According to president Marc Merrill, Riot Games success is a result of careful investment in a “really fun game.”
There are parties in the game industry that you could probably brand as being greedy with some degree of fairness. We’re not going to name names, of course, but such companies do exist. According to president/cofounder Marc Merrill however, Riot Games isn’t one of them. Commenting on a recent Reddit thread, Merrill offered a heated defense of his company after accusations of greed arose.
“It’s pretty frustrating when people try to position us as greedy,” he said. “Millions upon millions of our players spend zero dollars on league and enjoy it endlessly. We’re COMPLETELY OK with this. Greedy how? You do not have to spend money, it is completely opt-in.” Merrill also reminded those in the thread about the millions spent by the company “building a pro-esports scene to help some of our best players become global superstars.” According to Merrill, Riot earned its success “by building a really fun game, constantly investing over and over to grow and improve this game and by NOT selling power or being money hungry.”
It’s kind of hard not to agree when he puts it like that. That being said, even if Riot did make its decisions based primarily on its fiscal fortunes, we’re not sure it would be deserving of criticism even then. Setting aside obviously important things like workmanship and artistic vision, videogames are still a business. The very existence of games like League of Legends depends on their ability to earn money for the people that make them. We aren’t advocating for flat out Wolf of Wall Street exploitation, of course, but it’s kind of silly to get mad at a company for earning money off of a product they make and you enjoy.
Source: Reddit
Published: Jan 3, 2014 01:10 pm