40: Chapter 40 The Emergence of Esports?

Jiang Youyou nodded. She grasped the mouse, and the screen switched from the main menu to the tutorial level.

"The skill keys are on the left: QWER, and DF are for Summoner spells." Qin Mo, sitting beside her, only said this much.

"Figure out the rest from the on-screen prompts." Jiang Youyou rolled her eyes at him.

"Is that how you teach people?"

But her hand had already clicked into the champion selection interface.

The reason Qin Mo didn't say much was because he wanted to see how long it would take for a new player who had never touched league of legends to get the hang of the tutorial.

This concerned the entry barrier of league of legends.

The tutorial unlocked three champions by default: Ashe, Garen, and Ryze. Jiang Youyou stared at the character portraits for a few seconds and chose Ashe. The game finished loading.

She controlled Ashe as she walked out of the fountain; the minions hadn't spawned yet, and the map was empty. She tried clicking the mouse a few times, and the champion moved back and forth in the base with fluid animations.

"The movement speed is faster than dota." She muttered. The minions began to spawn. Afterward, Jiang Youyou followed the tutorial prompts, operating step by step through the training. Soon, expressions of delight kept appearing on her face.

"No denying, that's great!"

"The item shop also gives direct recommendations; you don't even need to click into the detailed interface. That's a thumbs up."

"And you can recall for free without buying scrolls!"

"There are no trees in the jungle, so I don't have to worry about maneuvering around them to block vision."

"The dota jungle is all forest; running around in circles makes my head spin. Your map is clear at a glance."

Very quickly, in less than five minutes, Jiang Youyou had easily gotten the hang of the game. Although there was more content in the tutorial, Jiang Youyou exited directly, unable to wait to start a real match.

"Coach Qin, how did I do?" Jiang Youyou blinked at Qin Mo beside her.

Zhao Lei whispered from behind, "Youyou, that was way too fast. When I first played, I spent ages looking for the shop."

Lin Xiao pushed up his glasses. "When you first played, you even messed up the skill hotkeys and used Flash as Heal."

"Can you not expose my embarrassing past?"

IceFrog stepped forward, his voice rarely carrying a hint of a smile. "Miss Jiang certainly has talent."

"However, you've played dota before, so you have a foundation in basic MOBA operations."

He paused. "But being able to fully adapt to the operational logic of a new game within five minutes shows that our tutorial is up to par."

"Before this, we found some employees upstairs who had never touched a MOBA game, and they were basically able to master it in ten minutes."

Meanwhile, Zhao Lei turned to Qin Mo. "Boss, aren't you going to try?"

Qin Mo leaned back in his chair and waved his hand. "No need."

"We can just start."

"I'll get the hang of it while playing."

Hearing Qin Mo say this, Zhao Lei shook his head and clicked his tongue. "Boss, you're too confident."

"You haven't even touched the tutorial, and you want to jump straight into a real match?"

"We've been coming to this floor to playtest quite often recently. Lin Xiao and I have played at least twenty or thirty matches, not to mention IceFrog and the others, who test it every day."

"But every time you come, you just watch; you've never touched the keyboard."

"Be careful not to get crushed by us later."

Lin Xiao also nodded. "I've indeed never seen Boss play."

"Then don't blame us for not holding back later!"

"I'm going to get twenty kills today!"

As they spoke, everyone took their seats. Qin Mo simply placed his hands on the keyboard. He naturally knew how to play this game.

In his previous life, he had played countless matches of league of legends, from the earliest beta servers to the later official releases, never missing a single season.

Although the version in this world wasn't exactly the same as in his memories, the core operational logic was identical. In his past life, while he wasn't a Challenger, he was at a Platinum/Emerald level.

Meanwhile, Qin Mo seemed to remember something and looked at IceFrog, who had just sat down. "How is the built-in spectator mode coming along?"

"It's ready to use." IceFrog pulled up the backend interface.

"We made spectator mode one of our core features during the early development phase."

"It supports God's eye view, free camera, and locked champion view."

"The data panel for each match is also synchronized in real-time. Economy, creep score, items, and skill cooldowns—the audience can see even more information than the players."

After listening, Qin Mo looked at Zhao Lei, who was sitting eagerly to one side, ready to play. "You have other work."

Zhao Lei froze, confusion in his eyes. "Go upstairs and find a few employees who have never been to this floor, or who don't even play games much."

Zhao Lei didn't react in time. "What for?"

"Go to the next room and watch us play."

Zhao Lei's expression became even more puzzled. "What's the point of watching others play? Games are only fun when you play them yourself."

"Just go find the people first, and you'll understand later."

Seeing Qin Mo say this, Zhao Lei felt somewhat helpless, but didn't ask again. He turned and walked quickly out of the studio.

A few minutes later, he led five or six employees from upstairs into the next room. Some of these people were from the operations team, others from administration; their daily work had nothing to do with games.

Someone muttered while entering, "Manager Zhao, what did you call us here to see?"

"Watching the Boss and IceFrog and the others play games."

"Huh?"

"No 'huh's, sit down."

Ten computers were all ready. IceFrog and several core designers from Riot Games sat down, and with Qin Mo, Jiang Youyou, and Lin Xiao, there were exactly ten people. Five to a team; Qin Mo and Jiang Youyou were on the same side.

Qin Mo chose Caitlyn, and Jiang Youyou chose Sona to support him. The game finished loading.

Qin Mo grasped the mouse, tapped his fingers on the keyboard twice to confirm the key bindings. The full view of Summoners Rift unfolded on the minimap, with the three minion lanes clearly visible.

"Are you okay in the bot lane?" Jiang Youyou tilted her head and looked at him.

"Didn't you say you'd get the hang of it while playing?"

"Don't drag me down later."

"I will." Qin Mo said, using a single word.

Caitlyn and Sona walked out of the fountain side by side. The opposing bot lane was Ezreal and Alistar, both operated by core designers from IceFrog's Riot Games. In particular, Alistar was being controlled by IceFrog himself.

The laning phase began quickly. For the first two levels, both sides were probing. Caitlyn relied on her range advantage to poke Ezreal a few times, while Alistar paced back and forth in front of the minion wave; neither side used key abilities.

Afterward, Qin Mo's Caitlyn fired a Piltover Peacemaker, the ability flying past Alistar's shoulder, dodged by the opponent's movement.

"This Alistar has slippery movement." Jiang Youyou muttered from the side.

Another wave of minions pushed toward the river entrance. Caitlyn's positioning suddenly pressed forward, entering a range where Alistar could control her. IceFrog seized the opportunity and immediately controlled Alistar to charge over, almost certainly locking Caitlyn down.

Jiang Youyou didn't even react in time to cast her CC, and Alistar was about to collide with Caitlyn. But in the next instant, Caitlyn instantly used Flash to dodge Alistar's W-Q combo, and crucially, flashed forward right into Ezreal's face.

The next moment, Caitlyn's figure traced a dash on the ground. The instant the 90 Caliber Net was fired, she had already retreated to the side and back. The spot where the net landed was right on Ezreal. Ezreal was instantly slowed.

Even more precisely, the moment the net landed, a Yordle Snap Trap appeared almost simultaneously under Ezreal's feet. The trap triggered. Ezreal was rooted in place.

At the same time, Caitlyn's Piltover Peacemaker fired from the muzzle, piercing through the rooted Ezreal, and immediately followed up with two headshots, maximizing the damage output. All three E-W-Q abilities were released in less than a second, each one hitting precisely. Ezreal's health instantly dropped to the danger zone.

By this time, Sona finally followed up with her CC. Ezreal couldn't even press Flash before being killed on the spot. First Blood.

Meanwhile, just as Caitlyn and Sona continued to chase the fleeing Alistar, a burst of exclamations erupted from the next room.

"Holy crap! What was that combo?!"

"That movement! I thought he was about to get caught!"

"Three skills hit; that wasn't just mashing keys, right?"

"You try mashing keys and see; this was clearly calculated!"

Zhao Lei's voice was amplified several times over, exclaiming along with the other employees. Those employees who didn't usually play games were all stretching their necks to stare at the screen; some even stood up from the front row and moved back, afraid of blocking the people behind them.

Besides Zhao Lei, the Riot Games employees and IceFrog were even more shocked.

"You can even pull off that move?" After Alistar was also killed, IceFrog finally couldn't help but speak.

As the producer of league of legends, although he knew that many champions had ability synergies, like Caitlyn's E-Q combo, he had never thought that one could also place a trap during that process!

Behind Qin Mo, many Riot Games employees were equally stunned, unable to close their mouths.

It was the first time they had ever seen someone use Caitlyn's E-W-Q to such effect. Placing a trap while dashing, casting Q the moment the trap landed—all the front and back animations of the three skills were canceled, making the entire action flow perfectly. This was not an operation a novice could pull off. But Qin Mo was indeed playing for the first time.

"Boss is a genius!" Zhao Lei even pushed open the door to the next room and shouted over.

Qin Mo looked at IceFrog and chuckled. "This is the fun of league of legends; players are truly the most creative people. I just read the champion's skill introduction, thought I'd try it, and didn't expect it to actually work."

Meanwhile, the game continued. Although Qin Mo had an advantage, his teammates in the top and mid lanes were at a disadvantage. Qin Mo didn't take it too seriously; he didn't use his full skill level from his previous life to dominate, allowing others to have a good gaming experience. Both sides traded blows back and forth.

Eventually, after Qin Mo stole Baron Nashor with a Piltover Peacemaker, the game ended. During the final team fight at Baron, the cheers from the next room grew louder and louder.

After the game ended, those employees who didn't usually play games stood up, and some even couldn't help but applaud. After that, a few more matches were played, with victories and defeats on both sides.

... Two hours later, Jiang Youyou was a bit tired, and this first internal beta test of league of legends came to an end.

"How was it?" Qin Mo smiled as he looked at Jiang Youyou, who looked tired around the eyes but still had excitement lingering in her gaze.

"It was so much fun!"

"Senior, after playing your game, I don't even want to play dota anymore."

Just as the two were talking, Zhao Lei walked out of the next room and hurried to Qin Mo's side.

His face still wore the remnants of excitement, and his voice was a bit hoarse. The employees behind him walked out as well, some whispering to each other about the brilliant plays from the last few matches.

"Boss." Zhao Lei looked at Qin Mo, opening his mouth several times.

"Watching others play games is actually really interesting."

He looked back at the employees behind him.

"I stood in the next room just now and watched from beginning to end."

"Every match had moments worth cheering for, and after every match, everyone was discussing which play was the coolest."

"Although they don't play games, they could actually tell which plays were flashy."

Zhao Lei paused. "We weren't playing the game, yet we were able to get emotionally invested."

"It was like watching a match."

Qin Mo stood up and looked at Zhao Lei. He didn't speak, just looked at him calmly.

Zhao Lei froze at first. After a few seconds, his expression changed from confusion to realization, and then to shock.

"Boss." His voice trembled slightly.

"This is the esports you want to create!"

Qin Mo nodded.

IceFrog also stood up from his workstation. He looked at Zhao Lei, then at the few employees still excitedly discussing, and finally turned his gaze to Qin Mo.

"I've been making MOBAs for so many years." He pushed up his glasses.

"I never imagined that watching others play games could also become an experience."

Qin Mo turned around and looked at everyone present in Riot Games.

"Of course, playing games yourself is fun."

"But when every detail of a high-level match can be seen by the audience, every brilliant play can be captured in real-time, and every turnaround can make the bystanders feel the same emotions."

"Then it's no longer just a game."

"It's competition."

Zhao Lei stood in place, instinctively swallowing his saliva. Those employees from upstairs were still discussing the Caitlyn E-W-Q combo from earlier; they weren't gamers, but the tone of their discussion sounded exactly like... they were chatting about a ball game that had just ended!

Qin Mo turned to IceFrog. "How long until the internal beta version is perfected?"

"Half a month." IceFrog answered quickly.

"In one month, the internal beta version of league of legends will be ready for official launch."

"As for the official version." IceFrog thought for a moment. "If things go fast, it can be launched within six months to a year."

Qin Mo straightened his posture.

"This timing will likely clash perfectly with dota 2."

"Well, there's no time like the present." He turned his head to look at Zhao Lei.

"The CG trailer we produced earlier can be released now."

"However, don't reveal for now that Riot Games belongs to Inspur Technology. Douyin has only just started to gain momentum, and developing a game now might lead some netizens to criticize us for not focusing on our main business."

After Zhao Lei nodded, he took out his phone to check the time. "Releasing it tonight?"

"Tonight."

... At 8 PM that night, a video was simultaneously uploaded to Douyin, Bilibili, and all major video platforms. The title was: "Brand new MOBA game, league of legends is about to start its internal beta!"