The History of Riot Games, an industry juggernaut built on a free game

This is the story of Riot, League of Legends maker and a self-styled ‘player-focused’ studio.

League of Legends has around 115 million monthly players. One hundred and fifteen million. Its developer Riot Games has a consumer base about as big as oxygen does, then, but it’s also something of an enigma. 

The studio’s only been around since the late noughties and has released just a handful of titles in its history. As the games industry expands and most of its major players take on the image of cold corporate entities, Riot retains a knack for talking to its community like a collective of like-minded human beings. And it’s kept its debut title, a free-to-play MOBA based on a 2003 Warcraft III mod, relevant to a massive audience. This is the story of Riot, a self-styled ‘player-focused’ studio.