The League of Legends visual makeover is on its way, and Riot Games released a video detailing the thought process behind the beautiful visual changes coming to the game’s battleground, the Summoner’s Rift.
The video tours the map and shows how the update isn’t just easy on the eyes, but functional, too.
“For us, this is about making all gameplay information more readable,” the narrator in the video says. The visual priority should follow the general order of User Interface, then champion abilities and summoner spells, then champions and monsters, and finally the map itself, the video says.
Each of the four jungle quadrants will have its own visual cues, allowing players to place themselves on the map with their surroundings and not just the minimap. Each base and the minions spawned from it will also have their own indicators, increasing the readability of what’s going on in the game while decreasing the graphical noise.
The pastels molding the landscape should give the game a timeless visual feel, one that can remain appealing as graphics technology races into the future. “We’ve chosen a hand-crafted art style we think will grow and evolve over time, just like the rest of the game,” the video states.
Overall, the changes look great and should have a big impact in not only improving the gameplay, but also esports viewability. But they’re by no means final—it’s still not clear when the updates will hit the live server.
