Since EDward Gaming (EDG) won the 2021 World Championship, LPL representatives have shown signs of fatigue compared to LCK teams in the biggest League of Legends arena. At the 2022 World Championship, the LCK had three representatives reach the Semi-Finals. Moving to the 2023 World Championship, only T1 from the LCK made it to this stage. However, the common point of these two World Championships is that the LCK representatives were still champions while the LPL teams faced disappointing defeats.
The consequence of this is that the LPL tournament is gradually becoming less attractive even to its own audience. Specifically, even the highlight match of LPL Spring 2024, JDG vs. BLG, only reached less than 1 million views. In contrast, the match between RNG and IG (two relatively unremarkable teams) at LPL Spring 2023 managed to hit 1.6 million views.
In a recent interview, former World Champion 2020 – Nuguri shared some noteworthy truths about the League of Legends players in LPL. This may be one of the reasons why LPL teams seem to lag behind LCK representatives in recent years.
“I realize there is a very clear cultural difference between LPL and LCK. Although LCK has many skilled players, only a few are regarded as idols, like Faker, for example. However, many LPL players are considered idols and they often “run shows” to earn a lot of money when they gain a bit of fame.
Personally, when I decided to move to LPL, half of the reason was to earn money. The other half was because FPX had many world champion players at that time. Initially, I really wanted to try competing abroad. It wasn’t until I actually moved to LPL that I realized the practice time was significantly less than when I played in LCK.” – Nuguri shared.
In LPL, many players are seen as idols and fans often engage in shocking behaviors. Recently, Scout’s fans continuously sent threatening messages, demanding LNG change their coach. The reason is that they believe the coaching style is causing LNG to perform poorly and not allowing Scout to shine.
Of course, the positive side of player idolization is that it helps the players or their teams earn a lot of money. In return, the time spent practicing to actually improve skills and strategic thinking will be less. In the context of LCK teams continuously improving, the trade-off of practice time for LPL players may have led to their poor performance at the World Championships.
After two consecutive World Championships without winning a title, the trust of fans in LPL representatives has significantly decreased. If they continue to miss the 2024 World Championship title, LPL must seriously reconsider its approach to League of Legends.