League of Legends Lecture

Before the millions of players and billions in revenue, before the esports tournaments that draw 100 million viewers, League of Legends was more of an idea than a game. And even after it launched, many players struggled to figure out its complexity, which makes it one of the most difficult games in eSports.

This course will explore the popular video game League of Legends through a variety of lenses, including gameplay, eSports, and psychology. Students will spend class time discussing and analyzing professional-level League of Legends games, and will apply what they learn in weekly homework assignments.

The course is designed to help students develop critical thinking skills by applying them to complex, competitive multiplayer games. This course is intended to be challenging and requires a high-end gaming PC capable of running League of Legends at a minimum frame rate of 60fps.

Co-founder Marc Merrill describes the early months leading up to League’s release as “super scary.” He and his team were focused on creating what he calls a “DOTA clone very quickly,” which meant churning out a new champion every month. But they also had a bigger goal: to create a game that genuinely resonated with players. This required a new type of testing that had never been done before: playtesting on a live server. The results weren’t good. A core team began to disband, and League went into closed beta in April 2009. Its official launch came in October of that year. 롤대리