League of Legends: Origins

Before starting this review, I think I should be upfront about the fact that the subject of this documentary, the video game “League of Legends,” is something I already knew a great deal about before watching the film. I have played “League of Legends” on and off since 2012 and have followed the game’s competitive scene for roughly the same amount of time. So for me, this movie was less a revelatory experience and more a walk down memory lane. However, I think this film is fairly disappointing no matter what your previous knowledge level coming in.

After I finished watching the movie I was left with basically one question: what was the point? Is it to tell the story of Riot Games and their road to developing and launching one of the biggest and most financially successful video games in the world? That idea is certainly what the movie’s name implies. While present, this concept only makes up about the first third of the film and isn’t handled with very much depth. Is it to explore the rise of “League of Legends” esports from a LAN party side event to a global phenomenon? This is where the majority of the runtime is dedicated. Again, even with the extra time, this idea is not explored fully or with much depth. Is it to explore an interesting subculture, the fandom around “League of Legends,” in a journalistic way a la Trekkies? The movie seems to start that way, but quickly moves the community aspects of League to small filler pieces in between the vignettes on game development, esports, and streaming that ultimately make up the movie.

Perhaps the goal was to capture the essence of a creative moment in time, like director Leslie Iwerks earlier film The Pixar Story. The problem is The Pixar Story just crafts a better narrative. The Pixar Story follows the parallel development of computer graphics, computer animation, and the titular animation studio. This gives us a ton of interesting characters who are part of, or cross paths with, this time of creative development. We learn about advances in graphical systems happening at prestigious universities. We learn about the early creative brain trust at Pixar of John Lasseter, Brad Bird, Andrew Stanton, Lee Unrich, and others. We learn about how Pixar was able to remake itself as a feature film producer. We learn about Steve Jobs’ profound influence on the direction of the company. League of Legends: Origins doesn’t have any of this. It has neither a compelling cast of characters who provide human interest throughout the piece nor the rich stories that keep the audience engaged.

To illustrate my point, I frequently noticed how the movie glosses over many aspects of Riot’s early years that have parallels to the engaging stories in The Pixar Story. In League of Legends: Origins, they mention the difficulties they faced establishing a European server, under tight time constraints, when their planned flights were cancelled by the volcanic eruption in Iceland. A similar tale is told in The Pixar Story about a technical issue during rendering that destroyed hours and hours of work, very near an unbreakable deadline, on one of Pixar’s early movies. The Pixar Story presents this as high drama: an existential threat to the company. In League of Legends: Origins the volcano incident is talked about briefly and then moved passed: just another wacky story from Riot’s founding years. This server launch was one of the few stories of the movie I didn’t know going in and I was surprised that such an interesting piece of history was handled in such an uninteresting way.

The movie also completely ignores the business side of things. The Pixar Story happily explores how Steve Jobs’ stubborn nature made landing certain deals difficult, how eventual partner Disney almost ruined Toy Story with their original story brief, and many other compelling anecdotes about the sometimes uncomfortable, but ultimately unavoidable, ways in which art and business interact. Despite similar experiences with Riot, such as their failed deal with EA over disagreements on monetization, their strained partnership with Garena, or their eventual acquisition by Tencent, this side of Riot’s history was totally left out. Speaking of Tencent, I was also surprised there was essentially no mention of China. China is the biggest market for “League of Legends,” in number of players, viewers of esports, and participants in fan-culture. Despite that, it is Korea that gets all the focus when discussing the game’s growth in Asian markets. This movie lacked interesting stories and delving into any of these areas could have really helped fill that hole.

All of this, from the lack of depth and focus to the absence of stories with any kind of dramatic tension, make League of Legends: Origins toothless. Given the nature of its production, the subject matter, and how safe the final product is, it becomes harder and harder to not see this movie as anything other than a piece of marketing for “League of Legends.” There is nothing wrong with League of Legends: Origins cheerleading its subject, portraying the central people and products as superlative and the challenges to greatness never insurmountable. The Pixar Story does that too. However, The Pixar Story, has plenty of interestingly told stories, arcs for its core characters, and behind the scenes wisdom that keep you engaged. That is why it is a good documentary; maybe even a great one. With League of Legends: Origins those elements are noticeably absent. Maybe if this was all brand new to you, it would be a good primer, but to me, someone who admittedly has heard many of these anecdotes before, it feels more like a puff piece than a proper documentary.

Would Recommend: If you are interested in an extremely broad, but fairly comprehensive, look at all aspects of the ten years of “League of Legends” growth as a global gaming phenomenon, explored in the most cursory and self-congratulatory way possible.

Would Not Recommend: If you are sensitive to material that seems like it is shilling for something.