Biggest change in League of Legends history is coming. Players fear it will „kill the game” after 16 years
League of Legends will follow in the footsteps of its competitors, but not all LoL fans are excited about the announcement of a new–old control option.
A new control option is coming to League of Legends, letting fans of the world’s most popular MOBA try out a classic setup.
Riot Games has dropped a fresh developer diary, outlining the new features coming to LoL in the next few patches. These include the return of the Doom Bots in patch 25.12 and cracking down on smurfing - including blocking accounts that are sold or shared. The developer plans to introduce these changes in version 25.18, with more measures to fight rank manipulation expected in future updates. You can find more details in the developers' separate post.
Riot Games also plans several gameplay improvements, including official jungle timers in all bases and an easier way to track Summoner's Spells on the Death Recap screen. Nonetheless, one change has really caught the attention of League of Legends fans - the game will finally let you move your champion using the classic WASD keys.
Old revolution has split LoL players
For a new player of LoL, this might sound a bit funny. Most players probably don’t even remember the time before WSAD became the industry standard - basically since the days of the original Quake. If you really wanted to trace the first game that used WSAD - or something similar - to move your character, you’d end up way back in the 1980s.
That said, it's important to remember that League of Legends is an MOBA, a genre that grew out of strategy games - where pretty much everything is done with the mouse. LoL is no different, which is why some are calling this change the biggest gameplay shift in League of Legends history. Too much? Not so much for a game that’s been out for 16 years.
Riot Games plans to introduce WSAD as an alternative control option, but fans worry it might give players using it a big advantage over those sticking to the traditional controls. In their opinion, developers will face a tough challenge balancing the game for both control schemes, much like how shooter creators struggle to balance aiming between PC (mouse) and consoles (gamepad with aim assist).
It's not that WSAD will be universally "better." Players are already pointing out the advantages of this control option, especially for kiting - that is, attacking an enemy while keeping a safe, consistent distance. That said, fans also note that movement precision might take a hit since it’s basically limited to eight directions - the four keys plus their diagonal combos.
"Death" of League of Legends by WSAD?
Still, most players think WSAD will end up being the “go-to” control style in LoL, which has a lot of fans feeling worried or frustrated. Some comments include dramatic declarations about the “death” of League of Legends or the end of their own journey with the game, along with calls to ban WSAD controls from ranked.
However, it will be a while before we can truly confirm whether the players’ concerns are justified or not. Riot Games will soon introduce WSAD controls on the test server, and the option is expected to stay there for several patches. There are definitely a lot of bugs and odd interactions that devs need to fix before the new controls are ready.
It’s worth noting that the developer has already run many tests and consulted with players - including pros. You can check out their feedback in an official League of Legends post. So far, neither the creators nor the testers share the worries some regular users have online, but they’re eager to hear more player opinions once the feature hits the test server.
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Author: Jacob Blazewicz
Graduated with a master's degree in Polish Studies from the University of Warsaw with a thesis dedicated to this very subject. Started his adventure with gamepressure.com in 2015, writing in the Newsroom and later also in the film and technology sections (also contributed to the Encyclopedia). Interested in video games (and not only video games) for years. He began with platform games and, to this day, remains a big fan of them (including Metroidvania). Also shows interest in card games (including paper), fighting games, soulslikes, and basically everything about games as such. Marvels at pixelated characters from games dating back to the time of the Game Boy (if not older).
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