Does the game really need so many characters?

After a long hiatus, I decided to return to League of Legends. Returning to the Summoner’s Rift feels like reopening a book you thought was closed forever, only to find out it has been rewritten and updated. With a flood of changes to the game, new champions and a revamped map, the return was quite a challenge. So today I wanted to take the opportunity to release a new champion to do an article and gameplay, as well as share my impressions of returning to League of Legends after such a long time.

Since I started playing some 12 or 13 years ago, the game has undergone significant changes. It’s amazing how time flies: so much has changed since I started during the first seasons, when there were only a handful of champions to choose from: Annie, Ashe, Master Yi and a few others. I played League of Legends regularly for the next five or six years. I remember stopping when Illaoi was released in 2015. Not because I no longer enjoy it, but simply because c’est la vie. Since then I’ve played the occasional game, maybe one or two a year, but not much more than that.

Returning to League of Legends after such a long time has been a bittersweet experience. On the one hand, I feel like a noob again (and it’s not like I was Faker before; I was a noob then too, but even more so now), especially with all the new changes. On the other hand, it’s reassuring to see that many of the elements I loved are still there. The games are still intense, the community remains passionate (sometimes excessively so: in my first game there was already an AFK player on our team), and the challenge to improve is as appealing as ever.

The first thing that caught my attention was the huge amount of new content that has been added (is this a good thing? Well, we’ll get to that later). There are new maps, game modes and, of course, an overwhelming number of new champions. Instead of jumping back into my old favorites like Yasuo or Zed (my usual go-tos), this humble servant decided to play a game with the new champion, Aurora, as a matter of duty. If you’ve seen the gameplay, you may have noticed it was a bit of a mess, given my lack of skill and unfamiliarity with the champion. But they don’t call them first impressions for nothing, do they? And sometimes, as I believe, it’s the imperfections that make things perfect.

Aurora is a champion with a somewhat unique concept in the vast world of Runeterra. Unlike many other champions, she is a Vastaya who stands out for her ability to communicate with the spiritual realm – an aspect not explored in depth in the game’s universe. With her bunny-witch appearance, Aurora combines a cute design with mystical depth, reflecting her connection with spirits and her ability to heal tormented entities. This originality is part of a development story that began six years ago and culminated in a character that, despite her origins in varied concepts and some challenges in her final design, captures the essence of a modern and spiritual witch.

The Champion caught my attention with her high mobility. Her skills, which combine agility and crowd control, are both attractive and versatile. The main problem I encountered, however, is her ultimate skill, Between Worlds, because it creates a visual saturation that makes it difficult to perceive what is happening on the battlefield. During battles, I found it difficult to keep track of where I was and what was going on, which can be a real drawback amidst all the chaos. And in terms of innovation, I don’t feel like it offers a particularly refreshing or immersive experience (aside from a somewhat unique concept); rather, it seems like a mix of skills from champions we’ve seen before.

If you want to play Aurora, you should know that she excels in team formations that can utilize her mobility and repositioning skills, and is devastating when used strategically. While her ultimate has remarkable competitive potential, allowing skilled players to create surprising moments and turn the tide of a match, she is also vulnerable to teams that can keep her at bay and control her with crowd control effects. In my experience, Aurora can shine in controlled situations, but her performance can be hampered in long-range compositions and against enemy combos.

Playing with Aurora is thus a dynamic experience, thanks to her agility that allows her to dodge and attack effectively. Her ultimate not only deals significant damage, but also controls the battlefield by slowing enemies down, making her ideal for team fights and applying pressure. With her mix of mobility, crowd control and damage, Aurora stands out as an intriguing champion for climbing the ranked ladder, fitting well into both mid/top and support roles, offering flexibility to players.

And that’s all for today’s first impressions: I enjoyed playing with Aurora, but I can’t help but wonder if League of Legends really needs so many champions. While Aurora has her merits, she does not offer any significant innovations that justify her addition to the game. It is an interesting addition in terms of the game’s lore and story, but in terms of gameplay, I feel it only exacerbates the feeling of gameplay saturation – a feeling I have experienced with this game over the past few years. I wonder if the time and resources spent developing new champions could not be better used to improve other aspects of the game.

And don’t get me wrong, I still enjoy returning to the game and playing a few matches from time to time, so if you like this content, we will continue to analyze new champions as soon as they are released. However, I can’t help but think about the current saturation and future of the game. It brings to mind Steve Jobs’ philosophy, which focused on simplicity above all else. Jobs believed that simplicity was not only about designing visually clean products, but also about streamlining the user experience by eliminating unnecessary features and focusing on what is essential. That’s what made Apple so great. After Steve left, we saw Apple expand into a multitude of models, which can be confusing and overwhelming for consumers. Not only that, but it becomes more challenging to keep each product at the highest level when you have to spread resources across so many, instead of focusing on just a few. League of Legends seems to be following a similar path: instead of maintaining a more refined and streamlined selection of champions, it keeps adding more and more, which can weaken the overall gameplay experience.

I don’t know about you, but I miss the early days 15 years ago when there were only 17 champions. Today there are 168. I’m not sure how much more they can innovate before quantity overwhelms quality. Perhaps instead of constantly adding more, it is better to focus on refining and balancing what we already have. Ultimately, only time will tell if this strategy of constantly adding new champions will continue to benefit the game or if it will eventually overwhelm it. I suppose it is the way of the world: quantity over quality. Maybe I’m getting old, but sometimes I long for simpler times.