Robert Oh-LookingOutwards-1

This is the new Nunu rework in League of Legends.

League of Legends is an incredibly popular multiplayer online battle arena video game developed and published by Riot Games. I’ve been playing League for about 4 years, and I’ve always been excited to see new updates for the game, as new elements make the game more interesting. For their most recent patch, Riot Games had updated Nunu, one of their oldest characters in the game (had first been released on February 21, 2009)! In a rework, the character gets a new visual model, as well as new abilities in the game.

There are a ton of teams that work on new characters (the design team, the gameplay team, the software team, etc), so I’d say its safe to assume that there were hundreds of people working on this project (and usually takes a few months to complete).  (I also have no idea what software they use).

I’d definitely say this project was inspired by their previous character updates. Every couple months, Riot chooses to update old characters to make them feel new and fresh. Just like the previous character reworks they’ve done, I feel as though Riot is aiming towards making their boring characters more interesting by adding new skills that make them feel more fun to play. Nunu is an excellent example of this, as they’ve incorporated his background into his abilities (one of his new abilities allows him to roll a snowball into enemies).

As a huge gamer (and a game design minor), I feel inspired by this new character design. This rework proves that you can turn any boring, dull character and make it feel new and fun again!

For those curious, this is what he used to look like: