It has come to my attention that apparently, 2XKO is dead. No, no, no, what I meant is that there will be no more content and is ceasing active development in December with the intention of leaving the servers online indefinetely. There's a lot to talk about, so... *sigh* let's jump right in...
I'm back with a brand new post that has some bad and heartbreaking news. So, with Marvel Tokon and SEGA vs. Capcom: The Next Level out, everyone's been pushing for them to recieve support for years to come, including Riot Games' League of Legends fighting game, 2XKO.
At the beginning, it was Project L, until years later, it was renamed to 2XKO. During the first Alpha Lab, feedback went all over the place. The second Alpha Lab came in to be a smaller playtest. Closed Beta opened the gates to giving anyone the the game. Early Access made the game downloadable. After the game launched on console, the half of the 2XKO team laid off and we got news that Akali and Senna are confirmed. The Climb became fun to play. I did a couple of rounds. It is kind of akin to MultiVersus' Rifts system.
Early buzz was established when the game came out on console, but that is not enough to establish insufficient player engagement, so half of the team was laid off. I have been waiting for Season 3 news and guess what? The news popped up stating that 2XKO is going to cease active development in December after one year since launch, but servers will remain online for the foreseeable future.
*sigh* Great, just great. Look, instead of getting angry, I gotta stay in a Buena Vista mood while monologuing about how very disappointed I am about this.
So, the game launched on consoles in January 20th. Weeks later, half of the 2XKO team was laid off. The article stated that they couldn't sustain player engagement. They evaluated the game's player base, not just revenue. Despite major updates and rave reviews, the player base remains flat and couldn't reach enough players to have sufficient player engagement. That explains why the Duo Finder took too long to find me a partner. When I said that... if a game, like, I don't know, Skullgirls could continue active development despite challenges, then anything was possible, I didn't mean 2XKO should cease active development despite rave reviews.
Other than Vi and Jinx in their Arcane model, Riot ceasing active development on 2XKO comes with them bringing League of Legends characters to Fortnite to be used as skins, starting with Ahri. Literally, just one year after launch. There are literally just a lot of characters just begging to be in the roster. Lee Sin, Miss Fortune, Ezreal, Gangplank, Leona, whomever you can think of. But that will never happen because the characters I mentioned are likely to be used as skins in Fortnite. Even Diaphone is quitting his job to play this game in light of the news and I don't even blame him. The console sneak peek video has made 9.8 million views on YouTube. This should've reflected as player engagement.
And Marvel Rivals has 16.8K viewers. It is not as overkill as Overwatch, but nonetheless, 16.8K viewers is a good amount if you ask me.
If we compare a game's player retention to let's say looking at a fictional woman's legs, Overwatch's player retention is looking at Emma Frost's legs, and 2XKO's player retention is looking at... Palamena's legs. It's one of the perfect side-by-side comparisons of brilliant execution and humiliating failure. Blizzard has literally nailed the grand slam with Overwatch. They kept the game free-to-play after dropping the 2 from the title. This actually exposed the main reason why 2XKO flopped because Riot relied on profit-driven choices and metrics over the community according to Ludwig's words.
Blizzard has listened to the community during Overwatch's active development and they intend to make it the best it can be for the community. I thought that 2XKO has changed everything that it is on par with the Alpha Lab playtests, but I was apparently wrong. This posed an issue with modern fighting games. The PC versions of them have performance issues and they have launch snags like Avatar Legends: The Fighting Game's missing Ranked and Switch performance issues and the PC version of Marvel Tokon having the Sony DRM that is the source of backlash.
Final SEGA side:
Ahri
Blitzcrank
Caitlyn
Ekko
Jinx
Samira
Teemo
Vi
Yasuo
Final Capcom side:
Akali
Braum
Darius
Illaoi
Lux
Senna
Thresh
Warwick
Final key points:
Ahri on the SEGA side = NiGHTS
Blitzcrank on the SEGA side = Vectorman
Caitlyn on the SEGA side = Gain Ground
Ekko on the SEGA side = Pulseman
Jinx on the SEGA side = Jet Set Radio
Samira on the SEGA side = Valkyria Chronicles
Vi on the SEGA side = Jet Set Radio
Yasuo on the SEGA side = Blood Will Tell: Tezuka Osamu's Dororo
Akali on the Capcom side = Power Stone
Darius on the Capcom side = Knights of the Round
Lux on the Capcom side = Star Gladiator
Senna on the Capcom side = Devil May Cry
Thresh on the Capcom side = Ghosts n' Goblins
Warwick on the Capcom side = Darkstalkers
Here are the final standings for the SEGA and Capcom sides and the key points. All of this have been finalized as 2XKO is going to cease active development in December because of the fact that the game couldn't have a sufficient player engagement. It has been a Maggie and the Ferocious Beast mess of things that weren't even half-baked because 2XKO not having a sufficient player engagement contributes to sunsetting active development despite early buzz. It has been the end of the road for what could've been a phenomenal League of Legends fighting game. For that, I am deleting the post that talks about the wanted future characters and mentions about it on certain posts, unfollowing their X account the moment active development is ceased and suspend myself from playing 2XKO until further notice like how Sony paused posting on X after they announced that they are killing discs in 2028.
My condolences and I'm sorry to the team that struggled to maintain player engagement of this game they pour their hearts and souls into and to Diaphone quitting his job. It sucks to end like this. I wish them the best of luck finding ways to come back stronger for their next game. I have a follow up post where I pinpoint the problems that caused 2XKO to have a low player engagement at launch and what solutions that should've had been done. If the post is up, you can click the link below.
-Post coming soon-
While I am disappointed that 2XKO is ending active development in December due to poor retention after a year since launch, there is one fighting game I am still getting when I get my refund, Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls. Marvel Tokon is going to get future content for years to come and that's a good thing. Do you know what else I'm getting? SEGA vs. Capcom: The Next Level. Like Marvel Tokon, SEGA vs. Capcom is also getting future content for years to come since 4CYDE Studios has straight up confirmed a bevy of characters to be in the roster like NiGHTS, Ulala, Ristar and Falcon, character themes to drop in Season 2 and literally everything else. You can click the link to the post where I did a deep dive into the situation.
https://rpggameroom.blogspot.com/2026/07/new-sega-vs-capcom-info-revealed.html
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