Are eSports Evolving Too Fast?

During the last podcast, Campeau brought up how he hasn't played League of Legends in quite a while, and that his main concern about going back was his need to study all the changes that were made. This is a little scary. There are just so many patches nowadays and the need to balance a heavily competitive game is so strong that games evolve at an alarming rate.

With traditional sports, such as hockey, changes to rules are only made during the off-season—in extreme cases they are added once, at an intermittent point (that is always the same) during the regular season. With League for instance, large sweeping changes are made during the off-season and then regularly, every week or two, patches are implemented that make changes across the board to characters and items. Not much is different with any other game; patches are pretty frequent everywhere.

I understand that this is part of the business model. For League, the developer tries to release a new character every month. New characters cause balancing issues. Balancing issues must be fixed. Patches ensue. Most of these changes are either welcomed with open arms or blasted in the forum by scornful fans. I'm 100% sure people have quit games over certain changes.

I guess part of the game evolving would be you evolving with it, but this brings me to my next point: Can anyone risk taking a break without fear of being left behind? I played League of Legends for about 2 years and, while I wasn't the best there was, I could easily hold my own. I don't think I would ever be able to go back (not that I really want to) because as much as the game is the same, it is almost entirely different. It would take me a while to get my bearing and learn all the new characters, simply because these games aren't just about how good you are: It's also about how well you know everyone else.

What can these companies do instead? Put a stricter guideline in place for gameplay changes maybe? I don't know how it is now, but I see this happening more and more as the tournament seasons continue to go on. Right now League of Legends is in or just starting its fifth season and they aren't going to stop any time soon. Another option may be to take the Magic: The Gathering approach and just have tournament standard characters and items that change between every season. The amount of studying and learning you would have to do would be limited to the pre-tournament season. This way if someone wants to quit mid season, they can come back in the New Year and be on the same level as everyone else.

Final Thoughts

Of course maybe this isn't a problem at all. The kind of people that play League of Legends play it religiously, just like anyone playing an MMO like World of Warcraft. They read the patch notes as they are released and they adapt like any good evolving organism. They don't have to worry about taking a break from the game, because taking a break really means you're quitting for good, right? Once you're out, just be happy and never look back.