@@TBSkyen Yay :D. Btw, good video overall. Also, quick curiosity question : on the community post where you announced that video, I commented that imo, there were some casting mistakes among the Sentinels. Now, talking purely interactions potential and character dynamics: would there be any sentinels you'd replace ? For instance, I had replaced : Diana with Aphelios Riven with Darius Pyke with Graves (For Bilge) Graves with Seraphine (for PnZ). Whoever the bandle champ was with Heimer
@T B Skyen hey wanted to ask since the last raodmap im pretty sure the event was rushed because they have the next event about arcane in making. Whats your opinion on this?
Can we also talk about how everyone was so pumped to imagine Vayne and Poppy working together - Vayne, who hates magic, working with the hero of Demacia who is a MAGICAL CREATURE?? It also would have pushed a yordle's story forward by having Poppy actually get over her humility to step in to be the HERO for Demacia. Just... why advertise her IN A CINEMATIC if she's not actually going to play a part in the story!? (sob)
Watched the cinematic as a low ELO Poppy main. "OH HELL YEAH!" Watched like three scenes of the VN and saw that Poppy wasn't even MENTIONED in the Demacia chapter, immediately checked out of the plot and only farmed for rewards.
didnt riot confirm that from the POV of humans that yordles look like people, it's just from our perspective that we see them next to each other like that. That's how they explained why yordles like Heimer can teach in piltover and nobody questions it.
@@EnbyAndromeda this has been retconed in current lore, Heimer has a statue of himself as a Yordle in Piltover, and he is clearly looked DOWN on Arcane, not to mention other yordle characters that appear in the show, same for other Yordle related cinematics that appeared on the last 2 years iirc, Yordles just look like Yordles right now and don't need disguises.
Another: I *loved* Ruined Draven's fight in his arena: _"What's this? It seems Draven is REACHING FOR SOMETHING IN HIS BELT... Yes! He's got.. MORE AXES!!!"_ It's silliness contrasted jarringly, it broke the fourth wall; all that was so perfect for spotlighting a Draven dialled to eleven.
I'd also like to add the moment where Diana is slowly being consumed by the Ruination in that one cave, because of the feeling that there's nothing she can do to help the Lunari, then two Lunari women appear hidden in the cave, and as the two Lunari regain their hope after seeing their "god" after them, feeling saved and safe, Diana regains her hope as well. I think that was a very good moment. I almost drop a tear.
@@chloethespider6298 That was a good scene as an isolated story bit. Majority of Diana's story is focused on her unsuccesfully searching for the Lunari. So when two Lunaris just popped up randomly Diana's goal was achieved without any effort. This narratively ruined (no pun intended) all her previous attempts.
I was so disappointed that Olaf turned out to be comic relief. His story and motivations are fairly simple, but the idea of fighting Viego is one of the things that fits perfectly for him. He *wants* to die a glorious death and find his peace that way, the Black Mist is the antithesis of that: it devours you like a helpless victim, like the sickness and age he desperately wants to _not_ die to, and denies those afflicted their final rest. And just like Viego he tries to change the course of destiny. They could've went further into his reverence for what he considers a "proper way to go" and how his culture puts a lot of emphasis on honor in death. Could've led to some interesting moments with Yorick as well.
Yeah.. idk why they turned Olaf, Regar, Graves and Pyke into comic relief. I can't stand the new ultimate skin of Graves because of this.. so I never bought it even tho I own all Graves skins. Senna turned out to be quite the battleaxe and I seriously have 0 idea how Lucian can take so much abuse and still have feelings like that its surreal as far as narratives go. The other characters were mostly fine minus MF selling out, I liked Vayne & Thresh and the new skins they had. Story sucked tho, especially Viego's simping.. he didn't turn out to be a compelling tragic villain.. more like pathetic and forgettable. They really screwed over Yorick and neither Kalista nor Heckarim made an appearance. Considering how they tie into Viego's story.. they should have been included with skins. What a missed opportunity, bad narrative design and weird personality shifts in characters.
Bruh, almost everyone was comic relief. Olaf - Wants to get his death battle, can't, has nothing to do other than make jokes Rengar - Dumb cat hunter now Pyke - Insane undead clown posse Akshan - hides sorrow with jokes (Ok to be one) Graves - First time his new "himbo" personality was in league and not in a cinematic. (semi-ok to be one)
Two days?! I have to keep myself busy until then. "continue to be unhappy that the pentakill event ends without any extra content, no imotes, no tokens, no yorick's hat."
To be fair, they teased another pentakill album saying that they were in the clear, for now... They might bring viego and rell black and rell being the new rival singer along with viego
It should have been yorick And the army he has been building and the sentinels of light fighting along side him in his life long mission. But it was yorick showing up for 2 frames to do the one thing he would never do.
@@nate8808 yorick should have been like Gandalf appearing at dawn at the battle of Helm's Deep. The heroes struggling and he appears with his army of ghouls holding off Viego's and turning the tide.
I remember how Sentinel Graves' lines said something about Illaoi's influence keeping Pyke co-operative, and then she was never referenced in the event.
Pyke being in this event makes absolutely no god damn sense with his lore. They made an assassin who is a tortured soul manipulated by evil into a shiny mummy of a comic relief character. Like... Yeah we pyke mains know he's a joke at the moment but show some respect riot...
Honestly my biggest fear with how this event ended up is that Riot will see the reaction and decide to never do anything like this again. The fact we even got a lore event progressing the narrative forward is sick and I would much rather they learn from their errors and improve upon what did work and try again sometime. But knowing Riot they'll just do their best to pretend this whole thing never happened and we'll never get a lore event again.
Well, looks like next year is about the Piltover & Zaun conflict; it's champion releases are being done in the same way as this year, so second chance?
Also you gotta love how Riot rectified Senna’s character by making her more than a fridged wife, but then they doubled down and made two more fridged women for the Ruination event (Isolde and Shadya). I guess they didn’t learn from their first success.
But still there was more whining about protecting Senna and that Senna should be careful and not be alone so did they really learn anything? Especially since Senna is probably the only person with that much knowledge about the mist (on the “good side”) If anything Lucian sounded just as creepily obsessed and overprotective as viego.
@@Julia-py9mk I mean, Lucian lost his wife for years. It makes perfect sense that he’d be overprotective of Senna. He’s not framed as CORRECT for being overprotective, he’s framed as a man who doesn’t want to lose the love of his life for a second time, and is reasonably emotionally distraught about the thought of her dying. But yeah fridging Isolde and Shadya was oof.
@@cartoonishidealism582 There’s a difference between being scared of losing the love of your life and trying to control what your partner does especially telling her what she can and what she can’t do. That ain’t cute no matter how much he means well. Also Senna made it pretty clear that she didn’t appreciate him acting like that so..
@@cartoonishidealism582 “He’s not framed to be correct” Well this is a fictional story. It’s pretty easy to write a character that’s worried about and wanting to protect someone without taking it to the extreme which is unfortunately what happens in this event. She’s a person, she doesn’t belong to him. Also it isn’t just one time it was in every segment, EVERY single one. Also I’m not entirely sure since it’s just written dialogue but from the way it’s written he seems pretty aggressive and it’s just like, what does this have to do with the story? Does it push anything forward that he literally won’t let Senna make decisions for herself and getting mad at her when she tries to? Idk if you’re a woman or not but as a woman myself it just made me very uncomfortable and I’ve seen a lot of others agree.
Isolde & Shadya at least bring different angles to the damsel in distress notion. I mean, isn’t the whole event about second guessing this trope? Isolde’s arc is that she doesn’t want to be rescued. Shadya is similar, but provides a different role to Akshan, as a mentor & motherly figure rather than a partner or object. ‘I should’ve paid more attention to Shadya’s lessons’ is a voice line that comes from Akshan when he dies, & it just gives off a very different energy to Senna & Isolde.
*Targon:* This is a land of powerful magic that reaches into the celestial realm, where god-like beings from the heavens walk among us. If any land has the power to ward off the Black Mist, surely it is this one. *Piltover:* Ha ha, fans go brrrrr
@@ponchobosque5019 yeah, i was hyped for "literal wind spirit defends an entire city from the black mist" but she doesn't even get an off-hand mention. she's literally the guardian spirit of zaun, and a wind spirit, and nothing.
@@watchfulwanderer6443 I would not be surprised if the majority or the writers have forgotten she exists, hell I forget she exists until I get the rare game when someone plays her.
Imagine if ASol was there: AS: *What is a glowing ant doing on my mountain?* Viego: "ISOLDE!!" _(flings mist at ASol)_ AS: _smites viego with the power of a thousand suns_
@@LucarioredLR He wouldn't even need that as a reason. (*Black Mist covers Runeterra*) ASol: "What an ugly creation." (*Star Breaths Mist*) "Now it's less hideous."
The only way I see this whole event as canon is as Akshan telling it to some random stranger while being drunk, oversimplifying things and wanting to make himself more important, like the story recaps on League's UA-cam channel. Chapter 3 literally starts with him saying "Let's see, what else they tell me." meaning that everything before he got involved could be completely made up. Akshan's story and his part in this story as a whole is something I very much dislike. When I read his bio + story I was suprised how his whole motivation was resolved in the first story he got. Also he has absolutely no connection to Viego or anything else in this story besides that he is a Sentinel. I also find his gun to be way to powerful as an item in the lore, you could resolve pretty much every story with it. You don't like that someone killed someone else? Just kill that person and the other one lives again. I mean it's a gun, a grapple hook and it revives people? Overdesigned much? He literally seems like a fanfiction OC that can do anything and is the key to everything. I accept that the base story happened but I don't really want to be reminded of it. Once money gets involved, everything else suffers.
I’m still very confused on how his gun even works. Like, if the scoundrel kills someone else does it stop working? It’s implied that it wears out? Do they come to life on the spot or at the place where they died or where their body is? Maybe these questions were all answered but I personally was left confused.
@@queendeborah14172 When even Aphelios is confused about his gun then you know something is wrong. Jokes aside, his weapon is barely explained on how it works. It's just bad.
@@queendeborah14172 no so let's say this. Viego kills senna and THEN Gwen, and akshan kills viego with the gun. the gun only revives the last person he killed, so this senna would be still dead and Gwen would be revived. in game it works differently than what the more says I think
I've made a video called "Rise of the Sentinels - Final chapter fixed" (cocky I know XD) with what I think the Shadow Isles canon version couldve been, would love the feedbak. About Akshan I would dedicate the whole Shurima episode to him making him confront Viego in Shurima.
The real tragedy is that the Ruined King game is gonna suffer due to this. I was so excited to play it when it was announced, but now I have a hard time getting hyped for it as I’m just so tired of the Ruination and I doubt I’m alone.
I dont expect anything about that game not for the Sentinels event, justo they didnt updated with new info since the last year (And was a post on Instagram saying Happy new year XD)
@@floraleaf1970 Yeah, actually seems to be stuck in dev. hell. Same thing for the Ekko Platformer, or the LoL fighter, or the diablo-like game. Quite a few games not making any progress really. We got more news about Kindom Hearts 3 over it's development than those
@@floraleaf1970 Good news is that theres a rumor that Project L (also know as street fighter LOL game) is on the works now so…yeah gotta take a while then.
I was personally really disappointed when Pantheon's prestige skin was made to be non-canon. Him overcoming Viego's mind control and turning into a new powerful being would have been so cool to see and would have progressed his personal story forward in a really cool way.
It was more of an “Unbound Pantheon” to me because. His trying to find a choice and only one option remains to be free from the mind control,to use the celestials powers which something he have sworn an oath not to do because he hates gods.
That sounds a bit out of character for him. Like, his whole concept is "badass man overcomes god with nothing but willpower" and turning him into new god breaks the concept.
Also he’s the embodiment of perseverance and overcoming an overwhelming foe, so this doesn’t make much sense for pantheon to just be corrupted and just be a one note goon for Viego. Just disappointing.
I'm surprised no one is talking about Pantheon. His lore is that he overtook a god as a man by sheer willpower alone. But here he's just a prop, so disappointing and situations like these make me not want to be invested in lore because what's the point of caring about a story if it's just going to be canonically butchered for the sake of profit?
@@lordcommissarthomas1922 From what i can tell the black mist corrupts those that are in a negative state or emotions, so this is probably the reason why Pantheon’s hatred had let him vulnerable to Viego.
One of my biggest problems is the *MASSIVE* over-use of mind control in the story IMO. In some cases, like Shyvana, it might actually be used to advance the story, so okay, I think it's warranted. However, *mind control inherently means that a character has to, temporarily, stop being themselves and do something else.* In a character oriented game like League of Legends that sells itself upon the backs of 150+ different power fantasies _(well, sometimes different power fantasies)_ having your *FIRST STORY EVENT* involving a good number of those characters get their personalities violated feels extremely out of order, and against the game's main narrative selling point of being character driven. I'd forgive it _if it wasn't_ for the fact that Viego has no shortage of Champions who are already more than willing to work for him. Why do we need to violate Atreus' power fantasy of being able to survive a god-killing attack through sheer force of will, and _simultaneously_ deny Hecarim his day of reckoning by Viego's side, kicking ass and taking names? oh wait $kins
Thank you for pointing out the Atreus thing. A man that already has been mind-controlled before, who through the sheer power of human will managed to stay alive while a literal aspect was killed, somehow just gets mind controlled again? With NO sign that he is fighting back? Imagine if the way they beat pantheon was by Atreus fighting back the mind control. We know he's been mind controlled before, and we know he has an incredible fighting will, so why the fuck aren't they using his main character trait in the story?
@@muselikesminecraft Can you imagine the absolute money pantheon skins would get if he was basically the man who could not be kept under control during this massive event? Like, he's a mortal (ostensibly) and breaks out of viegos mind control from sheer force of will
@@ArchiveTheMyth Like his Prestige skin? Which was explicitly stated to *not* be canon _despite the fact that the other Prestige skins have nothing that would suggest they aren't canon?_
If riot couldnt make time for all the side characters in their own story, then why add so many pointless characters to the event? Why make this big deal how they had to tell 3 different versions of the same story but with versions of the Sentinels that are tailored to those specific games with characters that have no impact on the story? Why not just make the Sentinels like the 3 champs you want to have cross appeal with the phone game, and the base game then just add in the characters that were already a part of it? Like hell make UnRuined Moakai, or Restored Kalista or like a battle ready Yorick? why did we need a tacked on Pyke, Rangar, or Olaf if all they cared about was Graves, Irrelia, and Rivan?
im sorry, i actually LOVE all of those champs and mained them all in the past but i HAD to laugh, u named 3 champs that really won't sell at all. Finding the balance between lore relevance and skins sells might be pretty hard but i agree that they should have told stories about those who actually had interesting stories to tell regardless of who got skins or not. Its like they made MORE work for themselves by not just taking the simple route. They didn't need to make all those skins to waste writing time on if only a few mattered ur right, but i'd argue that Olaf could have been important considering he was in the last Shadow Isles story in Bilgewater.
@@okidoxb4846 Nobody cares about Riot unfilling pockets, this event is the living will of that. There has been a following playerbase for 10 years now and they just expected that they would follow a fanfic try of a lore
I loved the concept of the harrowing. I used to say "happy harrowing" when I played around Halloween. I was big into monster horror, I made my yt channel specifically to comment on horror videos. I was hype to finally get some legit horror story. But when Viego released and I saw the direction they were going my enthusiasm steadily drained until I saw the start of the event itself and it essentially killed my love of the harrowing.
Yeah, they really ruined the harrowing. Just remember how it was portrayed during the release of Kallista and in this one cinematic with the puppeteer and compare that to the sentinel of light event.
@@randomdude2026 tbh their opening cinematic for the ruined king event was pretty exciting. The harrowing hitting Demacia? Ionia? Mismatched poppy and Vayne teaming up for survival against undead ghouls? The mist infecting the most powerful sacred being in the magical land of Ionia? What incredible implications. Maybe even agents of Demacia and noxious would have to team up to cleanse their lands. Maybe even that would force an alliance when mordekaiser breaks free. It'd be a shame if.... THEY DIDN'T EXPLORE THAT AT ALL Or Kalista or thresh or Yorick or Maokai or anything else they ever set up. Wait no I'll give some credit. The thresh cinematic was pretty good.
I'm fairly used to reading visual novels, and Riot really has no excuse about things like the battle scenes. Plenty of the VNs I've read have extensive, epic battles that go on for several minutes with descriptions so intense you can clearly visualize the fight in your head without the aid of any cutscene or artwork beyond the original characters' sprites. This is not an intrinsic problem of VNs, Riot just didn't let the scenes unfold as they should because it would risk people spending less time playing as chapters would go on for longer and you'd probably need more frequent breaks. VNs are hardly any different to reading a book. Yes, the format has its limitations, but it's more than capable of telling the story of the Sentinels of Light properly. Riot just didn't care about telling the story as much as they cared about you spending hours upon hours on farming for a 20-boxes cutscene and the most ridiculously small event reward per chapter ever given. There's so much interest I can put in a story that's divided in a "Where is the feather?" / "Oh, no! The feather!" / "Oh, no! The feather!" / "Oh, no! The feather!" / "Oh, no! The feather!" / "Aw, we lost another feather" structure.
Honestly, I'd love to see a "Building a Better Sentinels of Light" video in the future. A complete retelling of the story, how the event would be handled across all these mediums etc etc. Of course this would be a huge undertaking for you, but it would be great to see what you could come up with.
Writing this before the premier because I've been thinking about it way to much: Imagine, if you will, a slightly different ending to the Ruination. After Viego's fall at the hands of the Sentinels, the mist did actually dissipate a fair bit. While yes, Thresh, the self appointed new king of the Isles, through his (Was that ever explained? I forgot what he did. Absorb...souls for power?) Unbinding was able to bend a crude, medicore version of the ichor that flowed out Ruined King's heart to his will, for all intents and purposes, the Black Mist was gone. The thousands of millions of damned souls trapped in between life and death within the mist for centuries were free, with Yorick being there to guide them to their final resting place. What ever happened to these souls? Well, some with a strong enough will stayed, such as Kalista as there will always be betrayers in the world. -Hecarim along with Karthus begrudgingly now follow Thresh.- -(Truth be told, due to Riot's policy that playable champions must be "active" on Runeterra I'm kinda handwaving lore bits for the sake of sticking to it. I might rewrite parts if I can come up something more plausible.)- Hecarim and Karthus splintered off into their own sects on the isles with their own followers, refusing to accept Thresh' rule. Thresh in his hubris ignored their treachery as would crush them under his heel eventually, but for now, he'll enjoy his kingdom and freedom. (Thanks to @A for gving me the final push to change the previous roles for Karthus and Hecarim) But majority of those souls were whisked off to the afterlife, but even then, after all this time some thought what could possibly be awaiting them on the other side? It was simple. Mordekaiser. You see, the Iron Revenant had known about the King's affront to nature and thought about intervening but he saw an opportunity, as oddly, the Black Mist was extraordinarily similar to Mordekaiser's own Dark Magic. (NOTE: This is just to give plausibility to Mordekaiser recieving the souls rather than them going elsewhere. If you have better ideas, let me know) If he let this child's tragic love fester, eventually, some would rise to stop him, as did those who tried to stop the conquests of the great Sahn-Uzal long ago. And once that day came, all those specters tainted by the mist would be sent to where they belong. And now that they were here, it was time to put his plan into motion. PS: Also pretend I wrote a rewrite where: Vayne's disdain for magic is made as clear as it was in the comics (she tried to kill Senna at first). Diana was in Ionia and doesn't have her blade and at first joined the Sentinels to guide them through Targon and then bounce but then after seeing what Viego does to Pantheon decides to join them. The way Piltover warded off the mist wasn't fans but something more plausible (not saying much) like massive magic dome powered by a huge collection of hextech crystals, or as @Meg Lee-Jim suggested, Janna helping to keep the mist at bay, likely pushing herself to her limits. Pyke isn't played for a "IS HE ON THE LIST!?" joke (becuase if if any of the jokes were played straight Pyke would have likely murdered half of the Sentinels). PS PS: Miss Fortune would also stay the same because without the context of the Ruined King game, we don't really have any idea how stupid her thought process was. I don't doubt it was stupid, though.
Minor issue with Mordekaiser is that only those that died to him go this his Death Realm, all others go through the normal process ala dying to the spirits of death (Kindred and all its other representations), so Mordekaiser wouldn't be able to gather/absorb all those souls from the Shadow Isles.
@@user-bg8ep3gy5o i have been trying to think about alternatives to following Thresh because yeah nobody likes, and at first I thought about instead of them following Thresh they splinted off into their own "tribes" but I felt that would make the Shadow Isles a bit too close to Freljord so at the time I decided against it. However giving it some more thought, it makes Thresh into more of a king by name that nobody truly respects but puts up with, which is very much in line with how everyone interacts with him.
What's so frustrating about the Sentinels of Light event is that it was SO CLOSE to being good. The parts that were good shine like diamonds in the rough but they're burried under all the plot holes and comedy hijinks that seem to only exist to scream "BUY MORE SKINS!" at the player. It's like watching a movie and having it be interrupted by product placements. Like "oh no we can't defeat The Ruined King™️ but with the power of Sentinel Rengar ™️ (sponsored by Walmart) we can defeat him for the low low price of $4!"
One point id like to add that personally peeved me a bit was how unsympathetically the confrontation of Viego and Isolde was brushed aside. I wont lie I was primarily interested in the event because of Viego and I was interested to see if his character would have any kind of redemption and or resolution at the climax. Instead we got a few lines of text of Isolde basically saying "Your evil, I don't love you now let me die". As someone who was interested in this story from the shadow isles side of it, it was really disappointing to see that Viego (and all of the shadow isles characters) did not get the satisfying conclusion I feel like they all deserved.
I completely agree. They did all the Shadow Isles champs, even Viego, dirty. I really expected a confrontation between Viego and Isolde..but it was executed poorly. She basically said what everyone else said to Viego. I thought she'd at least be a bit more understanding. Isolde was barely a character tbh.
It was so bad I honestly just wanted Viego to win after a while. The most interesting part of the entire event was him and it felt impossible to root for the sentinels. They still did him dirty, I feel like viego is getting way too much hate just because the event was bad (which isn’t because of his character) and that he was busted in game. Also the entire Simp shit. People whining about mordekaiser being better than viego is just hilarious. In what world is mordekaiser better than viego design and character wise? Ah yes mordekaiser angry and evil and want to kill everyone because he’s angry and evil and he looks like a black and green tin can. Whereas viego actually has motivation and even though I don’t support obsessive love I think a lot of us can relate or understand to how shitty it would feel to not be able to be with someone you love.
@@Julia-py9mk FINALLY SOMEONE SAID IT THANK YOU SO MUCH . Like what's with all the angry mordkaiser fanboys they say that viego "sToLe mOrDkAiSeR rOlE " when he didn't fanboys are just angry that there favourite angry revenent was not the centre of the story , viego is NOTHING like mordkaiser he's not after destroying the world just to rule it because he thinks he deserves it he's using a deeadly force to bring back the person he cared about the most because he has no other option and doesn't care what he has to do in order to get his wife back he's and mordkaiser's motives are so deferent and there personalitys and Lores are deferent they don't have the problem that Seraphine and sona have they are entirely deferent character's with viego in my opinion having a better story , I am definitely gonna get attackers for saying that but mordkaiser is boring and I don't understand why people like him and want him to be the main star of the game and even go as far as saying that he should have been the ruined king without creating viego (as if sacrificeing the world for love suite his personality, they are ignoring what the ruined king is about and just want their golden revenent to be the one and only king of undeath ). mordkaiser is every lord of undead trope roled into one and he's just your typical bad guy who is evil just for the sake of being evil , I admit he isn't as boring as other Champs but viego is more interesting and more complex than him, he's a young spoiled prince who all of the sudden was forced to become a king even though he didn't want to or cared about it than he found love and happiness with Isolde and when she was diyeig right before he's eyes he was willing to do anything to save her wich I find understandable and relateable because how many of us have lost someone we love and we're willing to do anything to get them back, than he acedently got powers he doesn't like but decided to use it to find he's beloved , he's story could have dealt with themes like love and romance, grief,deppresion, the burden of expectations , haveing to handle way to many responsibilitys at a young age without being prepared , being manipulated during a vanerable state , the lose of identity and sanity , and he has a interesting concept of a normal person being acedently invested with a dark powerful force something I feel leauge dosent have much of apart from Zoe but where Zoe's narrative is childishe and comedic viego is dark and deppresed , what about mordkaiser? UHHHH he's evil ......he got mad that he didn't get a reward for being evil ......he decided to reward himself ( I don't get the Brazil joke) .....he got powers and decided to murder everything because.......... he's evil... , he has no personal relationship with any characters and no LeBlanc and rell don't count , compare that to viego , he's what Lucian And to some extent ledros could have been (would have been nice to see that explored more beyond just a few words her and there RIOT) , he has a personal relationship and beaf with kalista and hecarim, Thresh and he's a big part of their stories along with yorick and maokai and gwen (to bad all of it was wasted), the shadow isels are MUCH MORE INTERSTING than mordy's death realm because they explore themes of a lose of identity and living with only your worst single trait and your other good traits get washed away from you and the story of how it was created is the result of multiple indevelies and it effected them In deferent ways and had others caught in it , what is mordkaiser's death realm is about ? What themes does it have ? What do people like about it so dang much about ? it's just a ticking time bomb that you would need plot Armor to servives (with how much riot Nerfed the shadow isels and black mist I can easily see them doing the same with mordkaiser and the void they better not dare to touch the watchers ) . I admit there is nothing wrong with a character being evil just for the sake of being evil but viego is more interesting than mordkaiser, he has effects on other characters while mordkaiser is just evil on his own so I don't understand why people like him that much and hate viego that much and attack anyone who likes him . Viego is a good character and he could have been one of league's most complex and interesting villians and HE MOST DEFINITELY didn't deserve what happened to him in the event and riot should give him a second chance with cabeable writers rather than leaving him and all of the shadow isels characters in the dast Sorry if this was way too long I just CAN'T forgive riot for what they did with this story arc
Especially when they make Viego a shirtless attractive dude, yet you get no choice to side with him or see a different angle. You even get stabbed & corrupted, but don’t get the choice to pick a side.
@@miss.mirana4061 Jesus that was long but I totally agree with everything. Viego is my favorite champion released both design wise and character wise for a long time. Just like you said he’s such a complex character and there’s so much more they could’ve done with him and I would’ve loved if we could see more of the grief and despair of his lore and also see how the relationship was when Isolde was alive. I’m happy to have found someone who agrees with my view on mordekaiser and I just can’t understand how he got these fanboys from the beginning. Are empty edgy villains something people just like? They also have the nerve to call viego edgy when they worship mordekaiser lolol
well, there StraCraft II: Heart of the Swarm campaign, where Kerrigan (contrary to what T B Skyen thinks) wasn't trying to impress Raynor but to avenge him when she though Mensk (the main responsible for her becoming a monster) got him killed and just when they got back together too, what do you think of that campaign?
@@CRSB00 Something I always loved about the SC2 campaign was how varied each mission is, they really improved that aspect from WoL to HotS (WoL's variety was very little). But the story itself imo was good on premise but the execution was bad. The romance is poorly written and feels very tacked on compared to everything else Kerrigan does. It honestly felt like they really wanted to do a lot more with Jim and Kerrigan's romance but wasn't able to because stuff like needs to feel natural and properly paced so it could mature and blossom. But that'd take too long to develop so it all feels slapped on and duct taped to the main story.
@@JoJoSulyvahn yep, the first 2 missions it kind was nice watching banter and flirt during the missions and cutscenes, then Jim got kidnapped and after that ..it felt kind of cheesy(?) and the romance got put in the backburner for the "oh big bad Amon is going to destroy the universe OOOHHHH!!" culminating with the last scene of the campaign which was SPOILERS: unironically the " I-must-go-now-my-planet-needs-me" meme which I think kind of proves T B Skyen's point, the pace of a romance may be incompatible with that of an RTS
It does sound like a challenge. I can see a game with a concept like the “Kaguya-sama: Love Is War” manga/anime: a rom-com about two characters with a mutual crush, who are each too prideful to admit their feelings first. Whoever gives in and confesses loses, and they’re both geniuses who enjoy a challenge, so the RTS segments represent their battle of wits and zany shenanigans.
Honestly while yorick is probably the champ they wasted the most I feel the most dissapointed with the exclusion of kalista. This is a character who is a spirit of revenge obsessed with helping oatbreakers and who helps other with their vengeance quests in her own ''unique way'' and is related to an event that includes pyke and vayne and having her not show up at all despite her potentially having an interesting dynamic with both of them is really dissapointing. vayne could have had a really interesting story arc where she meets pyke, a person just as obsessed with vengeance as she is but he is warped to the point he isn't even going against anyone that betrayed him and Kalista who is a dark spirit that punishes traitors. Vayne who commited the ultimate act of betrayal against someone that was essentially her foster mother and who might be planning on betraying and killing Senna & pyke once viego is taken care off (honestly they shouldn't have made her ''mellow out'' but instead go ''alright i have bigger threats to take care off right now and these guys are competent'' in my opinion) would have to deal with Kalista calling her out. Maybe she attacks Pyke at some point and Kalista ends up making one of her revenge deals with him which might partially break the hold the creatures of the deep have on his mind. Maybe vayne doesn't attack and Pyke rejects Kalista's offer but a part of him doesn't know why. tons of interesting stuff there for all 3 characters. There's also graves who has reconcillid with his betrayer but I feel like a Pyke, Kalista, vayne sidestory would be more interesing really.
Kalista was not put in because of "engagement". More specifically , Kalista being among the worst adcs after her over the top nerfs , also the same goes for the other shadow isles characters.
@@decilence6184 are you saying pro play affected the exploration of Kalista's lore? It always comes back to pro play, damn them for being good at the game damn them
Its implied that the voice pyke hears in his head that keeps him seeking revenge against his ship's crew that are long past dead is kalista's. Or... i mean... not really implied but it makes the most sense with his lore. Sure as hell there's no reason for illaoi to keep him vengeful, or the drowned goddess herself. Pyke as a light sentinel feels weirder than urgot on star pajamas or blue Rhaast.
@@pmangano Some of his lines imply that whatever lurks in the depths of the ocean were the ones messing with his mind (presumably to avoid getting hunted by humans): "Captains told me to kill fish, fish told me to kill captains, makes sense." "Used to call 'em monsters, but they changed my mind. (pyke used to hunt sea life not black mist creatures)"
I just feel that the event could do little and try to save it. For example, MF siding with Viego and knowing GP is alive; That was bad… But. What if the there was no magical sentinel portal, and the only way they could enter Bilgewater safely and quickly was with a intermediary, and GP being the only Option?? Now you have a way to reveal GP to MF, and the sentinel being “in the same side” would give her the moment of vulnerabily to accept Viego Ruination. Also, her powerhungry ruined personality would be explained by her knowing that she was still not enough to kill GP. Its Little things like that, changes a bad idea into acceptable (Not perfect or good), but with the same core things that Riot is trying to sell and force.
@@risky2166 I think they didn't do it because of implications. Graves and TF is the closest canon gay relationship (male) we have. It seems obvious that the plot for one of them joining the sentinels would be to save the other, but maybe they didn't want to deal with the implications (maybe censorship, who knows?) of this plotline. Instead, they opted for Graves to bond with Vayne. Also, I remember reading up somewhere that Graves's death animation on the sentinel skin (a card that teleports him to safety) had to be begged with to be allowed to be in the game. I can't remember the source tho, so take it with a grain of salt
@@Piplup799 "I think they didn't do it because of implications. Graves and TF is the closest canon gay relationship (male) we have. " There is Varus kind of? In that the two souls stuck inside of him are gay lovers. Though of course that is between two "regular people" and not two champions
@@JoViljarHaugstulen Yeah but now in comparison GP is now more like a poor beggar, is no match for MF Navy.... so there is no way MF will be afraid of him + MF have a strong hate to GP that she will never be afraid of a GP returning there is no way, besides one of MF qualities is that she cant trust in no one!!! in no one I repeat!! then why she will trust in Viego to give her more power knowing is the guy that will destroy the world anyway? and she is the protector of innocents in Bilgewater she even risk her life to save a grandma and her grandchild in the past.... and why she will think that Veigo can give her power when he can't even invaded bilgewater in the past against MF navy in the past.... she literally annihilated viegos hordes of harrowing in the past. What kind of power a king that you were kicking his ass can offer now? and besides she cant trust in no one.... :(
I don't like it. But it is infinitely better than what we got as it gives a REASON for MF's stupidity, so I would much prefer your idea to what Riot gave us.
I’ve written literally essays about how bad sentinels of light was. What an absolute letdown on every level. Turning the rich world and characters into monotonous, empty husks. Noxus with no swain? Graves with NO TWISTED FATE? this could be completely different characters in a universe other than league and it would read exactly the same- it would be still bad but less unbelievably disappointing
Well you could put it as a footnote that he knew or planned part of Viego's fall, as a decoy and ploy to fuel himself with more souls, possibly temporarily break the chains of life&death from the realm of the dead. But yeah, throughout the main story he isn't relevant at all. Any character involving the original ruination of the Blessed Isles is strangely silent and/or absent from the literal fallout it could cause and possible destruction of Runeterra. Also no Janna to protect Zaun while they get "fans", no ASol or other Celestial to protect Targon...
@@damnmanstopmaldinglol6028 there's a comment by @Questionable Logic that i think actually does fit mordekaiser into the lore as basically a benefactor of the ending of the ruined king. I think it'd actually be rly cool.
One thing that really turned me down from the beginning was the writing. It was unbelievable bad, all the options from the player character didn't felt right and he was just there to be bullied by the other characters, it felt really out of place (A player character itself didn't seem to make sense). Dialogues in general were really bad, I generally really like all lore related stuff, but before Targon I simply started skipping everything.
I used to love Riot's lore for League. I was enthralled with it. The thing that really killed that passion for me was Viego. The Ruined King was hinted at and built up for nearly a decade. We could have had this tragically twisted, undead abomination of a King. This horrifying monster spreading and controlling this evil corrupting mist that rended the souls from the living and turned them into dark horrors against their will. But instead we got a pretty boy with his abs out. How they ruined the true potential of the Ruined King, Seraphine just being a revamped Sona rework and them doing my boy Yorick dirty completely killed my fascination for League's story.
As someone who's been reading and enjoying panth, moraganna and akali's lore, learning about this event is kind of a letdown. Especially since panth is in it.
Honestly, I think the higher ups jumped the shark with trying to get as much engagement as possible out of the SoL event. Personally speaking, why would I buy the new Pentakill skin for Yorick/Karthus, or the next new skin for Kalista/Maokai, or whatever, when they did them *this* dirty in their own lore event. Why should I want to buy their new Ruined King RPG, a game in a genre heavily dependent on strong lore, when *this* is the level of care and attention they're willing to put towards storytelling? Time and money will obviously speak for itself, but all the SoL event/visual novel showed me is that Riot products aren't worth the money I'd be spending on them.
That's usually what happen when a company grows too big, investors and marketing basically take over who never had a passion for what x company does in the first place but rather just for the $$$
People who are witnessing WoW Downfall /blizzard downfall have experienced the same thing: The game stops respecting your time, people feel like their time is actively being wasted by the game on purpose. This happened at the Serious player level ( in ranked) and now it s actively design in an evenmt that designed in hostile manner towards casual. We ve seen what that leads to in Blizzard repetitive boring bullshit that will leave you behind if you don t engage in it and it has left people leaving the game like i did, quit both games played other games like ff14 and people flock over because the key thing being that their time and money is respected by the game.
The visual novel format absolutely could have worked for this. Umineko, an 8 part visual novel story, makes use of over a hundred different soundtracks, voice acting, visual effects, dynamic character poses, and the most tried and true tool: artist CG, effectively a still image of the scene which may have a few variations to show a change in what is occurring in real time. its creator certainly did not have nearly as deep a wallet as Riot does. And this isn't even unique to Umineko - so many visual novels have done this and tell great stories, Umineko is just one that pushes the limits of its format to do so. They would have been better off just making a visual novel as a completely different small game. But god knows the higher ups at Riot don't care about interesting stories unless it makes them money.
Best visual novels I can think of are Umineko, The House in Fata Morgana, and Dangan Ronpa. They just push their medium to the absolute limits (in different ways) and it looks and feels amazing.
Skyen, bro. You are, by far, the most well-spoken and thoughtful content creator I’ve come across in the 8~ or so years that I’ve been consuming media of this wild ride that is the League of Legends. I’ve said it before (at least I hope I had?), but GOSH, your takes are some of THE BEST and provide such thorough, healthy critique of whatever media it is that you delve into discussion of. I wish I were as articulate as you so that I can give you the praise you deserve, though eloquent I unfortunately am not :’) Just know that I (and literally thousands of other folks) ADORE you and what you do!!!! Just. Thank you, man. For real.
My issue is that there were so many champions already involved in the setup for the event, and they decided to make an ensemble of unrelated, unimportant characters that end up doing nothing. And they take up so much screen time that none of the actual important characters exist or do anything
This was very insightful. I'm glad I skipped out on the actual event and got a lot caught up with how it went. It saved me a lot of time and heartache lol
I hate how Diana was non existant, aside from the fact that they just ignored her, Aphelios' and Nami's lore. Even the Targon chapter in Rookie's Log Book was about Irelia if you went to Ionia before Targon. Rengar randomly started to talk in third person and basically being his Kitty Pajama Rengar skin. It was just a complete mess how blatantly the characters were there just to be the poor advertisement for their own skin. How they "1 sentile/ruined for each region" but also "oh hey, Graves' in Piltover now", because yes.
I'm wondering what he'll talk about in part 2. Some stuff that comes to my mind: -Inconsistent characterization of the champs -Viego ruining Pantheon when he shouldn't be able to affect a celestial (granted his skin bio says the aspect serves him willingly, but that never comes up in the story). -Where the f**** is everybody? (skyen already talked about this, some absences are understandable, but the sheer number of them feels awkward) -What happened in the Bilgewater chapter -Lucian is ok with Pyke, but Senna isn't, even though Senna is the one who normally shows compassion for the undead -How did the rookie end up in the sentinel hq? -How is Senna accepted as the leader of the sentinels if she had no idea about the abilities of the hq? -How did Thresh become so powerful that all of the sentinels and all of the ruined champs combined loose all hope of fighting him? -Yorick sharing the waters of life a bit too willingly(granted it isn't impossible for him to share them, he just is picky with whom he does it) and then doing nothing, its not even clear if he participated in the last battle or not, also did the sentinels teleport away, leaving Yorick alone with Thresh? -How did Lucian fight Thresh on the shadow isles if he didn't have the waters of life protecting him back then? -Vexs ability to make portals for her allies was scrapped from her kit, so how can she make a portal to camavor just like that? Can she still do it in her lore (cause her bio doesn't mention that) or can all yordles do that now? -Several characters never interact even though it seems like they should (like the maiden and Viego).
I add my pet peeve - WHERE IS KARTHUS. bloody hell that Dude is the biggest SI Simp there is and one might think hed show up when there's fools too kill lol.
I am still pretty mad that Pantheon received non-canon Prestige Skin, which could be nicely made as him overcoming Pantheon's rage and using that power to help Sentinels or something.
also, one terrible point is riot not willing to kill ANY champion. imagine leaving Gwen alive, who's entire character arc is tied to this event. Or even reviving Viego in the cinematic. Kalista, Karthus, Hecarim...man...all to waste
You don’t need a character to be alive fro them to be playable since the actual gameplay is non canon. There is no rule that says only living or undead characters get to be playable. This is a lesson fighting game developers should learn as well.
Na, i dont think killing is necesary to make it interesting. The problem is there is no consecuences. Like. Gp now has a robot arm. Maybe make good 750 rp like thresh with the new canon aspects. But the made everything wrong
@@SuperMaster000X you need to kill someone in this lore, how can u progress character arcs? how can u solve issues btween races? (hello Zed and Xayah) if u always write something knowing that u can't kill someone, it gets too dificult. And you need to give reason to X character to live after a major event.
@@MarianaBello-fq3hx Yeah I get it. But death isnt the answer for everything. Maybe if you want dark story. But not not obligatory for character arcs. For example. What if, Vayne gets her arm or leg cut off by Viego and maokay makes her a prostetic leg of magic roots, now her character arc is the fact she hates magic creatures, but was saved by one, and now was "tainted" like a creature. So yea. I get your point but there is a lot consecuenses that riot didnt exploit. (only the workers lol)
Me, having no idea when this will come out: I could wait an eternity for this video. It's gonna be worth it! Me, now that exact time and date it will come out: Two days!? Why does it have to be so far away!?
I hope they don't try to make a weird non canon story and fanfiction story mashed up, Inside a big canon lore of Runeterra event ever again. Where is Yorick, And is the Ruined King game going to be any better?.
I was so excited to see the Riven and Irelia bit when they finally started actually talking about how they felt, I figured they'd all at least have a moment to help each other kind of round out their flaws, even if its just in the moment. Its clear that those who wrote it had other goals and the gorgeous art/assets made it clear it was supposed to be a major chance to build unique and interesting character interactions and draw interest to their ongoing stories. I wish Riot had at least admitted to what cuts, edits, and rush caused this flop themselves rather than hold their employees as "meatshields"
A little sidenote: Senna was no the experimente, but Kai'Sa. Senna was already a product of positive feedback on preexisting characters coming to LoL as real champions (which is pretty much why they invested on a cinematic and also tied her to True Damage).
You could say the same about Lissandra, but Kai Sa is such a week character in terms of personalities she is miles behind Senna, Yonne and even Lissandra.
and if u think about Kai'sa and Senna are almost the same, a woman that was supposed dead on a inescapable environment (lantern/void) but is actually alive bcause theyr strong will (and lucian help on senna case) and they fight agaisnt an unstoppable force (the isles/void) and they have a strong desire of live and protect others.
I think the only upsides to this event was mostly just to Diana’s whole scenario which was nice imo. Riven and Irelia’s dynamic was great too because I’m glad its not a whole, “I forgive you so we’re buddies now” dynamic between the two the entire time or at the end. Like Irelia really holds that grudge against Riven the entire time which is both realistic to anyone in that given scenario. Irelia does soften up at the end a little towards Riven, but you can tell she still has a little animosity still there. But those are the only “good/passable” aspects of this entire event. It definitely doesnt make the event story good or enough to counteract all of the bad aspects.
Too much influence from the higher ups thats what went wrong, they think that the kore is disposable and then made this not aftwr firing the guy that did the story of pyke Ornn and such. I honestly felt bad for the devs being so much limited on their biggest and most important event because their higher ups
The lore was disposable from the start. Riot MO has always been "make chapter 1, wait a few years, erase chapter 1 and write a new one. Chapter 2 don't exist" sinche The League was an actual element in the story. They always retcon and very rarely devolop.
Imagine working at riot, creating the new cool events and writing lore, just see it all flushed down the toilet and replaced by mediocre garbage because winnie the pooh tugged the leash a bit. I feel bad especially for the art team, Viego is cringe, and I refuse to play him because that kpop singer lookin bitch ain't no king. They had way better concepts for him, but the final word comes from China again cuz muh stocks, so this is what we'll be getting in future. Can't wait for Shaco rework to make em a cute grill with a weird toy collection hobby :^)
Here's my hot take before tb skyen starts talking People say that the visual novel medium wasted the story But I say they wasted the visual novel medium Not once did they take advantage of its strengths to let us have long, personal conversations with any of these characters by choice (although apparently they did it for Wild Rift?) and they never created visual set pieces, they only described them. In every other visual novel the dramatic moments get their own picture like when you fight a vampire or have sex with a vampire, but in SoL they go "There's a massive dramatic arena! And gods are fighting in the heavens! Fuck off if you think we'll draw that though lmao"
I think it would be nice if we can just pick one region and explore those, along with the characters in that said region and how they're trying to fight off the ruination. Shadow Isles could be closed until the final week or something, and we would be able to meet Yorick and co, as well as characters who would've made an impact in their own ways.
I really wanted Riven to go with Irelia back to Ionia at the end of the event. It’s implied that there’s a second Noxian invasion of Ionia coming, and well, what better way for Riven to redeem herself than to fight on the right side this time?
Can we take a moment to appreciate how Yoricks idle pose is so perfect for this video, it just has such an aura of, " really? Are you kidding me right now?".
13:10 it became a meme on /r/yorickmains, because riot said it would be too difficult to add a hat to yorick's new skin and a guy did in a weekend as a mod
Aside from all the things they did wrong for the event in LoL specifically, I wonder why the Ruined King game hasn't released yet. I was almost certain that was gonna be the event finale. Hoping you touch upon that in the video. Regardless, eagerly waiting to watch it.
Ruined King’s studio was flooded, power went out, etc due to Texas infrastructure problems. The studio’s work has been postponed because of this. If the global pandemic and Texas breaking down both didn’t happen, I’m sure we would have gotten Ruined King maybe even in 2020.
With the Shadow Isles being my favourite region of Runeterra and Thresh and Yorick my favourite characters, this event was the final nail in the coffin. It was 90% of the reason I finally stopped playing League because honestly the lore was the only thing keeping me into League after this much time.
Once the event became the second item on the client screen, I completely forgot about the story. Boring text to click through, cringy protagonist, disabled all story and just skipped through to get the awards.
I'm sorry but that Pantheon stuff is just hilarious to me, because the FREE FAN MADE VISUAL NOVEL for freaking RWBY of all things puts more god damn effort into selling its fights against hordes of evil monsters
After the event, I logged off to never return. Riot failed incomensurable to me, and I started playing by 2013 when Lissandra was released and she was my favorite back then, along with LeBlanc and Swain. What kept me hooked for so long was story and good character design, boy oh boy I loved playing with the new Urgot and Yorick, cuz they are good "monsters" in both aspects I mentioned. I hated the Lucius Malfoy Swain, it felt so special the old version walking with a cane to turn into a demon bird, and his story of endurance after the ionian war and winning the leadership over Noxus with cunning was inspirational to a certain degree... But after Spirit Blossom I honestly don't understand what went wrong, but definitely the game fell F-L-A-T. To try solace myself for spending so much time of my life playing this game, I think that I'll never have to spend energy on it ever again. The money and time won't come back, but not one once will be further spent.
funny enough, i came back after SoL so I never even knew about it. though, I guess i'm not too big on the lore since they never expand on my character in terms of lore, like shaco, zyra and zil. I would love more lore on shaco, but that is as likely as maokai and yorick getting a bigger lore.
41:50 It would've been wildly interesting if they had actually had a bunch of characters (let's say 5) on the Sentinel side and according to whether you get the favour of ones or others, you go fight Viego with Senna, Lucian, maybe Gwen (because of her having a piece of Isolde herself) and a couple who actually make a difference on what you do. That would've made the story interesting and more well-balanced (as you don't have dozens of Sentinels to move around) and also would've made people feel and have agency, which would've moved the mouth to mouth and pushed people to get into the lore and the game.
21:36 I’m always impressed with your integrity, Skyen. You’re very up-front about how the system works and how manipulative it is (and encourages you to be), which is one reason why I watch you. I don’t even play League, but I will give YOU my engagement because you deliver great content with no clickbait, low-effort tripe or BS. Despite not having one 1000tg the money Riot has to throw around, you did what they were too cowardly to do: delayed a big, buzz-heavy product that could have made you a lot more ad revenue because you wanted to make it the best possible. I salute you.
I actually like idea of using visual novels in lol. It gives extra level of interaction and if used right it can expand of the lore and give more love to unloved characters. I mean doing right would be amazing
For the say something nice, I found the joke where Olaf convinces Pyke that he drowned him to be really funny, since they're both practically immortal, and Pyke might be one of the few things capable of killing Olaf. Whether it is an honourable death remains to be seen but desperate times call for desperate measures.
What pissed me off so much with this event was that Riot ignored their lore and the shit that actually made sense for money. Riven is the only character that actually made sense to join the sentinels. Everyone makes zero sense. Why would Diana join this organization when she has trauma from big organizations like the Solari? Why would Vayne who is very anti-magic join this magic based organization? None of it made any sense to me. They did it becaues these characters were popular so they made the weirdest skins with the weirdest lore.
It"s funny, I enjoyed Spirit Blossom so much that I would actively grind to get to new parts of the character stories, even despite the fact that my enjoyment of the game has been actively decreasing since season 5. It gave me a new source of engagement and fun, and I was looking forward to more like it. Then they came out with the Ruined King, and I ended up forgetting to progress because I just didn't care after a certain point. I had no investment, and surprise surprise, the amount I played dipped hard. Also, in regards to the event, I find it hilarious that Akshan basically wields Chekov's Gun.
Oh boy I sure love going to a region, seeing the fetter, having someone take it, recruiting a new sentinel, leaving, repeating that like 9 times. Then seeing yorick for 5 minutes
Even with everything holding this event back, even with the limited format, cut characters and narrative designed around grinding, this event could have been so much more. It pleases me to see that so many people other than myself have put in the time and effort to imagine this event differently. As far as I’m concerned, the fan canon is the true SoL event.
Everything felt wrong, there's magical god like beings and they choose girl with flying knives, another girl with big sword, a guy with 2 pistols, a guy with crossbow, a girl with big crossbow, a living doll with giant scissors, and a zombie with a big gun to fight, like seriously
The positive thing I like about the event: 1.Gwen lore and character is pretty neat. 2.Akshan lore and character is great enough for me. 3.Sentinel Jinx art exist.
Akshan Lore and Character is very cool if you imagine its completely seperate universe from everything else - then Light Warrior Gone Rogue on Vengeful spree with giga busted weapon effect is cool af... sadly its part of massively bigger universe where he seems pointless, acting like a vilain yet being forced to being a hero and with a weapon that makes shit ton of plotholes and doesnt allow to build tension. Also Gwen didnt get any Lore progression during that event (except her release bio ofc) so I'd argue that its just a cool character of her that makes her cool. The idea of object becoming sentient due to its owner's soul is cool... sucks we didnt explore more of how Gwen feels about being 'her own person' now, especially after Isolde was killed-killed.
@@baxland2539 Wym, Gwen got some wonderful lore progression when Riot decided to replace some of her best voice lines for no good reason after the event.
I'm still SO upset about Gwen during the event. I loved her character from the moment she was announced, and was SO hyped for her to be part of the event, and then she did literally NOTHING. Not even a lore skin to at least make my wallet cry and my shitty capitalism mindset happy, just subpar space groove skin from her initial release. All Gwen did was sit there and look pretty, despite having all the potential to be a crucial part of the story and confronting Viego. I just want my pretty doll lady to be significant please riot i am on my knees
They did Gwen dirty. I'm still salty that she got one of the worst skinlines and her skin looks like garbage. At least the new cafe skin is cute. Not to mention, she is nerfed to death and has the worst win rate in top lane now.
Loved the FFXIV analogy it solves the issue of engagement with story and writing and carefully spaced out duty finder quests so that they aren't so common that they get dull or the narrative tension fades because of a queue time
Sad to figure that I read every piece of the spirit blossom event and once we got to sentinels, id thumbed through one chapter got half way through the second and noticed the pattern and flatter interactions between the player and character and wound up skippping through the entire thing after. Shame too because it included more areas that I find interesting than Ionia but (shrug)
I won't deny I sometimes wonder WHAT the story could have been, til this day Sometimes I feel the urge to try to write... Maybe a version where rookie is less the PERSON WHO GOES WITH THEM, and more... The sentinel blacksmith on a base. The one who bust Lucian morals, the one which makes the weapon of each new champion and bounds with each one while working or asking how did it goes Maybe in the latter chapters, will did GO WITH THEM because they need the Sentinel Blacksmith on the field to forge and repair something! I don't know. Would made more easy to TELL the story and not try to make action in a format (and with resources) to only tell dialogue. And DAMN a Sentinel Blacksmith would be COOL
The event is a massive "f*ck you" to Maokai and Yorick like seriously Pyke and Rengar? That little twist that they made where the good guys turn evil while the Anti-Hero/Neutral type characters turns into good guys are just poor writting trying to tweak the narrative into something different. And also I'm a Rengar main, the way they did his character and Other Champions didn't help either. But hey atleast they're at the event right? Except don't have any relation to the story whatsoever with only the exception that they exist in the same universe with the others. While Maokai and Yorick who's presence is crucial to the story didn't even get nothing. But hey there's not much player base that mains Yorick and Maokai so they pretty much didn't lose that much money.
The ruination could have been a Netflix animated series where each episode is a region, with each subject of the Ruined King affecting each region, like Hecarim attacking Demacia, Kalista attacking bilgewater, karthus attacking noxus, etc
Say something nice: The spirit blossom event was lovely. Fantastic video, summing up what went wrong here extremely well. We can't let management hide from what happened here just because a dozen writers with probably 4 hours of sleep between them had to figure out a way to justify ruined pantheon and they couldn't do it. Management steered them straight into that plot hole.
The first 1,000 people to use this link will get a 1 month free trial of Skillshare: skl.sh/tbskyen10211
Quick note Skyen, you wrote "with a dead with" instead of "with a dead wife" on the youtube chapter... thingy. Just wanted to let you know.
@@t-1156 Fixed! Good catch!
@@TBSkyen Yay :D.
Btw, good video overall. Also, quick curiosity question : on the community post where you announced that video, I commented that imo, there were some casting mistakes among the Sentinels. Now, talking purely interactions potential and character dynamics: would there be any sentinels you'd replace ? For instance, I had replaced :
Diana with Aphelios
Riven with Darius
Pyke with Graves (For Bilge)
Graves with Seraphine (for PnZ).
Whoever the bandle champ was with Heimer
@T B Skyen hey wanted to ask since the last raodmap im pretty sure the event was rushed because they have the next event about arcane in making. Whats your opinion on this?
I agree with the vid but i want to point out that Kai'sa was the first character seemingly pulled from the lore, not Senna.
Maybe the real Sentinels of Light are the Fix-it Fanfics that we wrote along the way.
Shoutout to the fic i saw where tf got ruined and THAT was graves' motivation for the event
@@somedragonbastardBro I need you to drop that fic title/link, I wanna give it a read
@somedragonbastard sorry for commenting this late after you posted, BUT what's the name of the fan fiction or could you send a link please?
Ruined tf is such a good concept. Sad I've only ever found three fics that use the concept
@@minichad5456 I tried digging for it, but I couldn't find it again. Sorry
Riot: "So Lucian makes a deal with Thresh-"
Everyone: "NO! NO COME ON NO! REDO THE EVENT REDO THE DAMN EVENT!"
Wait.. what?
@@mpbiggame1010 yep that happened
And what was the deal? Thresh says "You know the Absolver? Well it exists"
@@rafaelsousa2633 Lucian gave him a piece of Isolde’s soul if I’m not mistaken in return
What the deal should have been: you stay dead, and I won't have to kill you again
Can we also talk about how everyone was so pumped to imagine Vayne and Poppy working together - Vayne, who hates magic, working with the hero of Demacia who is a MAGICAL CREATURE??
It also would have pushed a yordle's story forward by having Poppy actually get over her humility to step in to be the HERO for Demacia.
Just... why advertise her IN A CINEMATIC if she's not actually going to play a part in the story!? (sob)
Watched the cinematic as a low ELO Poppy main. "OH HELL YEAH!" Watched like three scenes of the VN and saw that Poppy wasn't even MENTIONED in the Demacia chapter, immediately checked out of the plot and only farmed for rewards.
IKR! It sucks to cause Sentinel Vayne says she sent poppy an invite to join her with the sentinels but roit had her say no :(
didnt riot confirm that from the POV of humans that yordles look like people, it's just from our perspective that we see them next to each other like that. That's how they explained why yordles like Heimer can teach in piltover and nobody questions it.
I'm also annoyed vayne was portrayed as a good character, like they didn't address her kayle like "justice"
@@EnbyAndromeda this has been retconed in current lore, Heimer has a statue of himself as a Yordle in Piltover, and he is clearly looked DOWN on Arcane, not to mention other yordle characters that appear in the show, same for other Yordle related cinematics that appeared on the last 2 years iirc, Yordles just look like Yordles right now and don't need disguises.
For the "Say Something Nice" section: I liked when Yorick takes a minute to give Isolde her last rites.
Another: I *loved* Ruined Draven's fight in his arena:
_"What's this? It seems Draven is REACHING FOR SOMETHING IN HIS BELT... Yes! He's got.. MORE AXES!!!"_
It's silliness contrasted jarringly, it broke the fourth wall; all that was so perfect for spotlighting a Draven dialled to eleven.
I'd also like to add the moment where Diana is slowly being consumed by the Ruination in that one cave, because of the feeling that there's nothing she can do to help the Lunari, then two Lunari women appear hidden in the cave, and as the two Lunari regain their hope after seeing their "god" after them, feeling saved and safe, Diana regains her hope as well. I think that was a very good moment. I almost drop a tear.
*VEX*
@@chloethespider6298 That was a good scene as an isolated story bit. Majority of Diana's story is focused on her unsuccesfully searching for the Lunari. So when two Lunaris just popped up randomly Diana's goal was achieved without any effort. This narratively ruined (no pun intended) all her previous attempts.
I was so disappointed that Olaf turned out to be comic relief. His story and motivations are fairly simple, but the idea of fighting Viego is one of the things that fits perfectly for him. He *wants* to die a glorious death and find his peace that way, the Black Mist is the antithesis of that: it devours you like a helpless victim, like the sickness and age he desperately wants to _not_ die to, and denies those afflicted their final rest. And just like Viego he tries to change the course of destiny.
They could've went further into his reverence for what he considers a "proper way to go" and how his culture puts a lot of emphasis on honor in death. Could've led to some interesting moments with Yorick as well.
Everyone in the visual novel felt like comic relief though 🙄
@@queendeborah14172 truuuuuuuueeee
Yeah.. idk why they turned Olaf, Regar, Graves and Pyke into comic relief. I can't stand the new ultimate skin of Graves because of this.. so I never bought it even tho I own all Graves skins. Senna turned out to be quite the battleaxe and I seriously have 0 idea how Lucian can take so much abuse and still have feelings like that its surreal as far as narratives go. The other characters were mostly fine minus MF selling out, I liked Vayne & Thresh and the new skins they had. Story sucked tho, especially Viego's simping.. he didn't turn out to be a compelling tragic villain.. more like pathetic and forgettable. They really screwed over Yorick and neither Kalista nor Heckarim made an appearance. Considering how they tie into Viego's story.. they should have been included with skins. What a missed opportunity, bad narrative design and weird personality shifts in characters.
Bruh, almost everyone was comic relief.
Olaf - Wants to get his death battle, can't, has nothing to do other than make jokes
Rengar - Dumb cat hunter now
Pyke - Insane undead clown posse
Akshan - hides sorrow with jokes (Ok to be one)
Graves - First time his new "himbo" personality was in league and not in a cinematic. (semi-ok to be one)
@@SaiKisaragi I quite liked Rengo but yeah right on every point.
So hyped for this, seriouslys so much potential for a event that felt FLAT.
Flat? It crashed like a meteorite
Even my flat chest got flatter
This was a fan fiction lvl story written by a 14 year old schoolgirl.
It caved in
Not flat it went bellow the ground
Two days?!
I have to keep myself busy until then.
"continue to be unhappy that the pentakill event ends without any extra content, no imotes, no tokens, no yorick's hat."
also no pentakill Rell :(
WE DEMAND YORICKS HAT AS MERCH!
Just wanted pentakill Rell to be honest
To be fair, they teased another pentakill album saying that they were in the clear, for now... They might bring viego and rell black and rell being the new rival singer along with viego
@@senhorbolacha3336 where did they tease another album?
Fact they didnt put yorick in even though his lore literally revolves around it is beyond me
They did my boy dirty 😓
Everyone that's not marketable is gonna be given the Yorick treatment.
It should have been yorick And the army he has been building and the sentinels of light fighting along side him in his life long mission. But it was yorick showing up for 2 frames to do the one thing he would never do.
@@gravelor78 cries in Quinn fan ;-;
@@nate8808 yorick should have been like Gandalf appearing at dawn at the battle of Helm's Deep. The heroes struggling and he appears with his army of ghouls holding off Viego's and turning the tide.
I remember how Sentinel Graves' lines said something about Illaoi's influence keeping Pyke co-operative, and then she was never referenced in the event.
probably in the game tbh
Maybe in ruined king something will happen...
Pyke being in this event makes absolutely no god damn sense with his lore.
They made an assassin who is a tortured soul manipulated by evil into a shiny mummy of a comic relief character.
Like... Yeah we pyke mains know he's a joke at the moment but show some respect riot...
@@pmangano Pyke and Rengar were easily the more likeable of the SoL champions
Honestly my biggest fear with how this event ended up is that Riot will see the reaction and decide to never do anything like this again. The fact we even got a lore event progressing the narrative forward is sick and I would much rather they learn from their errors and improve upon what did work and try again sometime.
But knowing Riot they'll just do their best to pretend this whole thing never happened and we'll never get a lore event again.
Well, looks like next year is about the Piltover & Zaun conflict; it's champion releases are being done in the same way as this year, so second chance?
Also you gotta love how Riot rectified Senna’s character by making her more than a fridged wife, but then they doubled down and made two more fridged women for the Ruination event (Isolde and Shadya). I guess they didn’t learn from their first success.
But still there was more whining about protecting Senna and that Senna should be careful and not be alone so did they really learn anything? Especially since Senna is probably the only person with that much knowledge about the mist (on the “good side”)
If anything Lucian sounded just as creepily obsessed and overprotective as viego.
@@Julia-py9mk I mean, Lucian lost his wife for years. It makes perfect sense that he’d be overprotective of Senna.
He’s not framed as CORRECT for being overprotective, he’s framed as a man who doesn’t want to lose the love of his life for a second time, and is reasonably emotionally distraught about the thought of her dying.
But yeah fridging Isolde and Shadya was oof.
@@cartoonishidealism582
There’s a difference between being scared of losing the love of your life and trying to control what your partner does especially telling her what she can and what she can’t do. That ain’t cute no matter how much he means well.
Also Senna made it pretty clear that she didn’t appreciate him acting like that so..
@@cartoonishidealism582
“He’s not framed to be correct”
Well this is a fictional story. It’s pretty easy to write a character that’s worried about and wanting to protect someone without taking it to the extreme which is unfortunately what happens in this event. She’s a person, she doesn’t belong to him.
Also it isn’t just one time it was in every segment, EVERY single one. Also I’m not entirely sure since it’s just written dialogue but from the way it’s written he seems pretty aggressive and it’s just like, what does this have to do with the story? Does it push anything forward that he literally won’t let Senna make decisions for herself and getting mad at her when she tries to?
Idk if you’re a woman or not but as a woman myself it just made me very uncomfortable and I’ve seen a lot of others agree.
Isolde & Shadya at least bring different angles to the damsel in distress notion. I mean, isn’t the whole event about second guessing this trope?
Isolde’s arc is that she doesn’t want to be rescued. Shadya is similar, but provides a different role to Akshan, as a mentor & motherly figure rather than a partner or object.
‘I should’ve paid more attention to Shadya’s lessons’ is a voice line that comes from Akshan when he dies, & it just gives off a very different energy to Senna & Isolde.
*Targon:* This is a land of powerful magic that reaches into the celestial realm, where god-like beings from the heavens walk among us. If any land has the power to ward off the Black Mist, surely it is this one.
*Piltover:* Ha ha, fans go brrrrr
The fanbase: PnZ isn't covered in mist. Surely Janna is protecting the people there.
Riot: Janna who? Nah PnZ get fans.
@@ponchobosque5019 yeah, i was hyped for "literal wind spirit defends an entire city from the black mist" but she doesn't even get an off-hand mention. she's literally the guardian spirit of zaun, and a wind spirit, and nothing.
@@watchfulwanderer6443 I would not be surprised if the majority or the writers have forgotten she exists, hell I forget she exists until I get the rare game when someone plays her.
Imagine if ASol was there:
AS: *What is a glowing ant doing on my mountain?*
Viego: "ISOLDE!!" _(flings mist at ASol)_
AS: _smites viego with the power of a thousand suns_
@@LucarioredLR He wouldn't even need that as a reason.
(*Black Mist covers Runeterra*)
ASol: "What an ugly creation." (*Star Breaths Mist*) "Now it's less hideous."
The only way I see this whole event as canon is as Akshan telling it to some random stranger while being drunk, oversimplifying things and wanting to make himself more important, like the story recaps on League's UA-cam channel.
Chapter 3 literally starts with him saying "Let's see, what else they tell me." meaning that everything before he got involved could be completely made up.
Akshan's story and his part in this story as a whole is something I very much dislike.
When I read his bio + story I was suprised how his whole motivation was resolved in the first story he got. Also he has absolutely no connection to Viego or anything else in this story besides that he is a Sentinel.
I also find his gun to be way to powerful as an item in the lore, you could resolve pretty much every story with it. You don't like that someone killed someone else? Just kill that person and the other one lives again. I mean it's a gun, a grapple hook and it revives people? Overdesigned much? He literally seems like a fanfiction OC that can do anything and is the key to everything.
I accept that the base story happened but I don't really want to be reminded of it.
Once money gets involved, everything else suffers.
I’m still very confused on how his gun even works. Like, if the scoundrel kills someone else does it stop working? It’s implied that it wears out? Do they come to life on the spot or at the place where they died or where their body is? Maybe these questions were all answered but I personally was left confused.
@@queendeborah14172 When even Aphelios is confused about his gun then you know something is wrong.
Jokes aside, his weapon is barely explained on how it works.
It's just bad.
now I want to see a drunk akshan
@@queendeborah14172 no so let's say this.
Viego kills senna and THEN Gwen, and akshan kills viego with the gun. the gun only revives the last person he killed, so this senna would be still dead and Gwen would be revived. in game it works differently than what the more says I think
I've made a video called "Rise of the Sentinels - Final chapter fixed" (cocky I know XD) with what I think the Shadow Isles canon version couldve been, would love the feedbak. About Akshan I would dedicate the whole Shurima episode to him making him confront Viego in Shurima.
The real tragedy is that the Ruined King game is gonna suffer due to this. I was so excited to play it when it was announced, but now I have a hard time getting hyped for it as I’m just so tired of the Ruination and I doubt I’m alone.
I dont expect anything about that game not for the Sentinels event, justo they didnt updated with new info since the last year (And was a post on Instagram saying Happy new year XD)
@@floraleaf1970 Yeah, actually seems to be stuck in dev. hell. Same thing for the Ekko Platformer, or the LoL fighter, or the diablo-like game. Quite a few games not making any progress really.
We got more news about Kindom Hearts 3 over it's development than those
@@optidalfprime3904 I think when riot stop giving any info of the new games/reworks is a really bad think, cause all the hype just... D:
@@optidalfprime3904 they did announce recently that the fighting game is getting a developer update in November, so that's something
@@floraleaf1970 Good news is that theres a rumor that Project L (also know as street fighter LOL game) is on the works now so…yeah gotta take a while then.
I was personally really disappointed when Pantheon's prestige skin was made to be non-canon. Him overcoming Viego's mind control and turning into a new powerful being would have been so cool to see and would have progressed his personal story forward in a really cool way.
It was more of an “Unbound Pantheon” to me because. His trying to find a choice and only one option remains to be free from the mind control,to use the celestials powers which something he have sworn an oath not to do because he hates gods.
That sounds a bit out of character for him. Like, his whole concept is "badass man overcomes god with nothing but willpower" and turning him into new god breaks the concept.
Also he’s the embodiment of perseverance and overcoming an overwhelming foe, so this doesn’t make much sense for pantheon to just be corrupted and just be a one note goon for Viego. Just disappointing.
I'm surprised no one is talking about Pantheon. His lore is that he overtook a god as a man by sheer willpower alone. But here he's just a prop, so disappointing and situations like these make me not want to be invested in lore because what's the point of caring about a story if it's just going to be canonically butchered for the sake of profit?
@@lordcommissarthomas1922 From what i can tell the black mist corrupts those that are in a negative state or emotions, so this is probably the reason why Pantheon’s hatred had let him vulnerable to Viego.
One of my biggest problems is the *MASSIVE* over-use of mind control in the story IMO.
In some cases, like Shyvana, it might actually be used to advance the story, so okay, I think it's warranted. However, *mind control inherently means that a character has to, temporarily, stop being themselves and do something else.* In a character oriented game like League of Legends that sells itself upon the backs of 150+ different power fantasies _(well, sometimes different power fantasies)_ having your *FIRST STORY EVENT* involving a good number of those characters get their personalities violated feels extremely out of order, and against the game's main narrative selling point of being character driven.
I'd forgive it _if it wasn't_ for the fact that Viego has no shortage of Champions who are already more than willing to work for him. Why do we need to violate Atreus' power fantasy of being able to survive a god-killing attack through sheer force of will, and _simultaneously_ deny Hecarim his day of reckoning by Viego's side, kicking ass and taking names?
oh wait $kins
Thank you for pointing out the Atreus thing. A man that already has been mind-controlled before, who through the sheer power of human will managed to stay alive while a literal aspect was killed, somehow just gets mind controlled again? With NO sign that he is fighting back?
Imagine if the way they beat pantheon was by Atreus fighting back the mind control. We know he's been mind controlled before, and we know he has an incredible fighting will, so why the fuck aren't they using his main character trait in the story?
@@muselikesminecraft Can you imagine the absolute money pantheon skins would get if he was basically the man who could not be kept under control during this massive event? Like, he's a mortal (ostensibly) and breaks out of viegos mind control from sheer force of will
@@ArchiveTheMyth Like his Prestige skin? Which was explicitly stated to *not* be canon _despite the fact that the other Prestige skins have nothing that would suggest they aren't canon?_
If riot couldnt make time for all the side characters in their own story, then why add so many pointless characters to the event? Why make this big deal how they had to tell 3 different versions of the same story but with versions of the Sentinels that are tailored to those specific games with characters that have no impact on the story? Why not just make the Sentinels like the 3 champs you want to have cross appeal with the phone game, and the base game then just add in the characters that were already a part of it? Like hell make UnRuined Moakai, or Restored Kalista or like a battle ready Yorick? why did we need a tacked on Pyke, Rangar, or Olaf if all they cared about was Graves, Irrelia, and Rivan?
im sorry, i actually LOVE all of those champs and mained them all in the past but i HAD to laugh, u named 3 champs that really won't sell at all. Finding the balance between lore relevance and skins sells might be pretty hard but i agree that they should have told stories about those who actually had interesting stories to tell regardless of who got skins or not. Its like they made MORE work for themselves by not just taking the simple route. They didn't need to make all those skins to waste writing time on if only a few mattered ur right, but i'd argue that Olaf could have been important considering he was in the last Shadow Isles story in Bilgewater.
Why, why tell me why?
They wanted a sentinel from each region. Except Piltover and Zaun for… some reason.
@@okidoxb4846 Nobody cares about Riot unfilling pockets, this event is the living will of that. There has been a following playerbase for 10 years now and they just expected that they would follow a fanfic try of a lore
To sell skins
I loved the concept of the harrowing.
I used to say "happy harrowing" when I played around Halloween.
I was big into monster horror, I made my yt channel specifically to comment on horror videos. I was hype to finally get some legit horror story.
But when Viego released and I saw the direction they were going my enthusiasm steadily drained until I saw the start of the event itself and it essentially killed my love of the harrowing.
Viego's release doesn't really have any problems. It's just that they fucked up the event
Yeah, they really ruined the harrowing. Just remember how it was portrayed during the release of Kallista and in this one cinematic with the puppeteer and compare that to the sentinel of light event.
I will never forgive riot for what they did with the harrowing
@@randomdude2026 tbh their opening cinematic for the ruined king event was pretty exciting. The harrowing hitting Demacia? Ionia? Mismatched poppy and Vayne teaming up for survival against undead ghouls? The mist infecting the most powerful sacred being in the magical land of Ionia?
What incredible implications.
Maybe even agents of Demacia and noxious would have to team up to cleanse their lands. Maybe even that would force an alliance when mordekaiser breaks free.
It'd be a shame if.... THEY DIDN'T EXPLORE THAT AT ALL
Or Kalista or thresh or Yorick or Maokai or anything else they ever set up.
Wait no I'll give some credit. The thresh cinematic was pretty good.
@@aneonfoxtribute still kinda dissapointed the ruined king is a TikTok Eboy though
I'm fairly used to reading visual novels, and Riot really has no excuse about things like the battle scenes. Plenty of the VNs I've read have extensive, epic battles that go on for several minutes with descriptions so intense you can clearly visualize the fight in your head without the aid of any cutscene or artwork beyond the original characters' sprites. This is not an intrinsic problem of VNs, Riot just didn't let the scenes unfold as they should because it would risk people spending less time playing as chapters would go on for longer and you'd probably need more frequent breaks.
VNs are hardly any different to reading a book. Yes, the format has its limitations, but it's more than capable of telling the story of the Sentinels of Light properly. Riot just didn't care about telling the story as much as they cared about you spending hours upon hours on farming for a 20-boxes cutscene and the most ridiculously small event reward per chapter ever given.
There's so much interest I can put in a story that's divided in a "Where is the feather?" / "Oh, no! The feather!" / "Oh, no! The feather!" / "Oh, no! The feather!" / "Oh, no! The feather!" / "Aw, we lost another feather" structure.
Yeah, even in vns not centered around battle, there are more well made scenes of it.
Dies irae ftw
Honestly, I'd love to see a "Building a Better Sentinels of Light" video in the future. A complete retelling of the story, how the event would be handled across all these mediums etc etc. Of course this would be a huge undertaking for you, but it would be great to see what you could come up with.
YESSIR
YES PLEASE!!!
I'm still mad about Rengar and Pyke being completely different people from what they are supposed to be.
rengar and pyke being comic relief characters felt so off
Especially after seeing Pyke in ruined king
Writing this before the premier because I've been thinking about it way to much:
Imagine, if you will, a slightly different ending to the Ruination.
After Viego's fall at the hands of the Sentinels, the mist did actually dissipate a fair bit.
While yes, Thresh, the self appointed new king of the Isles, through his (Was that ever explained? I forgot what he did. Absorb...souls for power?) Unbinding was able to bend a crude, medicore version of the ichor that flowed out Ruined King's heart to his will, for all intents and purposes, the Black Mist was gone. The thousands of millions of damned souls trapped in between life and death within the mist for centuries were free, with Yorick being there to guide them to their final resting place.
What ever happened to these souls?
Well, some with a strong enough will stayed, such as Kalista as there will always be betrayers in the world.
-Hecarim along with Karthus begrudgingly now follow Thresh.-
-(Truth be told, due to Riot's policy that playable champions must be "active" on Runeterra I'm kinda handwaving lore bits for the sake of sticking to it. I might rewrite parts if I can come up something more plausible.)-
Hecarim and Karthus splintered off into their own sects on the isles with their own followers, refusing to accept Thresh' rule. Thresh in his hubris ignored their treachery as would crush them under his heel eventually, but for now, he'll enjoy his kingdom and freedom. (Thanks to @A for gving me the final push to change the previous roles for Karthus and Hecarim)
But majority of those souls were whisked off to the afterlife, but even then, after all this time some thought what could possibly be awaiting them on the other side?
It was simple.
Mordekaiser.
You see, the Iron Revenant had known about the King's affront to nature and thought about intervening but he saw an opportunity, as oddly, the Black Mist was extraordinarily similar to Mordekaiser's own Dark Magic. (NOTE: This is just to give plausibility to Mordekaiser recieving the souls rather than them going elsewhere. If you have better ideas, let me know)
If he let this child's tragic love fester, eventually, some would rise to stop him, as did those who tried to stop the conquests of the great Sahn-Uzal long ago. And once that day came, all those specters tainted by the mist would be sent to where they belong.
And now that they were here, it was time to put his plan into motion.
PS: Also pretend I wrote a rewrite where:
Vayne's disdain for magic is made as clear as it was in the comics (she tried to kill Senna at first).
Diana was in Ionia and doesn't have her blade and at first joined the Sentinels to guide them through Targon and then bounce but then after seeing what Viego does to Pantheon decides to join them.
The way Piltover warded off the mist wasn't fans but something more plausible (not saying much) like massive magic dome powered by a huge collection of hextech crystals, or as @Meg Lee-Jim suggested, Janna helping to keep the mist at bay, likely pushing herself to her limits.
Pyke isn't played for a "IS HE ON THE LIST!?" joke (becuase if if any of the jokes were played straight Pyke would have likely murdered half of the Sentinels).
PS PS:
Miss Fortune would also stay the same because without the context of the Ruined King game, we don't really have any idea how stupid her thought process was.
I don't doubt it was stupid, though.
This is great! Thanks for sharing
What about Janna helping ward off the mist as well?
Correction, Karthus will never follow Thresh. He state himself very clear that what Thresh does is unacceptable and naive.
Minor issue with Mordekaiser is that only those that died to him go this his Death Realm, all others go through the normal process ala dying to the spirits of death (Kindred and all its other representations), so Mordekaiser wouldn't be able to gather/absorb all those souls from the Shadow Isles.
@@user-bg8ep3gy5o i have been trying to think about alternatives to following Thresh because yeah nobody likes, and at first I thought about instead of them following Thresh they splinted off into their own "tribes" but I felt that would make the Shadow Isles a bit too close to Freljord so at the time I decided against it.
However giving it some more thought, it makes Thresh into more of a king by name that nobody truly respects but puts up with, which is very much in line with how everyone interacts with him.
What's so frustrating about the Sentinels of Light event is that it was SO CLOSE to being good. The parts that were good shine like diamonds in the rough but they're burried under all the plot holes and comedy hijinks that seem to only exist to scream "BUY MORE SKINS!" at the player.
It's like watching a movie and having it be interrupted by product placements. Like "oh no we can't defeat The Ruined King™️ but with the power of Sentinel Rengar ™️ (sponsored by Walmart) we can defeat him for the low low price of $4!"
Maybe with a red bull we could fly to bring kayle to help us
need more kromer
One point id like to add that personally peeved me a bit was how unsympathetically the confrontation of Viego and Isolde was brushed aside. I wont lie I was primarily interested in the event because of Viego and I was interested to see if his character would have any kind of redemption and or resolution at the climax. Instead we got a few lines of text of Isolde basically saying "Your evil, I don't love you now let me die". As someone who was interested in this story from the shadow isles side of it, it was really disappointing to see that Viego (and all of the shadow isles characters) did not get the satisfying conclusion I feel like they all deserved.
I completely agree. They did all the Shadow Isles champs, even Viego, dirty. I really expected a confrontation between Viego and Isolde..but it was executed poorly. She basically said what everyone else said to Viego. I thought she'd at least be a bit more understanding. Isolde was barely a character tbh.
It was so bad I honestly just wanted Viego to win after a while. The most interesting part of the entire event was him and it felt impossible to root for the sentinels.
They still did him dirty, I feel like viego is getting way too much hate just because the event was bad (which isn’t because of his character) and that he was busted in game.
Also the entire Simp shit. People whining about mordekaiser being better than viego is just hilarious. In what world is mordekaiser better than viego design and character wise?
Ah yes mordekaiser angry and evil and want to kill everyone because he’s angry and evil and he looks like a black and green tin can.
Whereas viego actually has motivation and even though I don’t support obsessive love I think a lot of us can relate or understand to how shitty it would feel to not be able to be with someone you love.
@@Julia-py9mk FINALLY SOMEONE SAID IT THANK YOU SO MUCH . Like what's with all the angry mordkaiser fanboys they say that viego "sToLe mOrDkAiSeR rOlE " when he didn't fanboys are just angry that there favourite angry revenent was not the centre of the story , viego is NOTHING like mordkaiser he's not after destroying the world just to rule it because he thinks he deserves it he's using a deeadly force to bring back the person he cared about the most because he has no other option and doesn't care what he has to do in order to get his wife back he's and mordkaiser's motives are so deferent and there personalitys and Lores are deferent they don't have the problem that Seraphine and sona have they are entirely deferent character's with viego in my opinion having a better story , I am definitely gonna get attackers for saying that but mordkaiser is boring and I don't understand why people like him and want him to be the main star of the game and even go as far as saying that he should have been the ruined king without creating viego (as if sacrificeing the world for love suite his personality, they are ignoring what the ruined king is about and just want their golden revenent to be the one and only king of undeath ). mordkaiser is every lord of undead trope roled into one and he's just your typical bad guy who is evil just for the sake of being evil , I admit he isn't as boring as other Champs but viego is more interesting and more complex than him, he's a young spoiled prince who all of the sudden was forced to become a king even though he didn't want to or cared about it than he found love and happiness with Isolde and when she was diyeig right before he's eyes he was willing to do anything to save her wich I find understandable and relateable because how many of us have lost someone we love and we're willing to do anything to get them back, than he acedently got powers he doesn't like but decided to use it to find he's beloved , he's story could have dealt with themes like love and romance, grief,deppresion, the burden of expectations , haveing to handle way to many responsibilitys at a young age without being prepared , being manipulated during a vanerable state , the lose of identity and sanity , and he has a interesting concept of a normal person being acedently invested with a dark powerful force something I feel leauge dosent have much of apart from Zoe but where Zoe's narrative is childishe and comedic viego is dark and deppresed , what about mordkaiser? UHHHH he's evil ......he got mad that he didn't get a reward for being evil ......he decided to reward himself ( I don't get the Brazil joke) .....he got powers and decided to murder everything because.......... he's evil... , he has no personal relationship with any characters and no LeBlanc and rell don't count , compare that to viego , he's what Lucian And to some extent ledros could have been (would have been nice to see that explored more beyond just a few words her and there RIOT) , he has a personal relationship and beaf with kalista and hecarim, Thresh and he's a big part of their stories along with yorick and maokai and gwen (to bad all of it was wasted), the shadow isels are MUCH MORE INTERSTING than mordy's death realm because they explore themes of a lose of identity and living with only your worst single trait and your other good traits get washed away from you and the story of how it was created is the result of multiple indevelies and it effected them In deferent ways and had others caught in it , what is mordkaiser's death realm is about ? What themes does it have ? What do people like about it so dang much about ? it's just a ticking time bomb that you would need plot Armor to servives (with how much riot Nerfed the shadow isels and black mist I can easily see them doing the same with mordkaiser and the void they better not dare to touch the watchers ) . I admit there is nothing wrong with a character being evil just for the sake of being evil but viego is more interesting than mordkaiser, he has effects on other characters while mordkaiser is just evil on his own so I don't understand why people like him that much and hate viego that much and attack anyone who likes him . Viego is a good character and he could have been one of league's most complex and interesting villians and HE MOST DEFINITELY didn't deserve what happened to him in the event and riot should give him a second chance with cabeable writers rather than leaving him and all of the shadow isels characters in the dast
Sorry if this was way too long I just CAN'T forgive riot for what they did with this story arc
Especially when they make Viego a shirtless attractive dude, yet you get no choice to side with him or see a different angle.
You even get stabbed & corrupted, but don’t get the choice to pick a side.
@@miss.mirana4061
Jesus that was long but I totally agree with everything.
Viego is my favorite champion released both design wise and character wise for a long time. Just like you said he’s such a complex character and there’s so much more they could’ve done with him and I would’ve loved if we could see more of the grief and despair of his lore and also see how the relationship was when Isolde was alive.
I’m happy to have found someone who agrees with my view on mordekaiser and I just can’t understand how he got these fanboys from the beginning.
Are empty edgy villains something people just like?
They also have the nerve to call viego edgy when they worship mordekaiser lolol
"An rts is good at telling war stories, not so much for romances."
That sounds like a challenge, my friend.
well, there StraCraft II: Heart of the Swarm campaign, where Kerrigan (contrary to what T B Skyen thinks) wasn't trying to impress Raynor but to avenge him when she though Mensk (the main responsible for her becoming a monster) got him killed and just when they got back together too, what do you think of that campaign?
@@CRSB00 Can't tell you since I haven't played it, but it sounds more like a tragic misunderstanding than romance.
@@CRSB00 Something I always loved about the SC2 campaign was how varied each mission is, they really improved that aspect from WoL to HotS (WoL's variety was very little). But the story itself imo was good on premise but the execution was bad. The romance is poorly written and feels very tacked on compared to everything else Kerrigan does. It honestly felt like they really wanted to do a lot more with Jim and Kerrigan's romance but wasn't able to because stuff like needs to feel natural and properly paced so it could mature and blossom. But that'd take too long to develop so it all feels slapped on and duct taped to the main story.
@@JoJoSulyvahn yep, the first 2 missions it kind was nice watching banter and flirt during the missions and cutscenes, then Jim got kidnapped and after that ..it felt kind of cheesy(?) and the romance got put in the backburner for the "oh big bad Amon is going to destroy the universe OOOHHHH!!" culminating with the last scene of the campaign which was
SPOILERS:
unironically the " I-must-go-now-my-planet-needs-me" meme which I think kind of proves T B Skyen's point, the pace of a romance may be incompatible with that of an RTS
It does sound like a challenge. I can see a game with a concept like the “Kaguya-sama: Love Is War” manga/anime: a rom-com about two characters with a mutual crush, who are each too prideful to admit their feelings first. Whoever gives in and confesses loses, and they’re both geniuses who enjoy a challenge, so the RTS segments represent their battle of wits and zany shenanigans.
All they had to do to save Yorick's lore was have him send his army of ghouls to keep Viego's forces at bay while the sentinels defeated him.
Spirit Blossom was just SO good. Yes im a sucker for dating sims but it also made me feel like i was a part of the story, Sentinels just felt so flat
Im still mad that i didnt get to have sex with thresh (it was hinted)
@@peri2656 If it was for me i wouldve stayed with him forever :(
@@Jeremy-xs4gt lmao that line actually made me go "what if it was possible...?"
Honestly while yorick is probably the champ they wasted the most I feel the most dissapointed with the exclusion of kalista. This is a character who is a spirit of revenge obsessed with helping oatbreakers and who helps other with their vengeance quests in her own ''unique way'' and is related to an event that includes pyke and vayne and having her not show up at all despite her potentially having an interesting dynamic with both of them is really dissapointing. vayne could have had a really interesting story arc where she meets pyke, a person just as obsessed with vengeance as she is but he is warped to the point he isn't even going against anyone that betrayed him and Kalista who is a dark spirit that punishes traitors. Vayne who commited the ultimate act of betrayal against someone that was essentially her foster mother and who might be planning on betraying and killing Senna & pyke once viego is taken care off (honestly they shouldn't have made her ''mellow out'' but instead go ''alright i have bigger threats to take care off right now and these guys are competent'' in my opinion) would have to deal with Kalista calling her out. Maybe she attacks Pyke at some point and Kalista ends up making one of her revenge deals with him which might partially break the hold the creatures of the deep have on his mind. Maybe vayne doesn't attack and Pyke rejects Kalista's offer but a part of him doesn't know why. tons of interesting stuff there for all 3 characters.
There's also graves who has reconcillid with his betrayer but I feel like a Pyke, Kalista, vayne sidestory would be more interesing really.
Kalista was not put in because of "engagement".
More specifically , Kalista being among the worst adcs after her over the top nerfs , also the same goes for the other shadow isles characters.
@@decilence6184 I know and that sucks
@@decilence6184 are you saying pro play affected the exploration of Kalista's lore? It always comes back to pro play, damn them for being good at the game damn them
Its implied that the voice pyke hears in his head that keeps him seeking revenge against his ship's crew that are long past dead is kalista's.
Or... i mean... not really implied but it makes the most sense with his lore. Sure as hell there's no reason for illaoi to keep him vengeful, or the drowned goddess herself.
Pyke as a light sentinel feels weirder than urgot on star pajamas or blue Rhaast.
@@pmangano Some of his lines imply that whatever lurks in the depths of the ocean were the ones messing with his mind (presumably to avoid getting hunted by humans):
"Captains told me to kill fish, fish told me to kill captains, makes sense."
"Used to call 'em monsters, but they changed my mind. (pyke used to hunt sea life not black mist creatures)"
I just feel that the event could do little and try to save it.
For example, MF siding with Viego and knowing GP is alive; That was bad… But.
What if the there was no magical sentinel portal, and the only way they could enter Bilgewater safely and quickly was with a intermediary, and GP being the only Option?? Now you have a way to reveal GP to MF, and the sentinel being “in the same side” would give her the moment of vulnerabily to accept Viego Ruination. Also, her powerhungry ruined personality would be explained by her knowing that she was still not enough to kill GP.
Its Little things like that, changes a bad idea into acceptable (Not perfect or good), but with the same core things that Riot is trying to sell and force.
MF turned bad isnt good in general, rather than pick MF how about just use Graves & TF dynamic
@@risky2166 I think they didn't do it because of implications. Graves and TF is the closest canon gay relationship (male) we have. It seems obvious that the plot for one of them joining the sentinels would be to save the other, but maybe they didn't want to deal with the implications (maybe censorship, who knows?) of this plotline. Instead, they opted for Graves to bond with Vayne.
Also, I remember reading up somewhere that Graves's death animation on the sentinel skin (a card that teleports him to safety) had to be begged with to be allowed to be in the game. I can't remember the source tho, so take it with a grain of salt
@@Piplup799 "I think they didn't do it because of implications. Graves and TF is the closest canon gay relationship (male) we have. "
There is Varus kind of? In that the two souls stuck inside of him are gay lovers. Though of course that is between two "regular people" and not two champions
@@JoViljarHaugstulen Yeah but now in comparison GP is now more like a poor beggar, is no match for MF Navy.... so there is no way MF will be afraid of him + MF have a strong hate to GP that she will never be afraid of a GP returning there is no way, besides one of MF qualities is that she cant trust in no one!!! in no one I repeat!! then why she will trust in Viego to give her more power knowing is the guy that will destroy the world anyway? and she is the protector of innocents in Bilgewater she even risk her life to save a grandma and her grandchild in the past.... and why she will think that Veigo can give her power when he can't even invaded bilgewater in the past against MF navy in the past.... she literally annihilated viegos hordes of harrowing in the past. What kind of power a king that you were kicking his ass can offer now? and besides she cant trust in no one.... :(
I don't like it. But it is infinitely better than what we got as it gives a REASON for MF's stupidity, so I would much prefer your idea to what Riot gave us.
I’ve written literally essays about how bad sentinels of light was. What an absolute letdown on every level. Turning the rich world and characters into monotonous, empty husks. Noxus with no swain? Graves with NO TWISTED FATE?
this could be completely different characters in a universe other than league and it would read exactly the same- it would be still bad but less unbelievably disappointing
No Kindred. No Kalista, Hecarim, or Mordekaiser. No Yorick. No Maokai. Pyke and Rengar literally didn't even do anything.
@@AzzyReal Mordekaiser has literally 0 to do with this storyline though.
@@damnmanstopmaldinglol6028 oh don't tell them that, you know they're gonna counter it with something equally as misinformed
Well you could put it as a footnote that he knew or planned part of Viego's fall, as a decoy and ploy to fuel himself with more souls, possibly temporarily break the chains of life&death from the realm of the dead.
But yeah, throughout the main story he isn't relevant at all. Any character involving the original ruination of the Blessed Isles is strangely silent and/or absent from the literal fallout it could cause and possible destruction of Runeterra. Also no Janna to protect Zaun while they get "fans", no ASol or other Celestial to protect Targon...
@@damnmanstopmaldinglol6028 there's a comment by @Questionable Logic that i think actually does fit mordekaiser into the lore as basically a benefactor of the ending of the ruined king. I think it'd actually be rly cool.
One thing that really turned me down from the beginning was the writing. It was unbelievable bad, all the options from the player character didn't felt right and he was just there to be bullied by the other characters, it felt really out of place (A player character itself didn't seem to make sense).
Dialogues in general were really bad, I generally really like all lore related stuff, but before Targon I simply started skipping everything.
I used to love Riot's lore for League. I was enthralled with it. The thing that really killed that passion for me was Viego. The Ruined King was hinted at and built up for nearly a decade. We could have had this tragically twisted, undead abomination of a King. This horrifying monster spreading and controlling this evil corrupting mist that rended the souls from the living and turned them into dark horrors against their will. But instead we got a pretty boy with his abs out. How they ruined the true potential of the Ruined King, Seraphine just being a revamped Sona rework and them doing my boy Yorick dirty completely killed my fascination for League's story.
As someone who's been reading and enjoying panth, moraganna and akali's lore, learning about this event is kind of a letdown. Especially since panth is in it.
Honestly, I think the higher ups jumped the shark with trying to get as much engagement as possible out of the SoL event. Personally speaking, why would I buy the new Pentakill skin for Yorick/Karthus, or the next new skin for Kalista/Maokai, or whatever, when they did them *this* dirty in their own lore event. Why should I want to buy their new Ruined King RPG, a game in a genre heavily dependent on strong lore, when *this* is the level of care and attention they're willing to put towards storytelling?
Time and money will obviously speak for itself, but all the SoL event/visual novel showed me is that Riot products aren't worth the money I'd be spending on them.
That's usually what happen when a company grows too big, investors and marketing basically take over who never had a passion for what x company does in the first place but rather just for the $$$
this still rings true, but reading this after arcane happened is quite amusing. they know what to do with the lore. just maybe not through the game
"for those who wanted to be crushed by big mommy cassiopia"
Me: *shamefully hides (cassipeias: my champion) emote*
You are not alone, brother
People who are witnessing WoW Downfall /blizzard downfall have experienced the same thing: The game stops respecting your time, people feel like their time is actively being wasted by the game on purpose. This happened at the Serious player level ( in ranked) and now it s actively design in an evenmt that designed in hostile manner towards casual. We ve seen what that leads to in Blizzard repetitive boring bullshit that will leave you behind if you don t engage in it and it has left people leaving the game like i did, quit both games played other games like ff14 and people flock over because the key thing being that their time and money is respected by the game.
The visual novel format absolutely could have worked for this.
Umineko, an 8 part visual novel story, makes use of over a hundred different soundtracks, voice acting, visual effects, dynamic character poses, and the most tried and true tool: artist CG, effectively a still image of the scene which may have a few variations to show a change in what is occurring in real time. its creator certainly did not have nearly as deep a wallet as Riot does. And this isn't even unique to Umineko - so many visual novels have done this and tell great stories, Umineko is just one that pushes the limits of its format to do so.
They would have been better off just making a visual novel as a completely different small game. But god knows the higher ups at Riot don't care about interesting stories unless it makes them money.
Doki doki comes to mind
Best visual novels I can think of are Umineko, The House in Fata Morgana, and Dangan Ronpa. They just push their medium to the absolute limits (in different ways) and it looks and feels amazing.
Based Umineko enjoyer
Oh boy, Rewrite and it's mindblowing SAVE MECHANIC comes to mind. VNs could do so much things... but money huh.
Skyen, bro. You are, by far, the most well-spoken and thoughtful content creator I’ve come across in the 8~ or so years that I’ve been consuming media of this wild ride that is the League of Legends. I’ve said it before (at least I hope I had?), but GOSH, your takes are some of THE BEST and provide such thorough, healthy critique of whatever media it is that you delve into discussion of.
I wish I were as articulate as you so that I can give you the praise you deserve, though eloquent I unfortunately am not :’) Just know that I (and literally thousands of other folks) ADORE you and what you do!!!!
Just.
Thank you, man. For real.
it's not that deep...
@@notmyopinion4981 😳
My issue is that there were so many champions already involved in the setup for the event, and they decided to make an ensemble of unrelated, unimportant characters that end up doing nothing. And they take up so much screen time that none of the actual important characters exist or do anything
This was very insightful. I'm glad I skipped out on the actual event and got a lot caught up with how it went. It saved me a lot of time and heartache lol
I hate how Diana was non existant, aside from the fact that they just ignored her, Aphelios' and Nami's lore. Even the Targon chapter in Rookie's Log Book was about Irelia if you went to Ionia before Targon. Rengar randomly started to talk in third person and basically being his Kitty Pajama Rengar skin. It was just a complete mess how blatantly the characters were there just to be the poor advertisement for their own skin. How they "1 sentile/ruined for each region" but also "oh hey, Graves' in Piltover now", because yes.
At this point, the fucking diana x leona doujins have more lore than actual riot media
I'm wondering what he'll talk about in part 2. Some stuff that comes to my mind:
-Inconsistent characterization of the champs
-Viego ruining Pantheon when he shouldn't be able to affect a celestial (granted his skin bio says the aspect serves him willingly, but that never comes up in the story).
-Where the f**** is everybody? (skyen already talked about this, some absences are understandable, but the sheer number of them feels awkward)
-What happened in the Bilgewater chapter
-Lucian is ok with Pyke, but Senna isn't, even though Senna is the one who normally shows compassion for the undead
-How did the rookie end up in the sentinel hq?
-How is Senna accepted as the leader of the sentinels if she had no idea about the abilities of the hq?
-How did Thresh become so powerful that all of the sentinels and all of the ruined champs combined loose all hope of fighting him?
-Yorick sharing the waters of life a bit too willingly(granted it isn't impossible for him to share them, he just is picky with whom he does it) and then doing nothing, its not even clear if he participated in the last battle or not, also did the sentinels teleport away, leaving Yorick alone with Thresh?
-How did Lucian fight Thresh on the shadow isles if he didn't have the waters of life protecting him back then?
-Vexs ability to make portals for her allies was scrapped from her kit, so how can she make a portal to camavor just like that? Can she still do it in her lore (cause her bio doesn't mention that) or can all yordles do that now?
-Several characters never interact even though it seems like they should (like the maiden and Viego).
I add my pet peeve
- WHERE IS KARTHUS.
bloody hell that Dude is the biggest SI Simp there is and one might think hed show up when there's fools too kill lol.
“The horniest thing riot has made”
Me: jeez skyen don’t call us out like that c’mon
I am still pretty mad that Pantheon received non-canon Prestige Skin, which could be nicely made as him overcoming Pantheon's rage and using that power to help Sentinels or something.
Grind was so huge I stopped playing until... Wait I still haven't touched the game again, good job Rito.
also, one terrible point is riot not willing to kill ANY champion.
imagine leaving Gwen alive, who's entire character arc is tied to this event. Or even reviving Viego in the cinematic.
Kalista, Karthus, Hecarim...man...all to waste
They killed GP and it was one of the best lol events ever.
Such a shame they won't do anything like that ever again...
You don’t need a character to be alive fro them to be playable since the actual gameplay is non canon. There is no rule that says only living or undead characters get to be playable.
This is a lesson fighting game developers should learn as well.
Na, i dont think killing is necesary to make it interesting. The problem is there is no consecuences. Like. Gp now has a robot arm. Maybe make good 750 rp like thresh with the new canon aspects. But the made everything wrong
@@SuperMaster000X you need to kill someone in this lore,
how can u progress character arcs?
how can u solve issues btween races? (hello Zed and Xayah)
if u always write something knowing that u can't kill someone, it gets too dificult. And you need to give reason to X character to live after a major event.
@@MarianaBello-fq3hx Yeah I get it. But death isnt the answer for everything. Maybe if you want dark story. But not not obligatory for character arcs. For example. What if, Vayne gets her arm or leg cut off by Viego and maokay makes her a prostetic leg of magic roots, now her character arc is the fact she hates magic creatures, but was saved by one, and now was "tainted" like a creature. So yea. I get your point but there is a lot consecuenses that riot didnt exploit. (only the workers lol)
Me, having no idea when this will come out: I could wait an eternity for this video. It's gonna be worth it!
Me, now that exact time and date it will come out: Two days!? Why does it have to be so far away!?
I hope they don't try to make a weird non canon story and fanfiction story mashed up,
Inside a big canon lore of Runeterra event ever again.
Where is Yorick,
And is the Ruined King game going to be any better?.
I was so excited to see the Riven and Irelia bit when they finally started actually talking about how they felt, I figured they'd all at least have a moment to help each other kind of round out their flaws, even if its just in the moment. Its clear that those who wrote it had other goals and the gorgeous art/assets made it clear it was supposed to be a major chance to build unique and interesting character interactions and draw interest to their ongoing stories. I wish Riot had at least admitted to what cuts, edits, and rush caused this flop themselves rather than hold their employees as "meatshields"
Astonishingly well done, always impressed by the level of nuance present within these videos
Thank you!
A little sidenote: Senna was no the experimente, but Kai'Sa. Senna was already a product of positive feedback on preexisting characters coming to LoL as real champions (which is pretty much why they invested on a cinematic and also tied her to True Damage).
You could say the same about Lissandra, but Kai Sa is such a week character in terms of personalities she is miles behind Senna, Yonne and even Lissandra.
and if u think about Kai'sa and Senna are almost the same, a woman that was supposed dead on a inescapable environment (lantern/void) but is actually alive bcause theyr strong will (and lucian help on senna case) and they fight agaisnt an unstoppable force (the isles/void) and they have a strong desire of live and protect others.
"What went wrong?"
_What did _*_not_*_ go wrong?_
What did not go wrong? That’s a 15 sec video
I think the only upsides to this event was mostly just to Diana’s whole scenario which was nice imo. Riven and Irelia’s dynamic was great too because I’m glad its not a whole, “I forgive you so we’re buddies now” dynamic between the two the entire time or at the end. Like Irelia really holds that grudge against Riven the entire time which is both realistic to anyone in that given scenario. Irelia does soften up at the end a little towards Riven, but you can tell she still has a little animosity still there.
But those are the only “good/passable” aspects of this entire event. It definitely doesnt make the event story good or enough to counteract all of the bad aspects.
Too much influence from the higher ups thats what went wrong, they think that the kore is disposable and then made this not aftwr firing the guy that did the story of pyke Ornn and such.
I honestly felt bad for the devs being so much limited on their biggest and most important event because their higher ups
Ahh yes...
*SERAPHINE*
The lore was disposable from the start. Riot MO has always been "make chapter 1, wait a few years, erase chapter 1 and write a new one. Chapter 2 don't exist" sinche The League was an actual element in the story. They always retcon and very rarely devolop.
Imagine working at riot, creating the new cool events and writing lore, just see it all flushed down the toilet and replaced by mediocre garbage because winnie the pooh tugged the leash a bit. I feel bad especially for the art team, Viego is cringe, and I refuse to play him because that kpop singer lookin bitch ain't no king. They had way better concepts for him, but the final word comes from China again cuz muh stocks, so this is what we'll be getting in future. Can't wait for Shaco rework to make em a cute grill with a weird toy collection hobby :^)
Here's my hot take before tb skyen starts talking
People say that the visual novel medium wasted the story
But I say they wasted the visual novel medium
Not once did they take advantage of its strengths to let us have long, personal conversations with any of these characters by choice (although apparently they did it for Wild Rift?) and they never created visual set pieces, they only described them. In every other visual novel the dramatic moments get their own picture like when you fight a vampire or have sex with a vampire, but in SoL they go "There's a massive dramatic arena! And gods are fighting in the heavens! Fuck off if you think we'll draw that though lmao"
"like when fight a vampire or have sex with a vampire," I mean, your not wrong
Or even bad ends where everyone fucking dies. It's still more personal and dramatic. Maybe you even get cgs why not
damn you are right, there was nothing visual about the visual novel lmao, just 2 different models for each character and blurry backgrounds hahaha
It's a sad day when a low budget still in development furry visual novel that isn't even about fights has better fights scenes
I think it would be nice if we can just pick one region and explore those, along with the characters in that said region and how they're trying to fight off the ruination. Shadow Isles could be closed until the final week or something, and we would be able to meet Yorick and co, as well as characters who would've made an impact in their own ways.
I really wanted Riven to go with Irelia back to Ionia at the end of the event. It’s implied that there’s a second Noxian invasion of Ionia coming, and well, what better way for Riven to redeem herself than to fight on the right side this time?
Can we take a moment to appreciate how Yoricks idle pose is so perfect for this video, it just has such an aura of, " really? Are you kidding me right now?".
13:10 it became a meme on /r/yorickmains, because riot said it would be too difficult to add a hat to yorick's new skin and a guy did in a weekend as a mod
I just realized they unfridged Senna only to bring in two NEW fridged ladies
A year later. thank you for this video. I needed something to listen to while working from home. You did a excellent job and it express how i felt.
I’m sad that Gwen had potential but just ended up dying
While ruination...
Bard to Aurelion: Cup of Tea?
Aurelion: Sure!
Aside from all the things they did wrong for the event in LoL specifically, I wonder why the Ruined King game hasn't released yet. I was almost certain that was gonna be the event finale.
Hoping you touch upon that in the video.
Regardless, eagerly waiting to watch it.
Ruined King’s studio was flooded, power went out, etc due to Texas infrastructure problems. The studio’s work has been postponed because of this. If the global pandemic and Texas breaking down both didn’t happen, I’m sure we would have gotten Ruined King maybe even in 2020.
@@mkminerhacks Oh dear. I'm so sorry to hear that.:( Hope everything turns out alright in the end for them.
Thanks for the info!
With the Shadow Isles being my favourite region of Runeterra and Thresh and Yorick my favourite characters, this event was the final nail in the coffin. It was 90% of the reason I finally stopped playing League because honestly the lore was the only thing keeping me into League after this much time.
Honestly, if you did a 4-6 hour, off the cuff stream just nitpicking every story point, I'd watch it, like, the whole thing.
"Scooby Doo Heist Hijnks with Graves." LOL, I mean you're NOT WRONG and I hate I didn't notice that before.
Once the event became the second item on the client screen, I completely forgot about the story. Boring text to click through, cringy protagonist, disabled all story and just skipped through to get the awards.
This is going to be the best birthday present ever. I can't wait until the 1st, holy shit.
Happy Birthday ♥
@@nekolamb thank you!!!
why put poppy in the event trailer then not give her a sentinal skin
Because she doesnt have enough playrate
I'm sorry but that Pantheon stuff is just hilarious to me, because the FREE FAN MADE VISUAL NOVEL for freaking RWBY of all things puts more god damn effort into selling its fights against hordes of evil monsters
After the event, I logged off to never return. Riot failed incomensurable to me, and I started playing by 2013 when Lissandra was released and she was my favorite back then, along with LeBlanc and Swain. What kept me hooked for so long was story and good character design, boy oh boy I loved playing with the new Urgot and Yorick, cuz they are good "monsters" in both aspects I mentioned. I hated the Lucius Malfoy Swain, it felt so special the old version walking with a cane to turn into a demon bird, and his story of endurance after the ionian war and winning the leadership over Noxus with cunning was inspirational to a certain degree... But after Spirit Blossom I honestly don't understand what went wrong, but definitely the game fell F-L-A-T. To try solace myself for spending so much time of my life playing this game, I think that I'll never have to spend energy on it ever again. The money and time won't come back, but not one once will be further spent.
I didn't even realise but I didn't play it since SoL too
funny enough, i came back after SoL so I never even knew about it. though, I guess i'm not too big on the lore since they never expand on my character in terms of lore, like shaco, zyra and zil. I would love more lore on shaco, but that is as likely as maokai and yorick getting a bigger lore.
yey, that’s the video i was waiting for, thanks for providing us with it ! im so hyped !
41:50 It would've been wildly interesting if they had actually had a bunch of characters (let's say 5) on the Sentinel side and according to whether you get the favour of ones or others, you go fight Viego with Senna, Lucian, maybe Gwen (because of her having a piece of Isolde herself) and a couple who actually make a difference on what you do.
That would've made the story interesting and more well-balanced (as you don't have dozens of Sentinels to move around) and also would've made people feel and have agency, which would've moved the mouth to mouth and pushed people to get into the lore and the game.
21:36 I’m always impressed with your integrity, Skyen. You’re very up-front about how the system works and how manipulative it is (and encourages you to be), which is one reason why I watch you. I don’t even play League, but I will give YOU my engagement because you deliver great content with no clickbait, low-effort tripe or BS.
Despite not having one 1000tg the money Riot has to throw around, you did what they were too cowardly to do: delayed a big, buzz-heavy product that could have made you a lot more ad revenue because you wanted to make it the best possible. I salute you.
This is what we've been waiting for. Grab your popcorn.
You know, I think I’ll be writing fanfic about characters relationships (ex. Akshan and yorick)
It’ll be fun
I actually like idea of using visual novels in lol. It gives extra level of interaction and if used right it can expand of the lore and give more love to unloved characters. I mean doing right would be amazing
For the say something nice, I found the joke where Olaf convinces Pyke that he drowned him to be really funny, since they're both practically immortal, and Pyke might be one of the few things capable of killing Olaf. Whether it is an honourable death remains to be seen but desperate times call for desperate measures.
35:30 ngl I'd pay to have a bunch of dedicated writers to make a book on Ruination based off all this
I'm happy you're also doing a part 2 about the plot holes and everything, because that's very cathartic to hear.
What pissed me off so much with this event was that Riot ignored their lore and the shit that actually made sense for money. Riven is the only character that actually made sense to join the sentinels. Everyone makes zero sense. Why would Diana join this organization when she has trauma from big organizations like the Solari? Why would Vayne who is very anti-magic join this magic based organization? None of it made any sense to me. They did it becaues these characters were popular so they made the weirdest skins with the weirdest lore.
Writer behind Dream Daddy... This explains SOOOOOOOOO much.
It"s funny, I enjoyed Spirit Blossom so much that I would actively grind to get to new parts of the character stories, even despite the fact that my enjoyment of the game has been actively decreasing since season 5. It gave me a new source of engagement and fun, and I was looking forward to more like it.
Then they came out with the Ruined King, and I ended up forgetting to progress because I just didn't care after a certain point. I had no investment, and surprise surprise, the amount I played dipped hard.
Also, in regards to the event, I find it hilarious that Akshan basically wields Chekov's Gun.
Oh boy I sure love going to a region, seeing the fetter, having someone take it, recruiting a new sentinel, leaving, repeating that like 9 times. Then seeing yorick for 5 minutes
Even with everything holding this event back, even with the limited format, cut characters and narrative designed around grinding, this event could have been so much more. It pleases me to see that so many people other than myself have put in the time and effort to imagine this event differently. As far as I’m concerned, the fan canon is the true SoL event.
Everything felt wrong, there's magical god like beings and they choose girl with flying knives, another girl with big sword, a guy with 2 pistols, a guy with crossbow, a girl with big crossbow, a living doll with giant scissors, and a zombie with a big gun to fight, like seriously
The positive thing I like about the event:
1.Gwen lore and character is pretty neat.
2.Akshan lore and character is great enough for me.
3.Sentinel Jinx art exist.
Akshan Lore and Character is very cool if you imagine its completely seperate universe from everything else - then Light Warrior Gone Rogue on Vengeful spree with giga busted weapon effect is cool af... sadly its part of massively bigger universe where he seems pointless, acting like a vilain yet being forced to being a hero and with a weapon that makes shit ton of plotholes and doesnt allow to build tension.
Also Gwen didnt get any Lore progression during that event (except her release bio ofc) so I'd argue that its just a cool character of her that makes her cool. The idea of object becoming sentient due to its owner's soul is cool... sucks we didnt explore more of how Gwen feels about being 'her own person' now, especially after Isolde was killed-killed.
@@baxland2539 Wym, Gwen got some wonderful lore progression when Riot decided to replace some of her best voice lines for no good reason after the event.
20:54 Felt like I was looking at Jim Sterling video, amazing work!
The thing I liked the most about the event, Riven finally got to smile again
Akshan is basically a deus ex-machina to revive senna and in one word Destroy senna`s reason as a character
I'm still SO upset about Gwen during the event. I loved her character from the moment she was announced, and was SO hyped for her to be part of the event, and then she did literally NOTHING. Not even a lore skin to at least make my wallet cry and my shitty capitalism mindset happy, just subpar space groove skin from her initial release. All Gwen did was sit there and look pretty, despite having all the potential to be a crucial part of the story and confronting Viego. I just want my pretty doll lady to be significant please riot i am on my knees
They did Gwen dirty. I'm still salty that she got one of the worst skinlines and her skin looks like garbage. At least the new cafe skin is cute. Not to mention, she is nerfed to death and has the worst win rate in top lane now.
Loved the FFXIV analogy it solves the issue of engagement with story and writing and carefully spaced out duty finder quests so that they aren't so common that they get dull or the narrative tension fades because of a queue time
Sad to figure that I read every piece of the spirit blossom event and once we got to sentinels, id thumbed through one chapter got half way through the second and noticed the pattern and flatter interactions between the player and character and wound up skippping through the entire thing after. Shame too because it included more areas that I find interesting than Ionia but (shrug)
Love your analysis, presentation, and insight :) made me think critically. Subscribed and eager for more content!!
I won't deny I sometimes wonder WHAT the story could have been, til this day
Sometimes I feel the urge to try to write... Maybe a version where rookie is less the PERSON WHO GOES WITH THEM, and more... The sentinel blacksmith on a base. The one who bust Lucian morals, the one which makes the weapon of each new champion and bounds with each one while working or asking how did it goes
Maybe in the latter chapters, will did GO WITH THEM because they need the Sentinel Blacksmith on the field to forge and repair something! I don't know. Would made more easy to TELL the story and not try to make action in a format (and with resources) to only tell dialogue.
And DAMN a Sentinel Blacksmith would be COOL
SoL was Riot’s way of saying “we don’t care about telling a good story or if our players are actually having fun, we just want them to make us money.”
The event is a massive "f*ck you" to Maokai and Yorick like seriously Pyke and Rengar? That little twist that they made where the good guys turn evil while the Anti-Hero/Neutral type characters turns into good guys are just poor writting trying to tweak the narrative into something different.
And also I'm a Rengar main, the way they did his character and Other Champions didn't help either.
But hey atleast they're at the event right? Except don't have any relation to the story whatsoever with only the exception that they exist in the same universe with the others. While Maokai and Yorick who's presence is crucial to the story didn't even get nothing. But hey there's not much player base that mains Yorick and Maokai so they pretty much didn't lose that much money.
The ruination could have been a Netflix animated series where each episode is a region, with each subject of the Ruined King affecting each region, like Hecarim attacking Demacia, Kalista attacking bilgewater, karthus attacking noxus, etc
Say something nice: The spirit blossom event was lovely.
Fantastic video, summing up what went wrong here extremely well. We can't let management hide from what happened here just because a dozen writers with probably 4 hours of sleep between them had to figure out a way to justify ruined pantheon and they couldn't do it. Management steered them straight into that plot hole.
“....what they really wanted was to get crushed in the living coils of snake mommy Cassiopeia.” -T B Skyen, on the sentinels of light event.