2XKO’s playable champions are decided by 2 unique factors

Riot Games has revealed a small pool of characters for its upcoming fighting game 2XKO, and the cast is as diverse as it is confusing.

The roster consists of characters from the League of Legends universe with six being shown off so far. Those are Ahri, Ekko, Darius, Yasuo, Illaoi, and the most recent reveal—Braum. With Yordles apparently being too short and hopes for crossover characters non-existent, just how does Riot Games decide on which characters to add to 2XKO? Dot Esports had the chance to discuss that with Shaun Rivera, the game director, as well as more details about the game at Evo on July 21.

“We’re trying to figure out if we’re underserving a ton of players, And how can we do a better job of serving them,” Rivera told Dot Esports. “So usually [when picking new fighters], this kind of falls into one or two categories.”

For the first factor, Rivera said the team looks to see if there is a “mechanical playstyle that’s not in the game that really could be in there, and people could fall in love with it.” Rivera used the recent reveal of Braum as one of these characters, as the team was getting a bunch of feedback from testers that they wanted a character that could “protect my friend, especially in duo play.”

As for the second factor, Rivera told Dot the team looks mainly for a “thematic that we’re not hitting” and specified things like male or female, how they identify, their personality, and what makes them different from characters already on the roster to make each fighter feel unique.

When pushed further on the roster, specifically how many characters players could expect to see at launch, Rivera has no comment, only saying that new champions will be released throughout the game’s lifecycle. At the very least, the game won’t be short for options with over a hundred League champs already to pull from.