Competition is good for business, they say. Long before its official release, Riot’s mobile MOBA Wild Rift already shows its impact on established mobile MOBAs like Mobile Legends and Arena of Valor. Ever since the official announcement at their 10th anniversary back in October 2019, Wild Rift seems to grow as a threat the closer we get to its launch.
Wild Rift – the Sword of Damocles?
While players were complaining about several issues before, now they have the prospect of playing a different game that (for now) obviously doesn’t share the same drawbacks. On forums such as Reddit, you’ll see an increasing amount of frustrated posts about game mechanics and balancing, now accompanied by (idle) threats to swap to WR.
The amount of true damage in this game is ridiculous. […] Where the heck is Wild Rift?
Sample Reddit post in the Mobile Legends sub
And even though not all players have the same mentality, those who genuinely enjoy the game also have their doubts on how Wild Rift’s impact on existing MOBA will play out.
Is Wild Rift’s impact solely bad for mobile MOBAs?
So, one part of the player base is complaining, the other one is afraid their beloved MOBA might die. But to be fair, most players probably don’t even care that much. In the end, we’re playing for fun and entertainment and many don’t exclude the possibility of simply playing more than one MOBA.
Also, both Moonton and Tencent took action since the announcement of Wild Rift: Moonton came up with several events where players could claim heroes and skins for free and they also brought huge gameplay and visual update just a couple of weeks after Riot’s anniversary stream.
At the same time, Tencent started the support of Arena of Valor again. They decided to drop it back in spring 2019 since AoV wasn’t as successful in the west as its Chinese pendant. Now, they provide consistent updates and developer letters to the player base every week.
And although we don’t know what the future will hold for neither the existing MOBAs nor for Wild Rift, its impact definitely did them good already. Also, Wild Rift will not be the perfect game. Many (frustrated) players seem to assume that just because it’s a Riot game, WR will be flawless. But its big brother League of Legends is facing similar balancing issues as well as tilted players.
Balancing MOBAs has always been a challenge. The games have too much complexity and variety to be a 100% fair. That’s fine and it’s also what keeps players engage.
So, which MOBA are you going to play? Will you stick to AoV, Marvel Super War or ML? Or are you going to swap to Wild Rift? Drop us your answer in the comment section down below.
Obviously the odd goes to wild rift..the copycat keep follow its shadow..never been original
Lets hope for the best! 🙂
Im ditching aov so hard when WR gets realeased, Im tired of those developers giving af about balance, all they want is money, now to buy a heroe you have to play for like 2 months to be able to save enough money. Go rito go! I know ur the chosen one for mobile mobas.
Hopefully, we won’t find the minor issues like p2w elements, balance fixes etc in LoL WR.
Well…I’ve been a MLBB player for almost 3 years now, and I have to say that the game is absolutely beautiful, compared to other MOBA games. I have tried pretty much all MOBAs on the play store, including VainGlory, as well as other titles, and I’m still enjoying Mobile Legends better.
With that being said, I think I will give Wild Rift a try, but might not switch unless I find a much better game.
This post has not aged well. On average, WR has a daily population of only 15,000 to 80,000 players while its unoriginal lite version (MLBB) has an average daily population of 30,000 to 300,000 players. The problem with WR is its big brother is its biggest enemy. Riot should have made WR with a much faster pace and a fresh new look (different map design, original game modes fit for mobile), instead, what Riot did is a lite version of League. A lot of fans of the original would rather stay and invest their time on the PC version rather… Read more »