Riot pauses support for URF, Ultimate Spellbook, and others to go all in on new deathmatch mode

For many League of Legends players, the rotating game mode schedule has turned into an indicator of when URF is active. This year, Riot Games intends to change that by introducing a new mode to the playerbase. Unfortunately, the cost of a new game mode in League is putting support for the game’s existing modes—URF, Ultimate Spellbook, and One for All—on a temporary hold. 

This summer, League will introduce a 2v2v2v2 deathmatch mode. This mode is expected to take up a lot of developmental resources from League’s game modes team, so players shouldn’t expect any major updates to the modes that are already in place until the back-half of this year. 

“Whether it’s new or updated champions or items, or invisible back end changes, these all take quite a bit of time and focus from our team,” League’s game modes lead Daniel Emmons said in an update today. “And right now we think it’s more important to get a new mode in your hands as quickly as possible.”

Even with developments and updates going on pause for the time being, Riot expects that the existing modes like URF and Ultimate Spellbook will be back in the rotation at some point later this year. However, the company doesn’t want to make any projections regarding an exact date. Players should expect them to return at some point in the “later half of the year,” according to Riot. 

Riot provides update on Nexus Blitz

Riot gave fans an additional update regarding Nexus Blitz, a much-loved game mode that was scheduled to return to the client in 2022. That, unfortunately, never came to fruition, largely because of the fact that the game modes team was working on developing League’s new deathmatch mode featuring four teams of two players each. “But we haven’t forgotten about that commitment,” Emmons said. “Now that we’re staffed up, we’re dedicating a bit of time getting Nexus Blitz functional again before we release it.”

No timeline was given for Nexus Blitz’s grand return, although the latter half of the year should be expected as a potential release window. Nexus Blitz has not been live in League since 2021.