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Designed with impressive graphics, captivating champions, and good-team play, this new real-time strategy, is sure to keep you coming back for more. League of Legends is a PC only MMORPG game which was developed by Riot Games and inspired by the Defense of the Ancients map for “Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne”. The object of the game is to destroy the nexus which is guarded by numerous turrets which you cannot take out alone. At the start of the game you are paired with other players and put in a lobby where you begin to choose your champion, runes, summoner spells, and masteries. What are these you ask? Well, let me tell you.
Champions
Champions are the heroes which you play who are assigned with different abilities. You use your abilities with the q, w, e, r, d, and f keys. To gain experience and gold in the game you kill enemy minions, turrets, and champions. With all of the money you accumulate you buy certain items which could consist of armour, health, movement spend, ability power, attack damage, etc. These will help you all throughout the game, and stacking your champion with the wrong items can prove fatal for you and your entire team. But say out of the champions you have unlocked that you don’t like their abilities very much… Just head over to the shop and buy yourself one of the other sixty-six champions with your influence points that you earn at the end of every game! You can buy tank, dps, crowd control, and even support champions and by playing the game more and more you will find which type you are good with and are the most fun to play!
Runes
Runes, not like the kind in Runescape, are used to gain extra stats at the start of the game. You purchase runes in the shop and while you only gain a small advantage from these, they can defiantly affect early game play to your advantage. With every Summoner Level gained from the experience after you play a game, you get closer and closer to a higher tier of runes which you can buy. The higher the tier, the better the stats and the more influence points they cost.
Summoner Spells
Summoner Spells are extra abilities which are controlled by the d and f keys. The higher your Summoner Level is, the more spells you unlock. Some of them include “Ignite” which is spell that can finish off an enemy and does damage over time to them. Also one of my other favorites is “Ghost” which boosts your movement speed tremendously. It is used to run into team fights, chase after another champion who is far away, and for you to run away when being killed.
Masteries
Masteries are perks which affect gameplay one point at a time. When you level your Summoner Level you gain points (up to 30) in your masteries section. Before each game you look into your masteries and place your points in each section as you please. The three sections are attack, which most champions who rely on their damage output put their mastery points into, defense, which most tanks or damage soakers place their mastery points in, and utility, which most champions who are supports or want to boost their summoner spells place their mastery points. While they don’t do very much for you at level 10, at level 30 they can boost all of your stats quite a lot.
Fields of Justice
Fields of Justice are the maps which you play on. At the moment there are only two maps in the game and this is the only problem which I have with the game. You can play on a map called Summoner’s Rift which supports five players on your team and five on the opposing team. The other map is Twisted Treeline, which supports three players on your team and three on the opposing team. Most players tend to play on Summoner’s Rift due to Twisted Treeline being a smaller map and if the opposing team has too many overpowered champions you are simply doomed.
League of Legends, I believe is going to be one of the next big games. It has everything a upcoming RTS needs; strategy, great graphics, fun teamplay, and is free! I guarantee you that you will simply fall in love with the game’s champions and sleek design. I can’t wait to hear back from some of you guys on how you like the game, send me a pm if you make an account and we can play together!
Keep Gaming,
Mr Sherdo
1st February 2011, at 4:13pm
Interesting article. Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on your point of view) the prediction this year is that VALVe is going to eat league of legend’s and Heroes of Newerth’s luch with a slated release of DotA 2 (Defense of the Ancients 2) produced by none other than Icefrog (one of the 3 original creators of DotA, and the one that has been maintaining the maps until now since the other 2 left for League). The other thing is, both HoN and DotA 2 are/will be mac compatible, whereas League is currently windows only (but with rumors of a mac version coming this fall). Another thing is that DotA 2 (according to VALVe) will be sporting all of the characters from the original, and not remakes that essentially play the same, but not quite.
Like I said though, interesting.