From being an event to honor Faker, the Hall of Fame inadvertently attracted a lot of criticism due to Riot Games’ decisions. It all started when Riot announced the price for the Signature bundle of the Legendary skin Ahri, reaching up to 59,260 RP. It is reported that international players have to spend approximately $500 (equivalent to 12.7 million VND) to acquire this amount of RP.
This is considered an absurd price for a skin in LOL, even if it comes with many effects and animations. After a period of silence, Riot officially spoke out to explain this issue. However, this move only gave the League of Legends community more reasons to criticize them further.
Indeed, the community’s opinion is quite reasonable in suggesting that Riot could set a more suitable price so everyone can purchase and enjoy this skin. Furthermore, one reason for the community’s criticism of Riot is that purchasing the expensive bundle mentioned above lacks much commemorative significance. Essentially, skin bundles and “exclusive items” are no longer unfamiliar to the gaming community. They often come with physical products that have significant commemorative value as a thank you from the developers to the players who purchased these bundles.
Meanwhile, Riot’s expensive bundle lacks this element, significantly diminishing its meaning. Riot could have easily added some items like an Ahri figure from the Legendary skin or a signed poster from Faker for those purchasing this bundle. That way, the aforementioned skin bundle would have much more significance and could potentially receive support from the community.
Fairly speaking, Riot Games’ attempt to quickly boost revenue is an understandable move. Although Riot is not a small company, they have faced many economic difficulties. Even in early 2024, Riot Games had to decide to lay off 11% of its employees to cut costs. Meanwhile, they are still developing many other projects, such as the League of Legends RPG and films related to the Runeterra universe, so they need significant financial resources.
Therefore, it is highly likely that Riot wants to use the Hall of Fame event and Faker’s fame to experiment with selling ‘super expensive’ item bundles in League of Legends to boost revenue as quickly as possible. Sadly, this experiment backfired, generating a massive wave of outrage within the community. Thus, Riot needs to carefully consider similar plans in the future to avoid criticism from their own fans again.