No, ‘League of Legends’ Is Not Coming To Xbox One

Speculation of popular PC MOBA League of Legends coming to the Xbox One buzzed Wednesday following the announcement of a partnership between Microsoft and Tencent to promote games on Windows 10. Developer Riot Games was quick to shoot that erroneous bit of rumor-mongering down.

The League of Legends on Xbox One speculation started when an IGN article and others were shared to the game’s sub-Reddit and across social media. Riot Games Brand Manager Vladimir Cole responded directly by calling reports on the Microsoft and Tencent partnership “significantly inaccurate.”

Cole later updated the post to add, “Today’s announcement mentioning League of Legends has generated a lot of speculation in the LoL player community. We’d like to clarify that our focus is on making sure League plays great on Mac and PC. No plans for console, mobile or other platforms at this time.”

The speculation surrounding League of Legends and Xbox One was fueled in part by Microsoft’s previous announcement that Windows 10 and the console will support Cross-Play and Cross-Buy. That initiative allows gamers to purchase a game on the Windows Store and play it either on their PC or console with other players on either device. These are called “universal apps” and support for the feature is completely up to the developers.

The Microsoft and Tencent announcement stated that the latter’s QQ app will be a universal app in the same sentence as revealing that League of Legends and other games will be available at the Windows Store. This is likely what led to early erroneous reports that League of Legends would be a universal app and, thus, playable on the Xbox One.

Tencent became part owner of Riot Games in 2011. League of Legends has grown into one of the dominant games in the PC market over the past few years and garners huge audiences worldwide for its eSports tournaments and championships. It is one of the top played titles in China, which helps explain Microsoft’s push to get it on Windows 10.

In addition to the partnership with Tencent to bring League of Legends and other titles to the Windows Store, Microsoft also revealed yesterday that the operating system will be offered as a free upgrade to all Windows 7 and Windows 8 owners starting this summer. This even includes owners of non-genuine (aka pirated) copies.

While League of Legends is not coming to the Xbox One, the console is far from MOBA-less. Hi-Rez Studios’ third-person SMITE just launched an alpha test last week while Microsoft revealed that another title called Gigantic is coming to the console and PC as part of its Cross-Play and Cross-Buy initiative later this year.

[Images via League of Legends, MMO Knight]