Riot founders return to game development to ‘put the S in Riot Games’

In a short press release on their official website, Riot founders Brandon “Ryze” Beck and Marc “Tryndamere” Merrill announced that they would be transitioning from Riot Games management back into development. Some of the other members of Riot’s managerial suite (Dylan Jadeja [CFO], Scott Gelb [CTO] and Nicolo Laurent [President]) will be stepping in to handle company operations from now on.

What makes this particular announcement interesting is the Beck and Merrill’s stated “making great games” as their reason for returning to development. Toward the end of their announcement, they tease what they will be working on:

We are thrilled to be able to have a great team of such capable leaders and look forward to working with them to finally put the “s” in Riot Games

Currently, Riot Games has only developed and published League of Legends (although the spin-off tabletop game, Mechs vs. Minions, released in 2016). While the founders have been using this “put the ‘s’ in Riot games” line for quite a while, this active moves suggests that a new project could be farther along than we think.

It is no secret that Riot has a large research and development team aimed at finding their next big project. Perhaps Riot is finally ready to commit to one of these new games? The post ends with saying they “look forward to sharing what we’re up to along the way,” so perhaps the news is closer than we think?