League of Legends: Wild Rift esports is pulling out of APAC
It's a dramatic turnaround after they tried to take over and resurrect the dying esports scene
- League of Legends: Wild Rift is dropping official support for esports in the APAC region
- This was the final area where Riot Games were planning to push esports in Wild Rift
- So what does it mean for Wild Rift going forwards?
League of Legends: Wild Rift is dropping official support for esports in the APAC (Asia Pacific) region. The announcement comes after Riot Games previously declared they would be pivoting support from a worldwide model to instead focus solely on this region. In an announcement on their official site the company said...
"We believe that pivoting to the model that relies on grassroots and community-led competition is the most sustainable and enabling path for APAC moving forward, giving players time and the space to grow and establish what role high-level competition will play in their community."
Owch
Unfortunately, if you're a Wild Rift fan (or an esports fan for that matter) the writing very much seems to be on the wall with this announcement. Although Riot are trying to spin it as a 'good thing', with the pivot to only supporting community-led tournaments it means that Wild Rift's esports scene is pretty much dead in the water.
As we said, Riot had previously scaled-back their plans to have a worldwide esports scene for League of Legends: Wild Rift, focusing purely on the APAC region. It wasn't a bad plan because this region has a really vibrant esports scene, but unfortunately the company still couldn't follow through on their plans.
That's not to say there's never going to be Wild Rift esports ever again, but it's all going to be via community-led competitions without any official support from Riot. It's a shame, especially given how Wild Rift has proven League can make its mark on mobile.
The upcoming Esports World Cup meanwhile looks to be going strong with games like PUBG Mobile, Honor of Kings and more already pledging to make an appearance. And while Wild Rift is closing up shop esports-wise, it's still more than worth a play. Check out the latest update which adds the grim and violent Kalista to the roster as well as even more content!
