Riot’s Project L beat ‘em up is free-to-play and has ghost tentacles

Riot Games have been quiet so far this year on their in-the-works Project L, a 2.5D fighting game set in the League Of Legends universe. Not so much now though, as the game’s senior director Tom Cannon has revealed that Project L will be free-to-play. You can also catch a glimpse of the newly announced hero Illaoi in the video below.

The Latest on 2XKO (Formerly Project L) - /dev diary

“When it comes to monetization, we promise to be respectful of both your time and your wallet,” Cannon said, after confirming that Project L would be free-to-play. It’s not exactly an unprecedented development. Some of Riot’s biggest games such as League Of Legends and Valorant are already using the model.

Cannon says the Project L team are finishing work on the game’s core mechanics now. They're starting to move on to developing the game’s hero-fighter “champions”, and aspects such as competitive play and Project L’s social systems. One of those champions is League Of Legends’ Illaoi, the Kraken Priestess. She’s the spiritual leader of her people, and pretty hard too from the look of her. She wields a big golden ball called the Eye Of God that can rip souls out of people and, oh, smack them with spirit tentacles. You can read more about Illaoi here.

Riot first touted a 2.5D fighting game under the Project L banner in 2019, but the last time they shared any info on how it was coming along was back in November last year. It’s not the only secretive game that’s in development at the company. There’s also Project F, a hack’n’slash action RPG, along with an untitled MMORPG based in League Of Legends’ world of Runeterra. In January, Riot agreed to pay $100 million (£82 million) to settle a gender discrimination lawsuit brought against them by current and former employees and contractors.

Still no word on when you can expect to lay the smackdown in Project L, but we’ll keep you posted. Expect to hear more when Riot releases another update later this year.