While League of Legends players may benefit greatly from content unlocked by connecting their Game Pass subscription and Riot Games account, one major aspect of the game will remain locked: purchasing skins.
As part of today’s announcement regarding the collaboration between Riot and Xbox Game Pass, Riot revealed that while players will unlock all existing and new champions in League upon release, they will not be able to purchase skins for the champions they do not own. Champions must be bought with Blue Essence or RP directly, or created via champion shards earned through various means in-game, before skins can be bought for them.
Related: How to unlock all League champions and VALORANT agents through Game Pass
This effectively means players using the Game Pass benefits will need to purchase all of the game’s champions individually; having them unlocked with Game Pass does not mean players own these champions permanently—just while their subscription is active. This appears to function similarly to League’s weekly free champion rotation, in which the champions can be used by anyone but still need to be purchased to own.
Notably, Riot did not provide any information on whether Game Pass owners will be able to use the champions they unlocked with their subscription in the game’s various ranked queues. Should the logistics of the subscription function similarly to the weekly free champion rotation, players will likely be unable to use any champion they have not purchased with Blue Essence or RP in ranked.
All of the content unlocked through connecting the player’s Xbox and Riot accounts will be marked in-game with a special icon. Upon a Game Pass subscription ending, the unlocked champions will once more be locked and unable to be used within League.
The Game Pass bonuses in all of Riot’s titles, including League, will launch officially on Dec. 12.
