How Riot Games are building a better League of Legends, and catching up to their own success
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“When we shipped League of Legends," Tom Cadwell, Riot’s VP of Game Design, explained to me last week, “we were hoping that, hey, maybe we’ll get 20 or 30 thousand concurrent users in six months. And that would allow us to continue paying people."We talked at Riot’s headquarters in Santa Monica the day before the League of Legends Season 2 Championship. It’s an office that demonstrates just how far Riot overshot their cautious goals. Before Riot moved in, their offices belonged to a major film studio, and the small, luxurious theater where film execs used to screen movies now plays host to game streams, Dr. Who marathons, and the meetings of various Riot movie clubs. The rest of the building features what seems like acres of workstations, conversation nooks, breakrooms, and conference rooms.
Riot have released the numbers for the Season 2 World Championship in Los Angeles weekend before last. While we knew it was a big event, the final numbers reveal just how huge a moment the Season 2 finals were for eSports.
Following a 
Taipei Assassins, the freshly anointed 
With so many matches occurring during the workweek, and on west coast time, it was hard to catch all of the action at the League of Legends World Championship. It’s not always the easiest game to watch, either: with single games routinely stretching well beyond 40 minutes, few viewers can book the time to watch a whole tournament.
During Riot’s press day prior to the League of Legends championship final, Riot VP of eSports Dustin Beck addressed the connectivity problems that 
Underneath a small galaxy of LED spotlights, with the silver Summoner’s Cup sitting tantalizingly close at center stage and shining like a diamond, Taiwan’s Taipei Assassins and Korea’s Azubu Frost met on the main stage of USC’s Galen Center to decide a million dollar prize and the Season 2 League of Legends world title.
The world’s two greatest League of Legends teams do battle tonight in a million-dollar best-of-five match for the League of Legends World Championship title. While Azubu Frost was a heavy favorite coming into the tournament and is still the favorite tonight, Taipei Assassins have shown a knack for beating the odds, taking out Korea’s fearsom NaJin Sword before beating the other tournament favorite, the renowned Moscow 5.
One of the uglier stories to emerge from the troubled League of Legends playoffs at LA Live last weekend was the 
Yet more bad news is coming out of Riot’s troubled Season 2 World Championship playoffs: a number of spectators at the LA event have accused World Elite and Azubu Frost of using the spectator minimaps arrayed on the stage to cheat in their playoff matches.
Whoever eventually wins the Groundhog Day quarterfinal of the League of Legends Season 2 World Championship playoffs, the results will always be clouded by the fact that it took 
The first day of the League of Legends Season 2 World Championship quarterfinals featured the best play of the tournament so far and three decisive victories for Korea’s Azubu Frost, Russia’s Moscow 5, and Taiwan’s Taipei Assassins. Team Solomid, North America’ last team standing, went out against Azubu Frost. On the 
It’s hard to avoid reading too much into the results of the first day of the League of Legends Season 2 Playoffs. As expected, the Asian teams from China, Taiwan, Korea, and Southeast Asia generally outperformed their Western rivals, with favored teams like Azubu Frost looking all but untouchable. Today, elite teams like SoloMid, Moscow Five, and CLG EU will be hard-pressed to stave off the challenge offered by the Asian powerhouses.
To celebrate the start of the 
The League of Legends Season Two playoffs are here! Twelve of the world’s best professional LoL squads have made their way to Los Angeles to spend three days fighting for a chance to win the $1 million grand prize. The playoffs start at 5 PM UK / 12 PM Eastern with Korea’s Azubu Frost v. Invictus Gaming, and will stream on 
