Riot will finally self-publish League of Legends in Southeast Asia
Riot Games announced that it will self-publish League of Legends and Teamfight Tactics in Southeast Asia starting on January 2023. The announcement signals the end of the company’s 12-year partnership with Garena.
In an announcement posted on its official site, Riot stated that the move to self-publish League and TFT will ensure that Southeast Asian players will have the “same experience” as players in other regions.
Even as they end their partnership, Riot acknowledged that Garena has been “instrumental” in growing League‘s community in the region and that they were thankful for the partnership. That said, the company stated that, with their growth and expansion into a “multi-game studio,” Riot needs t focus more on serving players around the world, especially in the Asia-Pacific regions.
The company also pointed out that it was already self-publishing a number of its own titles including Valorant, Legends of Runeterra, and the mobile spin-off title League of Legends: Wild Rift. While it wasn’t mentioned, the announcement likely means that Riot’s upcoming fighting game—codenamed Project L—will also be self-published. (Read: Riot’s “Project L” is an assist-based League of Legends fighting game similar to Marvel vs. Capcom)
As part of the announcement, Riot stated that their new structure will see them establish new local offices in key countries in Southeast Asia, such as Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines. This is on top of expanding their efforts in countries like Japan and India where they already publish in.
What Riot self-publishing League means for existing players
As for existing players, Riot confirmed that they would need to transition their accounts from Garena’s service to Riot’s own. Both companies are working closely on an account migration process that’s expected to open for all on November 18, 2022.
Players’ summoner name, cosmetic content, loot inventory, RP purchases, champion mastery, eternals, levels and friends list will be carried over from Garena to Riot.
As part of the transition process, players will receive a special welcome gift from the company consisting of a suite of in-game rewards. The announcement also stated that players who migrate early may receive more welcome rewards and participate in more welcoming events. Meanwhile, Riot also warned that those who fail to transition their accounts before December 31, 2022 may lose their data and would not be eligible for any compensation.
Garena servers for League and TFT will go down sometime next year. To compensate, Riot will be launching new servers for these games across key Southeast Asian markets in January 2023.
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