Before I get started on what makes League of Legends a powerhouse as far as it comes to online multiplayer games I want to define a few terms for people who may not know what they mean already. These will be important for understanding some attributes of the game, and I like the fact that League of Legends employs an alternative vocabulary. It's the first thing that stood out to me when I started playing the game myself.
Tanky- Characters with High defense and the ability to take a lot of damage for their team are described as tanky.
A.O.E.- Stands for area of effect, normally applied to damaging abilities champions use in combat.
M.O.B.A- Multiplayer online battle arena
Toxic- This applies to some league players who have bad attitudes and harass other players or their teammates during the game.
Feeding- This applies to losing as a player in League, the more you die, the more gold the opposing team gets, the stronger they can get. It's a little more complicated but that's the basic idea.
Bruiser- Characters with high skirmish potential who are supposed to engage in short fights in order to lower their enemies health.
AFK- Away from Keyboard, someone who has left the game but is still logged in as their champion.
Squishy Wizard- Actually a non-league term that applies to characters who deal magic damage and have low defense or health stats. Very vulnerable to attack.
O.O.M- Out of Mana, which essentially means the energy needed for higher damage abilities is gone.
Tilted- A psychological effect that occurs when players begin to lose or people get in their head.
Flamed- Insulted or otherwise yelled normally for a bad decision but possibly for no reason at all.
The Game Play
Alright, now that I've defined some terms lets talk about what League brings to the table as far as competitive video games. The first thing League offers is a chance to flex your decision making muscles. If you play League you'll learn really fast whether or not you make good decisions in the heat of battle. League is all about not putting yourself in a compromising position and being smart enough to know when your character has hit a point of strength, is about to be O.O.M., what their capabilities are in the first place. You can't play a bruiser like a tanky character, and you can't play a squishy wizard like a bruiser.
Pictured: Renekton, an armored alligator, very tanky.
Pictured: Veigar, a very powerful, very small mage.
The results of trying will almost always be the gray screen of death, and possibly being flamed by an unforgiving teammate. Positioning and decision making can make matches feel like real time chess where the objective is to place yourself just right on the field to overtake your opponent. The marked difference between league and chess is that every battle can end up as a “checkmate” and every checkmate usually ends with one player looking at their characters corpse while an announcer lets their entire team know they just died. In other words, it's a little more intense than chess.
The strategy and decision making are nice but the main reason I like this M.O.B.A is the champion diversity. There are 123 different champions to choose from in League of Legends and they release one every few months to ensure that the game play doesn't ever get predictable. Each champ has their own kit, their own abilities that do massive damage, or apply effects to other characters, and each champs kit heavily influences their game style. There are also in the game items that amplify attributes of the champs or have their own effects that can turn the tide of battle.
Outside of what the champs can do there is a lot of customization around what they can look like, and each champion has their own animations you can access while in game. League of Legends is not just a head to head competitive battle of wits; it has a lot of personality and the designers clearly put a lot of work into making the game fun for the more casual gamer.
Battle takes place on summoners rift, as well as a few other arena's if you're feeling feisty, which is a three lane arena with the spaces in between lanes being referred to as the jungle. The terrain allows for surprise attacks, ganks (walking into a lane from the side in order to flank an enemy), and there are jungle camps that give experience and gold if you destroy them. Each champ plays a specific position and will occupy either top lane, mid lane, bottom lane (two champs go here) or the jungle.
Pictured: Summoners Rift, basically where you'll spend a lot of your time playing League
The Pros
League is a free to play the game with a reward system that allows you access champions simply through playing enough games and saving up. These points are called “influence points” and every champion can be purchased with them, which essentially means you could collect every champion for free if you spent enough time playing the game.If you are into spending a few hours a day in front of your computer screen it's a cost effective way to have a good time, offers a lot of variety, and the experience is never dull. The amount of variety they have as far as champions go is insane and makes game play amazingly engaging. The amount of objectives there are per game, the challenge of overcoming enemy opponents in high risk maneuvers, the abilities each champion has that manifest themselves on screen as crazy looking graphics, all of these things make League of Legends an addicting experience.
Win or lose, and you will lose way more than you win when you first start playing, League of Legends is an engaging game. I know there have been games that I've played where I was literally on the edge of my seat palms sweating on the keyboard praying to God that my team held it together long enough for us to win.
The Cons
Speaking of teams, that leads me to the negative aspects of League of Legends. League of Legends is a team "sport". In and of itself that's not a negative thing, but like with any team sport, if you can't work together with your teammates or they can't seem to figure out how to work with you... you're gonna have a bad time. I have been in and seen countless games where the players are having a good time playing a FREE VIDEO GAME and suddenly people are cursing each other out over the chat because one person died or started feeding lane. I've been playing League for around three months now, I'm still pretty bad, and I have been exposed to some of the toxicity that can occur. It isn't pretty, it isn't polite and some of the things people say when they know no one can see their face or know their real name is enough to make me want to wash my brain in bleach. Once your team members get tilted it's a slippery slope downward. Despite this, however, I have also found people on League who are genuinely courteous, kind and fun to play with. To nurture this behavior Riot, the creators of League of Legends, actually implemented a system where people can be rewarded for showing teamwork, being friendly and/or being helpful. There is even one for being an "honorable opponent".
This has not halted the flood of players who flame, who argue with their team instead of trying to communicate effectively and who flat out AFK instead of trying to muster up some kind of patience and work it out with the other players on their team. However it does feel nice to be appreciated for rising above the petty squabbling; a.k.a literally muting everyone on the team in chat and playing the game.
Over All
I think League is a great time and I look forward to playing it whenever I have free time. The graphics are amazing, the community can be a bit rough but are ultimately passionate fans who express their love for the game like any other fandom, and the game itself totally deserves all the hype.
