College linebackers against middle schoolers and the competitive ranking problem

League of Legends is (and will be) the undisputed champion of the war of the MOBAs. Like Blizzard's World or Warcrarft, it may not necessarily the best of it's genre, but it will go down in gaming history as the champion of the genre because of its sheer popularity. And this is not a bad thing. Riot has done more for the popularization of professional gaming and free gaming business models than anyone else, save (perhaps) for it's ancestors like the DOTA (obviously) but also for it's less popular ancestor (and in the mind of this worthless poster, far superior) Tides of Blood, among others. Shame on Blizzard for not striking while the proverbial iron was hot. I can't help but to wonder who at Blizzard was so oblivious as to miss the birth of this brand new genre.

However, Riot's League of Legends also includes the failures of many of it's forefathers. A primary example of such failures includes Riot's failure to address the inherent problem of a ranking system where one individual can play multiple accounts. Non ranked games are (as they are intended to be) full of players attempting to learn new champions, new itemization, and/or roles, while the ranked system is a cluster fk of players that want a more intense and competitive experience but said experience is undermined by so-called nurfs (sp?) accounts (i.e., player's who have other accounts that have achieved a much higher level of competitiveness). These nurf accounts often create an almost comical level of imbalance in what is intended to be a more intense competitive gaming experience, like a college linebacker admitted to play full-contact football against a comical group of pubescent middle schoolers. To make things worse (and more comical in a way) this imbalance gives rise to the understandable disposition of said middle schoolers not really giving a fk, which obviously only exacerbates the imbalance.

In short, Riot should be applauded for their foresight and innovativeness with respect to the MOBA genre and for popularizing professional gaming, and Riot will (and should) go down as the MOBA king (sorry dota lovers), but it will be a long time, another game, and likely another genre, that is bold and innovative enough to solve the competitive ladder problem. For those that want a reliable competitive gaming experience, League of Legends will leave you wanting (unless of course you're a college linebacker).