest and most popular MOBA game in the entire world.
It exploded into popularity, and when riot released the offical number, it became a huge
milestone for the community.
On october 3rd, the Season 3 world championship took place in the united states in the staples
center and was won by Sk telecom t1 against Royal club, with the squad of Impact up top,
Faker in mid, bengi on jungle, piglet on ad carry, and poohmandu on support.
The finals was watched by 32 million unique viewers across the world, shattering all esports
viewing records and showing the world that esports is the real deal, and that the viewership
rivals and can exceed that of tranditional sports.
This record from the season three world championship still stands to this day as the most watched
esport event in the history of professional gaming.
On october 6, a programmer by the name of AstralFoxy publicly released an exploit that
allowed players to play in a custom game on the howling abyss as 5 of the same champion.
Much fun was had until riot had patched the exploit out a week and a half later, but it
set the idea in motion for riot to release their own custom game modes later on, as it
was met with much praise by the community, and riot chose not to ban a single person
for abusing this exploit.
On november 12th, season 3 ranked officially ended, marking the beginnning of the new preaseason
which would lead to a ton of new updates.
On November 22nd, Riot released their first temporary game mode, one for all on summoners
rift.
It was considered by most to be not nearly as fun as Astralfoxy’s exploit, which was
played on howling abyss, but it was still awesome to play the game mode again, until
the mode was removed a couple weeks later.
As well on the same day of november 22nd, a huge preseason update hit the live servers
with major changes to support, changes to vision limiting wards to 3 wards per player,
where it was previously unlimited, making pink wards visible, adding trinkets into the
game, new support items, the removal of oracle’s elixir, a rework to the mastery system, changes
to the jungle with the addition of the new wight jungle camp, and overall changes to
the flow and dynamics of the game.
Heading into 2014 now, in january Riot Games announced that League of Legends hit 67 Million
active montly players, becoming the most played computer game In the entire world by a huge
margin.
They haven’t released any statistics on the player base since, but the fact remains
that league of legends has exploded into popularity and still remains the most popular computer
game in the world to this day On january 14th, Season 4 officially launched,
with the increase of the challenger tier from 50 players to 200, and other minor tweaks
to the ranked system.
On january 17th, the first official challenger series began in north america and europe,
creating an official way for aspiring talent to feed into the coveted league championship
series.
On march 23rd, Team builder officially launched as a new normal game queue mode.
This was an awesome addition to the game to finally allow players to guarantee the role
that they wanted in queueing.
On april 1st, the Ultra Rapid Fire featured game mode was added for two weeks, and was
met by huge praise from the community as an awesome, chaotic, and fun new take on League
of Legends, that was much more than most had expected from the featured game modes from
Riot.
On June 4th, team ranked rewards of the ward skin and summoner icons were announced, providing
casual players with a small incentive to play on the team ranked ladder.
On july 17th, the doom bots featured game mode was added into the game for two weeks.
Similar to urf, it was innovative and unexpected for how unqiue this game mode was.
Although not as memorable as urf, there was still a ton of fun that was had facing those
doom bots.
On august 27th, master tier was added into the ranked system, removing lp clumping at
diamond 1, and creating a much better system for feeding into the challenger ranked tier.
On October 19th, the Season 4 world championship took place in south korea, and was won by
Samsung galaxy white over star horned royal club, with a roster of Looper up top, dandy
in the jungle, pawn at mid, imp on ad carry, and mata on support.
And on november 5th, season 4 ranked officially ended, as the stage was set for another hectic
preseason.
Also on november 5th, the second and more recent summoner’s rift visual update entered
open beta and was added into the game.
On november 20th, a huge preseason patch hit live serves with change to the jungle, dragon
and baron, and the addition of the rift scuttler, and huge changes to items, most notably the
jungle items that affected the smite summoner spell, as well as a bunch of other minor tweaks
and changes.
Heading into the year 2015 now, on january 15th, base gates were added into the game
as a way to help comebacks.
On january 21st, season 5 ranked officially began, marking another ranked reset for the
ladder.
On march 12th, cinderhulk was added into the game, resulting in a tank dominated meta and
a lot more champion diversity in the jungle.
On april 28th, the champion mastery system was released, packed with the mastery emotes
for players particularly experienced on any given champion.
As well on april 28th, Howling abyss received a minor visual update and gained a new summoner
spell unique to the game mode, that buffed champions reliant on getting into melee range
and initiating, overall making the game mode much less favored towards poke heavy champions,
and a lot less RNG at champion select based for who would win.
On June 10th, the Twisted Treeline and Crystal Scar received visual updates to go along with
the visual update to summoners rift and howling abyss.
On june 22nd, A new Heads up display was added into the game, and although the community
hated it at first, after a few tweaks, resulted in a fairly sleek HUD that we now have in
the game today.
On august 20th, the juggernaut update took place, completely shattering the meta, and
leading to one of the most imbalanced game states league of legends has ever seen.
On October 31st, the season 5 world championship was held in europe, and was won by sk telecom
t1 over the koo tigers, with a squad of marin up top, faker and easyhoon at mid, bengi at
jungle, bang on ad carry, and wolf on support.
And on November 11th 2015, season 5 officially ended comboed with the preseason patch that
brought a massive update to the ad carry role and champions, huge item updates, the addition
of the rift herald, the removal of green wards, the rework of masteries, and changes to the
game flow and dynamics.
And that leaves us to where we are today, but there’s also a lot of huge confirmed
updates for 2016.
Although it is not 2016 at the time of maaking this video, we know for sure that in 2016,
season 6 will begin and end, and the season 6 world championship will take place.
As well, a new client will be added into the game, to replace the long outdated adobe aire
client that we have now.
A new champion select format and menu will be implemented into the game alongside teambuilder
ranked, which will allow you to queue as two of your favorite roles in order to ensure
that everyone gets a role that they like in your ranked game.
As well, dynamic queues will be added to the ranked ladder allowing you to queue with a
full team of 5 on the individual ranked ladder.
And lastly, the hextech crafting system will launch, significantly improving the champion
mastery system, and giving players a bunch of random rewards for playing on their favorite
champions.
And that’s it, so with all of that said, despite all of the criticism, there’s no
doubt that Riot Games has created a fantastic game that has caused millions to have fantastic
experiences.
Here’s to the future, and thanks for watching.