If you play League of Legends and have roughly $450 burning a hole in your pocket then rejoice, then boy does developer Riot Games have the bundles for you. The new cosmetics in question are themed to LoL esports player Lee Sang-hyeok, better known as Faker, and even in a world of ludicrous microtransactions, players are unable to explain the ridiculous prices of these bundles.
The bundle is part of a celebration Riot is calling the Hall of Legends. It is essentially the League of Legends Hall of Fame, and Faker is the inaugural inductee. To coincide with this, a celebratory collection of in-game bundles are being offered—three in total—each one costing more than the next. The cheapest starts at 5430 RP, which correlates to roughly $40, and among its contents are an Ahri skin and a Hall of Legends pass. (The latter is a special battle pass to unlock more Faker-themed content.) The second, the Immortalized bundle, unlocks another skin and more special cosmetics and costs players 32,430 RP. That’s roughly $250!
But the final bundle is truly astounding. Coming in at 59,260, or about $450, the Signature bundle includes everything from the Immortalized bundle, alongside an upgrade to the signature Ahri skin that unlocks Faker’s signature move and structure finisher, the “Final Boss Faker” title, banners, splash art, and a handful of other items. None of which, of course, make any material difference to how you play the game.
For context, you could buy an Xbox Series S for less money than you’d lose to purchase the Signature bundle for the Faker celebration.
The community response is pretty unanimously disgusted by the bundle. What should be a celebration of the game’s best and perhaps most famous player—a person who has been the face of LoL esports—has been turned into a chance to extract obscene amounts of money from devoted players, whales, and fans. I’d argue it also goes completely against Faker’s identity as a LoL player. Beyond his incredible talent in competitive play, Faker has long been known for not using cosmetic skins when playing.
Despite Riot pulling in a lot of money through skins, seeing the best player in the world use the base skins is a reminder to players that they don’t give any advantages, and their only value is if you just really like the look.
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