League of Legends’ second VGU of Season 12 is in development, but Riot is tight-lipped about the recipient of the rework. The first details have emerged as players eagerly await Udyr’s rework, set to drop at the start of 2022.
Riot is continuing their schedule of two VGUs a year in 2022, with Udyr’s rework coming in the first half of Season 12.
The first details of the second planned rework are being sprinkled around too, with lead champion producer Ryan ‘Reav3’ Mirales sharing tidbits on Reddit.
Udyr is next on League’s VGU list, but another will be joining him in 2022.“Early development” started on League’s second Season 12 VGU
The VGU is in “super early development” with developers Michael ‘SkiptomyLuo’ Luo, Daniel ‘Maxw3ll’ Emmons, and Gem ‘Lonewingy’ Lim working on it.
SkiptomyLuo has worked on the narrative for champions like Pantheon, Samira, and Gwen, while Maxw3ll helped design Yuumi, Lillia, and Gwen. Lonewingy has designed concept art for over 20 champions, from Aurelion Sol to, most recently, Vex.
While the champion hasn’t been revealed, some have been ruled out (no Teemo rework coming soon, sorry). Nocturne, Quinn, Skarner, and Shyvana, who all featured on Season 11’s VGU poll, will not be getting reworked.
Shyvana was in line to receive a VGU in League of Legends Season 12, but it’d take too long.Shyvana was high on Riot’s list of VGU targets, but the amount of resources needed to do it alongside Udyr’s was too much to handle in a year.
“Had Udyr not won, we might have worked on [Shyvana] as the next VGU since she is also in high demand from players. Doing two multiple-form VGUs in a row would have been a huge amount of work, especially for our outsourcing partners who help us with the skins,” Reav3 explained.
Dr. Mundo, who featured on the Season 9 VGU poll, was also recently reworked, putting Riot back to square one. Instead of polling players, they’re looking internally for inspiration.
“We also were pretty strapped on design resources when we started that project, so we wanted to choose something that wasn’t like a full kit makeover that would require a ton of design time,” Reav3 said.
Dr. Mundo received a long-awaited League of Legends rework in 2021.“Sometimes a designer or artist is really passionate about a specific VGU candidate and pitches a design hook or draws some really cool concept art, and if it’s really exciting and the team is also really excited to work on it, it usually leads to an overall higher quality project.”
Riot are dropping a champion roadmap later in September 2021, so keep your eyes peeled for any news on the VGU front in there.
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