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PSA: League is not dying

Karunamon·5/25/2018, 1:32:00 PM·5 votes·1,810 views

I've seen quite a few folks misusing Google Trends the last few weeks, so I want to set the record straight.

There are two kinds of GT searches.. keywords and topics. Keywords only search the exact word as written, so if you do a keyword search for "League of Legends", you will only get people searching the exact words "League of Legends".

This is absolute rubbish for determining popularity.

What you want instead is a topic search. This would include people searching for information about the game. Searches like "teemo builds" or "2018 LCS" or "C9 Sneaky's latest cosplay" or "why is teemo such a ██████" - anything related to the game.

When you actually adjust your search to account for this, using topics instead of keywords, the result is much less dire. And much more telling as to what is really happening.

https://i.imgur.com/j828qww.png

https://g.co/trends/6rGYq

MOBAs in general are on a downward trend, but League is the biggest one by at least 4x.

You wanna see what's sucking the oxygen out of the room?

https://i.imgur.com/tL5TuUh.png

https://g.co/trends/r7pUk

Fortnite is now more popular than all MOBAs combined in the last 5 years.

League is not "dying". It's bigger than all of its competition.. the MOBA genre is just settling into its niche.

BTW: Those were all USA links. Zoom out to a worldwide level instead, and the trend still holds - MOBAs in general down, Fortnite way up, League still the biggest MOBA.

https://i.imgur.com/CCw5Lmx.png

https://g.co/trends/fVxKT

8 Comments

Vhan87655/25/2018, 1:35:48 PM4 votes

All MOBAs may be going down in popularity, but that doesn't change the facts; even looking at your charts, the blue line representing League is clearly plummeting.

I think I'm missing the point here. Two negatives don't make a positive.

Pika Fox5/25/2018, 1:34:10 PM3 votes

Runescape is dying guys.

Azadethe5/25/2018, 2:28:05 PM2 votes

I have a question. Do you even know how to read stats?

This is a TREND line. The highest point in every graph only tells you one thing: The Search topic's highest point of interest on a scale from 0-100%.

In other words, a spiking Fortnite chart doesn't mean it's more popular than League. It means Fortnite is at its highest search trending.

League could have 1 Billion players..... and Fortnite could have 100,000, and because League is 9 years old, and Fortnite is only a few months, Fortnite would spike to 100-90%.... because that's the highest interest it's ever had.

There is also no correlation between Search trending and player bases. Players who have already downloaded the game, and aren't fond of forums, have no need to search. They just open the League direct plugin and play.

The truth is, as far as we can tell, Riot's sales have increased per annum, even into last year and probably this year. Part of that is premium skins and sponsorship and hextech chests... but increasing sales suggests one thing: The population base isn't dwindling enough to shrink revenues.

We will never really know for sure, because Riot is owned by TenCent, who doesn't post an itemized revenue report per year or user data. All they tell us is.... in the Online game part of their business, LoL has enjoyed increases in revenue which have offset losses in their other online game portfolios.

Trend lines do NOT increase over time unless new products came out under a brand! They always fall. Searches mean very little.

Professor Ward5/25/2018, 1:50:12 PM1 votes

"All humans have the exact same life threatening disease, but it kills men at a slower rate, that means that men arent dying!!!!"

Rubbish...

Just because league is the forerunner in the field doesnt mean they arent dying, theyll just be the last to do so.