Project L is one of the names that has aroused the most interest in the fighting game community. Behind him is Riot Games (League of Legends, Valorant) with what this implies at the level of size, long-term support and online structure. But little or nothing had been seen of the game so far, which the company has shown a Vertical Slice, a video with the game experience that is created to decide what it will look like. Although what is seen is promising, they already warn: “We will not launch the game in 2021 or 2022.”
Riot’s main goal, he explains Tom Cannon, Senior Director and Executive Producer of Project L, is to achieve “develop a fighting game of the highest quality possible so that you can dedicate yourself to it for years or decades.” Among the new features, we know that it will be a two-on-two team fighting game, that very easy-to-learn controls have been created and that one of their priorities will be “to create the best possible network code for a fighting game”. The rollback will be the base but they will add technology from Riot like RiotDirect, which does a great job “minimizing latency from League of Legends and Valorant.”
- Learn how rollback, the most acclaimed online system in the fighting genre, works in this article
The project, yes, is far from over. Right now he is in the stadium where the company has decided all the aspects of the title: basic experience of the game, controls, artistic direction … But others are missing such as the complete roster of champions, the scenarios, menus, the UI, system of rankings and more.
Two versus two and simplified controls
In the six-minute development video, the creators explain that they have decided to do a two-on-two fighting game because it offers rewards at the level of strategy and decision-making with the team (there will be assists as in games like FighterZ or Marvel vs Capcom ). They want it to be a high-paced, fantasy-fighting game, they literally say.
On the other hand, the decision on controls is explained as follows. The easy to control but difficult to master that so much is touted in most games of the genre returns to the scene here. They say they are aware that it is important to be able to go deep for hours to obtain mastery in the mastery of a character and that they consider that seeing pro players doing unique things is an inspiration for the rest of the players. No, “it will not be a game where new players can challenge the pro”, they clarify, but “a way to offer fun at all skill levels.”
Apparently in the videos, there will be three attack buttons, one special and one assist (two types per character). It remains to be seen how the simplicity of inputs –commands to carry out special attacks- with the high levels of the game, since this tends to be a general complaint in recent years in the genre.
Echo has been the chosen champion to show how they have established movements from their original game to Project L, in their case, the Chrono Strike, which allows you to generate a previous image of yours where we can return in the following seconds, offering varied mixups (for example, attack from the air, do cross-up to go to the other side and, when returning to the previous image, press again from that point, as seen in the video).
Riot Games has pledged to share at least twice during 2022 game news. So we have to wait for early second half of 2022.
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