According to the game director of 2XKO, Shaun Rivera, we are gonna see several new Champions get released in a year. Following Teemo and Warwick's release in Season 0, each year will come with five Seasons starting in 2026 and beyond. Each Season will have a new Champion after announcing that Season 0 would introduce Teemo as the tenth Champion and even Warwick as the eleventh Champion and we're gonna see five new Champions per year. This is good news for us in the 2XKO community that we are seeing more Champions make their way into the game.
I'm back with another 2XKO post that has some great news. So, if you played League of Legends or watched Arcane, chances are, there are numerous Champions in League of Legends and Arcane just begging to be in 2XKO. Well, it seems this might be exactly what is coming on the docket. If you watched the Early Access announcement video, Shaun Rivera has announced that they are planning a cadence of releasing five new Champions per year, starting in early 2026 after unveiling Teemo as the tenth character in Season 0 during Early Access. But Teemo wasn't the only Champ, but Warwick as well, the eleventh Champ and the fourth Arcane character.
This is generally in response to the criticism surrounding a 2v2 tag-oriented fighting game having a small roster when others use a larger roster, especially to the competitive scene. Now this is League of Legends we're talking about. The game has over 170 Champions and there are a lot of them. But it turns out that 2XKO wasn't the only thing that has a small roster being a source of criticism, but Skullgirls as well, the fighting game that started out with eight base characters where there are tag battles, but expanded the roster to the number of characters we have today.
Early Access saw Teemo and Warwick expanding the roster to 11 characters at launch. What this means is that 2026 will expand the roster to 16 characters while 2027 will expand the roster to 21 characters and so on and so forth. That's a little more than enough to address the criticism.
See, the industry is in a bit of a pivot. Microtransactions became a continuous point of contention and the source of criticism when it comes to grinding, especially on the PS5 and Xbox Series X generation. That lead to officials from across the globe making calls to push the game industry to regulate microtransactions. In some cases, they became predatory and players were pressured to pay money for premium currency after removing the core currency when it comes to progressing and that alienated a LOT of players and I mean a LOT. That's exactly how MultiVersus failed during full release and why people are favoring indie games over AAA because of innovation, low pricing, freedom indie game developers have and light monetization on free-to-play games like Brawlhalla.
League of Legends as a whole became the most popular MOBA with its ever-expanding roster of characters and there are a lot of them just begging for a chance to get an adaptation to 2XKO and they will always have a chance for an adaptation to the fighting game genre. And they adapted eleven characters from the MOBA into a fighting game so far. I need to explain on how they can be able to adapt characters from League of Legends to 2XKO.
Now, the first thing to do when it comes to adapting MOBA characters into fighting game characters is to start with DNA as always. The acronym consists of design, narrative and art teams. The three teams decide how Champs in the MOBA are going to play and look like in a fighting game. They have to look at what sides they haven't explored yet and what fighting game archetypes they can fit and what aesthetics or mechanics are missing from their current roster. Once DNA is decided, concept can go in and develop a costume that highlights their planned moveset in a fighting game. Once the concept they really like is found, it comes together very nicely and the character from the MOBA was adapted well into a fighting game.
This resulted in Teemo being well-adapted into 2XKO to have innovations in the fighting game genre like swinging his blowdart, camouflaging, putting in a patch of grass and being able to shoot his fire-imbued projectile from his slingshot to set the grass on fire when he earned his slingshot badge fair enough. However, Teemo is not the only character that launched in Early Access, but Warwick as well, the desired fourth Arcane character, who was also well-adapted into 2XKO to receive innovations in the fighting game genre like having a character-specific resource called Bloodlust. It grants him cancel options and EX special moves when the Bloodlust gauge is full. I'll tell you why I wanted a fourth Arcane character like Warwick to be in 2XKO later on.
I know that you are trying to think that I am going think that Teemo is fun to play against in 2XKO, but I'm gonna have to complain that Teemo is so annoying to play against because he's a trap character and trap characters are annoying to deal with, like zoners like Jinx and grapplers like Blitzcrank. The Teemo trailer was praised by fighting game players, but it frustrated League players. Warwick is pretty much relatively decent. He became fun to play as and to play against. I praised the way he is having cancel options and EX special moves during his Bloodlust feature. The Warwick trailer is also praised about his moveset.
Now, I want to do something creative. 2XKO's gameplay nearly resembles SEGA vs. Capcom in terms of being a tag fighter. Instead of me telling you, let's take a look at the Champ select screen. Its placement comes in two sides, so I will be imagining the left side as the SEGA side and the right side as the Capcom side. Now, before I begin, this is simply my imagination, but at least hear me out.
Right off the hop, I will be taking the old Champ select screen from Alpha Lab 1. This has an even number of characters and they are the ones that are unlocked by default. Now, on to the imagining.
Now, Yasuo, Ekko and Braum are on the SEGA side while Illaoi, Darius and Ahri are on the Capcom side.
Let's take a look at the updated Champ select screen first seen in Alpha Lab 2. Ahri, Braum, Ekko, Jinx and Yasuo are on the SEGA side while Blitzcrank, Darius, Illaoi and Vi are on the Capcom side.
Now here's the Champ select screen that remained pretty much the same in Early Access, but now we got two new characters, Teemo and Warwick, on the Capcom side and the Champ select theme got a revamp in Early Access and will stay that way on the game's full launch. Vi was on the Capcom side. And now, she's on the SEGA side with other Arcane characters while Warwick is the only Arcane character on the Capcom side. We now have Ahri, Braum, Ekko, Jinx, Vi and Yasuo on the SEGA side and Blitzcrank, Darius, Illaoi, Teemo and Warwick on the Capcom side for now. Remained uneven, but we'll highly likely get a 12th Champion in Season 1.
Before we start listing and breaking down several Champions in my wish list, we must go back to the explanation for a second and look at the piece of information. "They have to look at what sides they haven't explored yet and what fighting game archetypes they can fit and what aesthetics or mechanics are missing from their current roster". Now, this is the only thing I need you to focus on. What this means Champs in the current roster have mechanics and aesthetics in their abilities that aren't seen in League of Legends. There is one following thing that applies to this to get out of the way.
Teemo can put patches of grass and set them on fire with his fire shot from his slingshot in 2XKO, but not in League of Legends, making this a 2XKO-exclusive mechanic. What this means is that Champs that were adapted into 2XKO will have innovations that are "fighting game genre-exclusive". Darius' Ultimate in League of Legends, Noxian Guillotine, received innovations in 2XKO with the same name. I call it a fighting game genre-exclusive innovation. Now, this is a firm term as it's basically coined to explain how characters from SEGA and Capcom's non-fighting game IPs were adapted into the fighting game environment.
First off, a character from the MOBA setting, in this case, would be Teemo, summons traps and improves them in fighting game setting, but not in a MOBA setting, so Teemo summons patches of grass and sets them on fire in 2XKO, but he doesn't do that in League of Legends as he's a ranged character. Another example of defining fighting game genre-exclusive innovation is obvious. A character from the MOBA has a unique resource in a fighting game setting, but they don't have that in a MOBA setting. Perfect example would be Warwick, so Warwick has Bloodlust, a character-specific resource that grants him EX special moves and cancel options in 2XKO, but not in League of Legends. I'm not saying that certain characters won't be well-adapted into fighting games, but they will get well-adapted into the fighting game environment guaranteed.
Now, this may be an obvious statement, but in reality, especially when it comes to fighting games that don't have characters they wished for, it isn't really obvious. When you go online, whether it's social media or message boards or literally anywhere, you would get people saying, "Oh, Riot needs to put this Champion in 2XKO!" or, "Why Riot doesn't ever bring this Champion to 2XKO?!" and, "I need Riot to give us this Champion, right now!".
But Riot has deconfirmed none of the Champs in League of Legends and Arcane to be in 2XKO. That's why I call it the Marvel vs. Capcom 3 effect, because many people thought that certain Champions will never be adapted into 2XKO, hence why people are like, "Why didn't Riot ever give us the this Champ?!". But in reality, since the five Champs per year cadence is being planned, starting in early 2026, many Champs will always have a guaranteed chance to be in 2XKO with fighting game genre-exclusive innovations to their kit.
So that means Rivera announced that numerous characters in League of Legends and Arcane will always get a guaranteed adaptation into 2XKO, including support characters and characters that wield projectiles. They can develop characters from the ground up and adapt MOBA characters into fighting characters instead of copying and pasting the characters from the MOBA because both games have their own development teams.
Now, Warwick is confirmed to be the fourth Arcane character to come to 2XKO for four reasons.
Firstly is Arcane's lore. Vander became Warwick and this one is canon enough to seal the deal that Warwick is the fourth Arcane character to come to 2XKO. However, while he became Warwick, Vander remained loyal to Vi and Jinx, which Arcane centers around. Oh and there's also a synergy about Vi and Jinx being great duos. If Warwick teams up with either one of his daughters, the synergy would be created and that is canon.
Secondly, the trilogy of invite-only play windows saw the introduction certain matches. Alpha Lab 1 introduced all-male matches, Alpha Lab 2 introduced Ionia vs. Zaun mathes, Closed Beta saw all-female matches and Early Access will introduce all-Arcane character matches.
Thirdly, a padding that we had with Riot is that they like to release one Arcane character on each phase. Alpha Lab 1 introduced Ekko, Alpha Lab 2 introduced Jinx, Closed Beta introduced Vi, and Early Access will introduce Warwick. Once the game is fully launched, we can be able to expect the fifth Arcane character.
And fourthly, the Starter Pack contains Arcane skins for Ekko, Jinx and Vi, and Warwick has one as well, but through grinding the Battle Pass in its Ultra tier. What this means is that future Arcane characters that make it to 2XKO will get an Arcane skin.
I know I don't play League of Legends and watched Arcane, but I want to focus on Champions that are well known into League of Legends' competitive meta as they would be catering to being popular and frequent picks in the competitive scene depending on the patch or Champions that have aesthetics or mechanics that are missing from the current roster in 2XKO. I ignored Champions that are in 2XKO being picked frequently in competitive League of Legends and Champions that have existing aesthetics or mechanics.
That being said, I have a lot of Champions in my wish list, but I am going to list and highlight Champions that are popular examples of the Marvel vs. Capcom 3 effect. I have the ones that are featured in Arcane will have an asterisk that if any of the Arcane characters make it to 2XKO, they will come with an Arcane skin. I may have the majority of Champions being humans, but this is what I want overall.
Miss Fortune
In League of Legends, our red-haired female pirate of Bilgewater wields her dual pistols. I believe that playstyle can work like that in 2XKO, meaning that if she makes it into the game, she would be a rushdown character and play like Noel Vermillion from BlazBlue and Star-Lord in Marvel Tokon. Most notably, shooting down bullets to the ground vertically while in mid-air with ↓+S2. However, her lore page is not on there and was temporarily replaced with a 404 error screen.
Caitlyn Kiramman*
The member of the noble Kiramman family and Vi's best friend in Piltover is one of the characters that wields her rifle and is featured in Arcane. Her low normals would involve using her fists while her mid and high normals can involve swinging her rifle and she would have fighting game-exclusive innovations to her kit like Hextech grenades and mines in her arsenal to deem her playstyle similar to Erron Black from Mortal Kombat and/or Black Dahlia from Skullgirls. I genuinely would love to see Piltover's sheriff make her way into 2XKO in any way, shape or form and she can be a decent Champion to play. Oh and she's likely to be the fifth Arcane character to have her Arcane skin since Ekko is the first, Jinx is the second, Vi is the third and Warwick is the fourth.
Jayce*
Now this is one of the characters that can be the most interesting out of the other Champs and is yet another Arcane character. Jayce is a hammer-wielding Champion. He can stun enemies with his hammer and I believe that his hammer attacks would be perfect for 2XKO. Sure, I know Jinx has a hammer, but Jayce would be a totally different story that he would use his hammer in most of his moveset. If Jayce comes to 2XKO, he'll come with an Arcane skin.
Xin Zhao
It comes to my attention that 2XKO never had a Demacia Champion and Xin Zhao is one of the Demacia Champions. I would like to see our spear-wielding warrior of Demacia make his way and his spear attacks are adequate enough to be in 2XKO. There are several characters in fighting games that use a spear and Xin Zhao can take the playstyle from one of the spear-wielding characters in fighting games.
Katarina
During the game's earlier stage of development when it was Project L, Katarina was sadly cut from the game in its earlier stage. That's why the devs had to go back to the drawing board and retool it. She is one of the characters I wanted as a launch character, but since Teemo and Warwick have taken the spot, she's highly likely to be the first post-launch Champion and the 12th Champion because 2XKO's Wikipedia page has been updated to have her name listed on the list of current characters. This seals the deal that Katarina is guaranteed to be the 12th (and first post-launch) 2XKO champion and she deserved to be on my wish list. And she can be a decent Champion to play.
Akali
Another interesting Champion. Akali is the rogue assassin and she bears great mobility like any Assassin in League of Legends. She can throw shurikens and kunais and create a shroud of black mist. According to her kit, Akali would be great Champion to come to 2XKO. And there is one user I came across who also wanted Akali in the game by having a username titled "Akali One Trick". In a nutshell, Yasuo is the samurai of the wind and there's a ninja of the twilight shroud.
Mel Medarda*
Mel is a Noxian like Darius, Katarina and other Noxians. She is featured in Arcane while the show takes place in Piltover and Zaun. Mel would make a great addition to 2XKO. One of her abilities involved summoning an eclipse surrounding her enemies and that would be her Ultimate. If she does make it to 2XKO, she can a somewhat similar playstyle to Dr. Strange in Marvel vs. Capcom 3 and can have an Arcane skin. In a way, I genuinely would love to see the Noxian mage make it to 2XKO.
Rumble:
Another Yordle of Bandle City, Rumble has a great arsenal of missles, harpoons and a flame thrower in his mech. We got Teemo as the first Yordle to come to 2XKO, so I like to see another one. In fact, in League of Legends, Rumble never wields his spiky ball and he will be when he gets into 2XKO, meaning that he can have the same playstyle as Tron Bonne from Mega Man Legends in Marvel vs. Capcom 2. That's one example on how characters in the MOBA are adapted into fighting game genre.
Ambessa Medarda*
Now, Ambessa might be the next interesting Champion to talk about. Like Mel, daughter of the Medarda family, Ambessa is a Noxian and also one of the characters featured in Arcane. She wields her twin drakehounds and uses them in her kit. After looking at her kit, I would love to see Ambessa make her debut to 2XKO. Her gameplay in League of Legends is fun to experience. And she is featured in Arcane and she retains her twin drakehounds in the show. That's what driven me to put her in this list highlighting the Champs I want for 2XKO. Not only that. She can come with an Arcane skin if she makes her debut to 2XKO.
Sona
Sona is a healer in League of Legends and she is imbued with the power of music in her instrument. If Sona makes it into 2XKO, her instrument can be innovated into something that fits in the fighting game genre and have innovative healing powers that accelerate her gray health healing and I believe that it can fit into the fighting game environment. And that's the point of bringing Champs to 2XKO with innovative abilities exclusive to the fighting game environment.
Lee Sin
Here is another most interesting Champ to highlight. We need to keep this one. Lee Sin is a martial artist in Ionia. He is one of the Champs I want to 2XKO and he can definetely fit into the fighting game genre. Think of martial artists in fighting games like Marshall Law from Tekken, Fei Long from Street Fighter, and Liu Kang from Mortal Kombat. I believe that Lee Sin is gonna be adapted well into 2XKO to have the same playstyle from the mentioned characters.
Nidalee
One of Ixtal's Champs that we need to keep as well. Nidalee transforms into a cougar and throws her javelin in League of Legends. And it's possible to innovate that in 2XKO, meaning she can swing her javelin in all of her normals, but can still throw her javelin using S1 and can transform into a cougar using ↓+S2. Think of Valkenhayn from BlazBlue; he transforms into a wolf in a fighting game. That said, Nidalee is gonna fit well in the fighting game environment in any way, shape or form.
Kennen
Any of the eagle-eyed fans has spotted someone in the background of Bandlewood Crossing in the trailer and that's another Yordle coming to 2XKO, and that's Kennen. Weirdly enough, Kennen could be a decent Champion to play overall and a less annoying Yordle to play against than Teemo. Since Riot has confirmed that no Champion is deconfirmed yet, this means that Kennen will have a guaranteed chance of receiving an adaptation into the fighting game setting, along with others I have listed above, and that's something we can look forward to.
*Champion featured in Arcane and may come with a skin inspired by Arcane.
These are the Champions in my wish list that will always have a chance to be in 2XKO and they are likely guaranteed. In fact, these are the ones that are not only guaranteed, but can bring aesthetics and mechanics that are currently missing in 2XKO. So that means Nidalee, Kennen and even Sona will have more of a chance to be adapted into 2XKO to receive innovations exclusive in the fighting game genre because adapting a character from a MOBA to a fighting game comes with innovations introduced in their abilities.
In case if you're unaware, 2XKO is now available to download for free for everyone on PC for now, but consoles will join as well, hopefully this year because they're aiming towards releasing the game on PC and console this year and they're now focusing on the work that it takes to shift from the console betas from the Alpha Lab playtests to being a full-featured game. If you haven't downloaded it yet, I suggest that you do so.
No comments:
Post a Comment