After more than 20 hours, the title will be decided in the 2019 League of Legends Global Finals. Two e-sports teams FPX and G2, which reached the final for the first time, will compete for the trophy at the Accor Hotel Arena in Paris, France, and will also end the 2019 season of "League of Legends".
Compared with the previous two years, the "League of Legends" event has not been discussed so much in the industry in 2019. After all, the S competition was held in China in 2017, and they announced the start of allianceization in the same year. In 2018, the event entered the Jakarta Asian Games and became a performance event, marking that e-sports has been further recognized by the mainstream society. In contrast, no similar milestone has occurred since 2019.
But because of this, the development of the 2019 "League of Legends" event is more worthy of our observation - when there is no topic brought by more external forces, we have a better opportunity to judge the self-generating and independent survival ability of this event, which determines whether they can develop continuously and vigorously in the future.
still starts from the perspective of recorders. We have summarized the five observations of the 2019 "League of Legends" S9 event, which to a certain extent also indicates the future development direction of this e-sports event.
1. The number of audiences worldwide is still the largest, and its influence is still the first place in e-sports
From the data, the data on watching the game of "League of Legends" S9 is still good. According to data statistics from Esports Charts, if you do not count the audience in China, the first game of the S9 main competition, that is, the group stage between RNG and SKT, the highest number of viewers reached 2.04 million, 77% higher than last year; and in the semi-finals G2 against SKT, this number reached 3.99 million, which is the largest number of viewers in history. The match between
G2 and SKT broke the record for viewers of e-sports events (not counting Chinese audiences). Data source: Esports Charts
. In comparison, the DOTA TI event is 1.97 million, the Overwatch OWL playoff event is 320,000, and the National Cup event of PUBG is 470,000. It can be seen that the League of Legends event still has the largest number of viewers worldwide.
In China, the interest homepage of "League of Legends S9" on Weibo has generated 8.95 billion views and 2.895 million discussions. Although it is slightly worse than last year's 10.82 billion views and 4.471 million discussions, considering that the final has not yet been held, this number still has room for improvement. In addition, topics about events such as #doinb Stone Man#, #the shy and ning handshake# and #xiaotian mvp# have triggered considerable discussions on Weibo.
Last year, iG used a championship to help the League of Legends event create unprecedented discussion in China. This year, FPX is expected to use a champion to continue this popularity. As for sports events, nothing can be talked about by the people who are good at it.
2. The old and the old are alternating, and the effect of the "franchise" system is manifested. If we analyze it from the competition level, a highlight of S9 this year is the alternating between the old and the old. The teams and players who once dominated this event have begun to gradually retreat, and new forces are rising. Among the teams entering the quarterfinals on
S9, FPX from LPL and GRF and DWG from LCK are all new teams that have been established for less than 3 years, but they have contributed their outstanding performance in the competition.
's most surprising thing is FPX. This new team, which only joined the LPL in 2017, completed its transformation in two years. Not only did they win the championship in this summer, but they also overcome all obstacles after entering the S game, defeating strong teams such as FNC and iG all the way to reach the finals. It is hard to imagine that all the five starting players participated in the S game for the first time. All five players from
FPX participated in the S competition for the first time. (Photo/Yicun)
However, the regulars in the S competition in previous years have performed more or less in S9. The Korean team SKT T1, which once dominated the League of Legends competition, made a comeback this year, but eventually lost to the European team G2 and fell on the semi-finals stage. This is the worst record in the S game since their founding of the team, except for the two seasons of S4 and S8 that failed to participate in the competition.The team's top player Faker also suffered controversy among e-sports fans in the last game, and even saw hand trembling in the game.
In terms of performance in the division, the LEC and LPL teams maintained their strength last year, occupying three seats in the semi-finals. G2, who won this year's mid-season championship (MSI), went further than last year's results and reached the finals, while last year's champion iG unfortunately stopped in the semi-finals.
The reason is that the "franchise rights" system initiated by the alliance reform of the LPL and LEC areas has obviously played a certain role. After avoids the risk of club downgrade, it will not only attract more investors to join, but also enhance investors' confidence in increasing investment and affordable trial and error space. The joining of excellent investors has brought a more scientific club management methodology, and it also gives new players more room to play.
FPX entered the LPL through bidding after the LPL started its alliance reform in 2017, and reached the S final in two years. In addition, another TES e-sports club that won an LPL place through bidding at the end of 2017 also achieved good results in the fourth and third place in the spring season this year.
believes that as time goes by, the "franchise" system will allow more and more new forces to appear in the "League of Legends" event, continuously enhancing vitality for the event.
3. The business rights and interests of the event are more detailed. The LPL region performed outstandingly. In addition to the competition, both the event itself and the participating clubs have delivered good results in commercialization. There are three partners in the Chinese region of
S9, namely Mercedes-Benz, which has participated for many years, KFC, which joined last year, and Pudong Development Bank credit card, which once sponsored KPL. Like LPL, Mercedes-Benz appeared in front of people as the chief partner of China. In addition, OPPO, Mastercard and Aliens have become global partners in the event. This means that the official has made a more detailed division of the commercial rights and interests of the event and strived to maximize the commercial value.
In addition, the official also brought the luxury jewelry brand Louis Vuitton. Under Riot's partnership agreement with it, Louis Vuit will customize a trophy suitcase for the 2019 Global Finals to place the championship trophy, the Summoner’s Cup. In addition, League of Legends will work with Louis Vuitton's women's clothing art director Nicolas Ghesquière to design customized skins and other game equipment for the Global Finals.
luxury brand Louis Vuitton has also carried out brand cooperation with League of Legends.
At the club level, we can see that all teams participating in the S match have achieved more or less certain commercial results. Among them, the LPL team has the most outstanding commercialization results, with a total of 23 brands entering the market.
In terms of quantity, the old-fashioned RNG is the most popular among brands, attracting 13 brand sponsors. In addition to traditional 3C brands and live broadcast platforms, it also includes beverages, finance, automobiles and catering fields. After having 5 LPL sponsors in Xinke LPL, FPX also reached a cooperation with OPPO and Kuaishou after entering the S game.
is worth mentioning iG. They won the championship last year, but were subject to some controversy in commercialization because they had only three sponsors at that time, two of them were affiliated with the industry invested by their boss Wang Sicong, which made many marketing people feel sorry for it.
This year, it is obvious that iG has changed its thinking and attracted 7 sponsors to join, including well-known brands such as Meinand Chevrolet, which shows that it has put in some effort in commercialization. According to Lazy Bear Sports, after winning the S Championship last year, the signing price of iG clubs has risen, and the live broadcast has exceeded 8 digits, which is rare among current e-sports clubs.
4. Brands increase commercial rights activation, fast-moving consumer goods have become the main force
. On the other hand, brands have gradually realized the value of e-sports marketing and have begun to design marketing strategies in a targeted manner.
If brands realized last year that they needed to obtain more marketing scenarios by sponsoring clubs, then this year they obviously put a lot of effort into activate commercial rights and are more willing to spend a lot of effort to produce marketing content.
Mercedes-Benz is an old face in the League of Legends event, and their moves are also considered to be the representative of Volkswagen brands beginning to enter the e-sports industry. At this year's S competition, they not only sponsored the event and RNG clubs as in previous years, but also planned a cheering event with the theme of "Fearless Expedition", inviting former e-sports player mlxg and film and television actor Zhang Binbin to set off from Shanghai, passing through 7 cities, and finally arrived in Berlin, one of the hosts of the S competition. They record every bit of it and shoot documentaries in an attempt to establish emotional links with LPL fans and deepen brand connections with the League of Legends events.
At this year's LPL summer final, Mercedes-Benz, the chief partner, even drove the car to the competition stage.
and OPPO can be said to be a new player in the League of Legends event. Similar to vivo sponsoring KPL, they chose to focus on their mobile phone series OPPO Reno Ace in this marketing plan. This new product, which focuses on gaming phones, happened to be released in October this year. The target consumer group is naturally young people who love games, and when they step on the "League of Legends" mobile game to start reservations, it is obvious that they have made sufficient preparations at the marketing time point.
In addition, there are many brands such as KFC, Kuaishou, and Bixin Practice. They also carried out various marketing activities during the S game, intending to enhance the brand's popularity and reputation through the S game, the e-sports event.
At the same time, we can also see that among the mass brands entering the e-sports field, fast-moving consumer goods brands have become the main force. Among the 23 brands sponsoring LPL clubs, 5 are affiliated with fast-moving consumer goods brands, second only to the 6 brands of 3C brands. More and more practitioners of realize that e-sports, as the main force in front of the audience's screen, is very suitable for fast-moving consumer goods such as snacks and beverages to carry out marketing strategies.
It is worth mentioning that with the signing of a Nike contract with LPL, more and more sports clothing brands are gradually beginning to pay attention to this market. On S9, Li Ning became a GRF clothing sponsor and designed an exclusive team uniform for the latter. At the beginning of this year, Puma also signed a contract with C9 in the LCS competition area, becoming the club's official clothing and footwear equipment supplier.
5. Riot launched peripheral mobile games for the first time, and 4K technology introduced the broadcast of
for the first time. In this S competition, we also saw some things that can be called "innovation".
is broadcasting technology. At this S competition, Huya, one of the broadcasting platforms, announced that it has begun to try to use 4K technology to broadcast the "League of Legends" event, which is the first time in the global e-sports field.
Huya official said that through a series of technical means, they have used AI super-resolution processing and video encoding optimization of the official output 1080P video source, thereby increasing the resolution to 4K to give users a better experience.
, and what is more worthy of attention is obviously the official move. Just during the S game, at the 10th anniversary celebration of "League of Legends", Riot announced the launch of a number of new products, including the long-awaited "League of Legends" mobile game, "Legends of Runeterra" and "League of Legends Esports Manager".
"League of Legends" mobile game has been brewing for a long time. According to the official statement, mobile games will "restore classic operation and in-depth experience of PC games" and add many innovative methods to adapt to mobile operations. The duration of each game is estimated to be 15-18 minutes; "Legends of Runeterra" is the first strategy card game based on League of Legends IP in Riot Games. It adopts a turn-based system. In the same round, both offense and defense have the opportunity to play cards; and "League of Legends Esports Manager" is a business management mobile game, and players can form a professional team of "League of Legends" to "participate" various official events.
At the 10th anniversary celebration of League of Legends, the official announced a series of new product plans such as mobile games (photo/Yicun)
It is obvious that the launch of these new products is obviously Riot's official attempt to inject more fresh vitality into the IP of "League of Legends".But at present, it is still difficult for us to determine whether these products will be paid by the market and what impact will they have on the current e-sports ecosystem. What kind of future will these new products and technologies such as
bring to the "League of Legends" event also deserve our attention. In addition, according to the leaks from ESPN contributor Fionn on Twitter, Riot is considering holding the "League of Legends World Cup" with the country as the participating units. If the plan is finally completed, it will probably cause considerable changes to the current situation of the League of Legends event.
According to Lazy Bear Sports, the bidding for seats in the new year of the LPL region has been completed. If nothing unexpected happens, new teams will appear on the field in the spring next year, and the price they spend is a more expensive seat fee than last year.
S match will be held in China again next year. Whether this event can still trigger an unprecedented "national e-sports" frenzy like in 2017 is also a great expectation for China's e-sports for 2020.
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