2XKO: What We Know So Far - Characters, Gameplay and More

In mid-2019, Riot Games' newest venture was announced, based within the League of Legends universe, Project L - Now, officially called 2XKO, the title promises to revolutionize the fighting game genre.

After releasing some teasers and during the biggest fighting game tournament in the world, EVO, Riot released a demo where it was possible to confirm some interesting characters and gameplay aspects.

Characters

Betting on the emblematic characters of its League of Legends franchise, Riot Games has so far shown the following characters:

Darius

Ahri

Ekko

Yasuo

Illaoi

In addition to them, Katarina and Jinx were confirmed.

Only a few fighters were shown in the demo, namely: Darius, Ekko, Yasuo and Ahri, much of what the characters are in their original title was respected, maintaining their iconic characteristics and movements, so far, being a great reading of the MOBA's mechanics to the fighting games, the other characters were previewed in teasers released by Riot.

Game Mode

2XKO will be a Tag Fight, being 2x2 with a single player controlling two characters that can be alternated during the match and used as assistance, extending combos and stopping enemy attacks. In addition, it is possible to have four simultaneous players in a match, with each player controlling their respective character.

Tag Fighters are a very popular style of fighting games. Historically, titles like Marvel vs Capcom were and continue to be hugely successful, being played to this day in their classic or updated versions. Perhaps this will make it easier for the League of Legends audience to migrate to fighting games, and a tool for those who don't yet know League of Legends' universe to try out the MOBA.

Official Name

In February 2024, the official name of Project L was announced, with the previous one being a provisional name for the title.

The official name, 2XKO, did not please many who are anxiously following the launch, some players preferred the previous name, with the argument that the current and official name would sound strange in regions outside the United States, and that even in English-speaking countries, the title sounds generic and unnecessarily complicated.

The game's producers have already emphasized, on more than one occasion, the desire for an open channel with the community, but due to legal developments, it may be too late to change the name once more.

Cannon Factor

The brothers Tom and Tony Cannon are two of the biggest names in fighting games, being founders of the Evolution Championship Series, EVO, the biggest fighting game tournament in the world that has honored legends like Daigo “the beast ” Umehara, Sonic Fox and Xiao Hai and also developers of Rollback netcode, a feature which helped improve the amount of lag between online players, allowing people from different regions of the world to play together, with a significant reduction in problems caused by distance.

With the brothers leading the project, we can see that Riot Games is sparing no effort to bring a title that will make a difference in the market. Together with the servers already established by the company around the world and the development of technology for better connectivity between players, 2XKO can revolutionize the way players interact with each other, as well as a better platform for ranked matches with no need for out-of-the-game engines.

Aside from mechanics and connectivity, we can expect attention to the competitive circuit, where the company has already demonstrated its work in other titles, such as Valorant and League of Legends. Nothing about it was disclosed, but considering Riot's history, the founding of its own leagues and rankings for the game would not be unusual, just as it is in the company's other titles, which have very robust competitive circuits with thousands of active players.

Gameplay

According to Riot, 2XKO focuses on being a game with simple commands, but with a large learning curve, being equally attractive to those who are starting out in the world of fighting games and to the more experienced and long-time audience of the genre, where even though they are familiar with the controls, they will have to adapt to the gameplay of each chosen character.

Cost and Platforms

2XKO will be free-to-play, like all other competitive games from Riot Games, a critical point in the game's development as this will be a huge differentiator, given that many titles in the fighting genre are steep at release.

Riot's bet to enter the fighting games market could be a great gateway for several new players. In addition to PC, the platforms confirmed so far are: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and Series S.

According to Tom Cannon in a video released on 2XKO's official channels in February 2024, much of the game still has to be produced and perfected, so we shouldn't expect a release (or, perhaps, even a release date) until 2025.

Are you excited to try 2XKO? What are your bets for possible League of Legends characters that could show up as available fighters?

Leave your impressions in the comments, and thanks for reading!