League of Legends stats: 1.4m players daily

Over 15 million LoL accounts have been registered, developer Riot Games has revealed, with 1.4 million playing every day and peak concurrency of 500,000.

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To celebrate the end of League of Legends' first competitive season, developer Riot Games has released a few statistics on the free-to-play's game player base. Over 15 million accounts have been registered since it launches in October 2010, with an average of 1.4 million playing every day and a peak of 500,000 playing at the same time.

Over a million rounds of LoL are played every day, mostly 5v5. 3.7 million hours are spent in-game each day; as the average LoL match is hardly hours long, presumably a lot of chatting and lollygagging are going on.

Then there's over six million page views per day on the official website, nearly 100 million Youtube views, and numbers, numbers, numbers. Unfortunately, Riot offers no numbers on how many actually pay for premium perks and actually support the game financially.

"We are extremely proud and appreciative of the devoted League of Legends community which has grown substantially over the last year and a half," Riot CEO Brandon Beck said in today's announcement.

"We're committed to continuing to match their dedication with our relentless focus on ongoing enhancements to the player experience with great new features, content, and polish - and we have some very exciting surprises in store just around the corner."

League of Legends runs under a free-to-play model, letting players download and play for nowt. However, only certain characters are playable for free, with Riot charging microtransactions to permanently unlock them. The free selection rotates every week, keeping the game fresh but also introducing players to more characters they might fancy buying. Cosmetic custom skins and boosters are also sold. However, you can unlock characters and items with in-game currency earned by playing, if you're patient and persistent.

"In the end, free-to-play is just a business model. It is viable for some games and not well suited for others," Beck recently told Joystiq. "Ultimately, if our players feel like they are getting a good value, being well taken care of, and having a good experience, they will make purchases in whatever fashion they are comfortable with."

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  • reply
    July 26, 2011 10:15 AM

    Alice O'Connor posted a new article, League of Legends stats: 1.4m players daily.

    Over 15 million LoL accounts have been registered, developer Riot Games has revealed, with 1.4 million playing every day and peak concurrency of 500,000.

    • reply
      July 26, 2011 10:25 AM

      They're handily beating HoN now. Poor S2.

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        July 26, 2011 10:27 AM

        Free is a tough price-point to beat.

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          July 26, 2011 11:43 AM

          I wouldn't play HoN if it was free. They did a couple free weekend deals and they were a nightmare. They need to at least keep those people out of matchmaking.

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            July 26, 2011 2:00 PM

            Sure, from the HoN player's perspective it's probably better to a smaller, more-skilled playerbase. But from a moneymaking standpoint I think LoL probably got it right.

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        July 26, 2011 11:22 AM

        Can you post the total number from S2's (ie, not just the NA region servers)? I'm curious how far apart they are.

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          July 26, 2011 11:39 AM

          The only thing I saw was:

          It's been a year since HoN launched after spending some time in beta. Now, the game currently has 420,000 unique active players and averages 30,000 people playing at any given time, with daily concurrent peaks of more than 50,000 players.

          This is from this article back in May: http://gamasutra.com/view/news/34412/Interview_Heroes_of_Newerths_Marc_DeForest_On_Evolving_Business_Models.php

          The article also says HoN is going F2P. This is interesting and something I did not know but, honestly, I'm unlikely to give it a try given how much I enjoy LoL and DotA2 slated for later this year if I want a more "true" DotA clone to play for free...

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            July 26, 2011 12:04 PM

            I'm pretty sure the 30k number is only the NA region. I can't see how many are normally on the SEA region.

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              July 26, 2011 2:33 PM

              And by NA, I assume you mean everywhere that isn't SEA?

    • reply
      July 26, 2011 10:37 AM

      Dam its so hard to belive such a poor game has so many players when there are so many other better free to play games.

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        July 26, 2011 10:39 AM

        Please point me to a better free2play MOBA.

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          July 26, 2011 2:36 PM

          MOBA?

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            July 26, 2011 2:38 PM

            That genre of game. Multiplayer Online Battle Arena. AKA DOTA.
            http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiplayer_Online_Battle_Arena

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            July 26, 2011 2:40 PM

            Massive Online Battle Arena, aka DOTA type game.

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            July 26, 2011 3:35 PM

            I do not like this acronym at all. Nevertheless, it seems to have taken hold as a replacement of "DotA-clone" or "DotA-like".

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              July 26, 2011 3:43 PM

              [deleted]

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                July 26, 2011 4:15 PM

                I agree, but my problem was that it doesn't describe the elements of DotA at all. Why is Quake not a MOBA? TF2? CoD? WoW arenas? SC2 on Battle.net? Virtually the only thing that people do with "multiplayer" games is "battle" "online" in "arenas".

                What made DotA special was the combination of creep lanes, upgradable heroes, tower/nexus defense, and the isometric view. None of these elements is covered in the MOBA acronym.

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              July 26, 2011 4:15 PM

              It should just be referred to as a DOTA game to dilute the trademark. You don't want to end up calling it a MOBA any more than you wanted to call a frisbee a flying disc or whatever.

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                July 26, 2011 4:17 PM

                Agreed, at least until someone comes up with a succinct description of the game type. Strangely, it kind of makes me happy any time I see a trademark diluted. I don't know why, I guess it's just my general dislike for how trademarks are used.

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              July 26, 2011 4:24 PM

              The term was actually coined by the LoL creators, and you're right... it's a very poor descriptor.

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                July 26, 2011 7:54 PM

                [deleted]

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                  July 26, 2011 10:17 PM

                  It's more that Riot Games is making a big deal out of it. They're really pushing for adoption of the term, and it makes sense as it'd depreciate the mindshare of DotA.

                  There was the trademark tussle with Valve as well... they care.

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        July 26, 2011 11:12 AM

        [deleted]

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        July 26, 2011 12:19 PM

        Really makes you think, doesn't it?

      • reply
        July 26, 2011 1:00 PM

        With so many better free posts to read, why did I read this one?

        • reply
          July 26, 2011 2:02 PM

          hahaha

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          July 26, 2011 4:20 PM

          Hahaha it's moments like this (and the parent) that make nushack better than oldshack!

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        July 26, 2011 2:01 PM

        lmao

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        July 26, 2011 2:35 PM

        You didn't even have to write, 'I'd tell you what they are, but you wouldn't know them.', because I read it that way anyway.

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        July 26, 2011 4:34 PM

        Whenever I see a post like this I look at their previous comments, like in most cases this guys is hilariously bad.

      • Ebu legacy 10 years legacy 20 years
        reply
        July 26, 2011 4:38 PM

        I'm imagining that, when you chose this username, you envisioned those two dashes as representing the blades of two swords. Twin swords, even.

        Please tell me that's what you intended.

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          July 26, 2011 4:58 PM

          Its more probably blanks that you should fill in. I think it should be TwinAssWord

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      July 26, 2011 10:50 AM

      How could you spell "Now" wrong? RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAGGE

      Anyway, I remember the beta times. Ah yes.... sitting afk....

    • reply
      July 26, 2011 11:14 AM

      haha, didn't quite read the first line and though LoL accounts referred to ThomW's [lol]s

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      July 26, 2011 11:48 AM

      has this surpassed DOTA yet?

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        July 26, 2011 3:29 PM

        [deleted]

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          July 26, 2011 3:32 PM

          500,000k peak daily is pretty huge. That's what battle.net usually says in Starcraft 2 (and that number includes World of Warcraft users afaik).

          Is Warcraft 3 / DOTA really that popular still?

    • reply
      July 26, 2011 2:17 PM

      That's a lot of accounts. I play it... and fell for the RP scheme. And i fucking hate micro payments so shelled out 20 euros for ... well.. skins i guess?

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      July 26, 2011 3:13 PM

      The success of LoL really makes me wonder if valve is going to just try to go head-to-head with Riot or if they will try to differentiate Dota 2 from LoL somehow. I don't know how much you can do to change the gameplay without putting off the classic Dota fans.

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        July 26, 2011 3:30 PM

        [deleted]

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        July 26, 2011 4:17 PM

        DOTA 2 will be DOTA with some new bits like reconnect, HLTV, matchmaking etc. Icefrog stated last year that DOTA 2 will be the continuation of the game, so it will be at post-release that I would expect new stuff.

        LoL has their own graphics style, new heroes, items, and unique game play changes, so I don't see it as Valve vs Riot. It's more DOTA/HON fans that would be in to a Valve+Icefrog backed game.

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        July 26, 2011 4:50 PM

        Didn't the classic DOTA fans hate LoL and flock to HON anyway?

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      July 26, 2011 3:32 PM

      The game is great but there are so many little problems with it that I believe DOTA2 will completely steamroll it.

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      July 26, 2011 4:01 PM

      Awesome game! Just started it for the first time a few weeks ago and it's surprisingly great! I find myself playing it a lot nowadays because at my current level it's not as stressful as Starcraft 2 (aka the best game of all time).

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        July 26, 2011 4:31 PM

        Try out Heroes of Newerth on one of their free weekends. It's MUCH better, and currently, they have the game on sale for $10, which is a steal. Besides, when you buy the game, you have all the heroes they've released, as well as instant access to all heroes they release in the future. No nickel and diming like Riot. No teasing. The ONLY thing you don't get instantly are all of the extra skins, etc. though you can earn those for free anyways by just earning coins via matchmaking.

        I've enjoyed HoN since beta, and it's a very fun game with a great pace, and very balanced heroes, especially for how many heroes there are. They have had reconnect abilities if you get dc'd since beta, replays, spectators, etc., the game has much better graphics than LoL, and did I say no nickel and diming?

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      July 26, 2011 4:46 PM

      For anyone interested in trying it out, it truly is free to play. Paying does not provide any direct power whatsoever. Every non-cosmetic item can be obtained through playing for free. And the amount of time to unlock things scales with the gameplay, so free players are NOT behind the curve.

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        July 26, 2011 5:51 PM

        I don't believe this one either. Your gains in IP are very small based on level and very small to begin with unless you are winning constantly. Useful runes are around 1k+ IP a pop. Further most the champions they release now are 6300ip and the number of expensive champions to cheap ones is growing quickly as well.

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          July 26, 2011 7:01 PM

          Not entirely accurate. Useful *runes* range from 200-800 ip each, most of my starter runes were ~400 ip. The quints are hella expensive at 500-2000 each but at least you only need 3 of those. While the latest champions are 6300 (and I understand why they do this) there are lots of champs that are 450-3150 and there are a copule of bundles that you can buy (with real cash, yes) that give you a ton of champs letting you spend most of your IP on runes while still having a large assortment of champs to play. I still have a ton of champs I've never played and I have over 300 games under my belt.

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          July 26, 2011 7:24 PM

          While it's true that new champions are being released for 6300ip (about $10 US, I think), they're free in the next week or so, so you can try them out. Try them before you buy them. If you don't spend your ip frivolously, you'll have plenty.

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          July 26, 2011 8:00 PM

          [deleted]

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      July 26, 2011 5:05 PM

      I started playing LoL about a month ago and love it, they took all "hardcore" shit out of HoN and just made a fun game. I can see how the super competitive people love HoN, but LoL is a great game for the more casual gamer.

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      July 26, 2011 5:51 PM

      I played HoN in beta but did not buy it. Recently got a new computer and gave LoL a shot about 1 1/2 months ago. I have been very surprised and really enjoy LoL. I went back to HoN the other day and it just lacks the fun I am finding in LoL.

      I've actually become a fan of the hero rotations because it changes the game play up on a weekly basis. They've done a great job.

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