Riot Games is teasing a LoL trading card game

League of Legends developer Riot Games has teased that a real-life trading card game is on the way, thanks to a video shared on Chinese social media Bilibili.

Riot’s MOBA League of Legends has come a long way since its inception. Originally hosting only 40 champions on release, the game has since quadrupled in size, with over 160 characters today, a multitude of items, game modes, and of course tonnes of cosmetics to mess around with too.

The same can be said for the developers as well, who have profited and expanded massively thanks to the game’s success. Now Riot Games portfolio spans multiple titles, all stretching across several genres as well.

And it seems that Riot might be trying to jump into the trading card game scene too after a video was released on Chinese social media Bilibili.

As shown by well-known leaker Big Bad Bear, an IRL trading card game is on the horizon for League of Legends fans. Titled “Rune Battleground” the video depicts several icons which transform into the game’s iconic champions, colliding together into a card held by someone.

This isn’t the first time Riot has delved into card games before. Legends of Runeterra was their first try at transforming the MOBA into the format, but it was entirely digital with no market for players to trade and collect cards.

Instead, Legends of Runeterra allowed players to collect cards through weekly challenges and a battle pass for each region, letting them play the game completely for free.

Of course, a physical trading card game would be a very different step, with Riot able to monetize the title and also potentially introduce card rarities that can greatly boost up their price.

LoL devs confirm no plans for worldwide release

A League of Legends developer has confirmed that the card game currently is not scheduled for a global release.

“While we’re excited about this project, there aren’t any plans for a worldwide release at this time.”

It’s very possible that the devs want to test it out in a single market before taking it to a global market, but with players showing plenty of interest, it may sway how soon this release could be.