Three champions that have been in League of Legends since early seasons received visual updates in Patch 10.18.
The goal of these updates to Nocturne, Viktor, and Malzahar, according to League visual effects lead artist Beardilocks, is to improve the overall gameplay clarity of VFX while bringing the champs up to modern League standards.
Here are the visual changes coming to Malzahar, Nocturne, and Viktor.
Malzahar
Riot has doubled down on the theme of Malzahar, making his abilities feel more attached to the Void. They have a clearer, modern purple hue, allowing you to become a master of the Void yourself.
Malzahar’s entire kit looks much clearer and should be better for opponents as well, who will be able to more easily read what the champ is doing.
Nocturne
Nocturne looks much more menacing thanks to this update. His passive received a great quality-of-life enhancement, showing the radius that he hits it with.
If you didn’t have enough nightmares already from solo queue Nocturne, then you should prepare yourself since they’ll be increasing tenfold after these changes go live.
Viktor
Viktor received some amazing upgrades to his entire kit. The glorious evolution might have finally arrived for him. The E upgrade was long overdue considering how unclear the hitbox was before.
Riot Games has recently updated the Ignite spell as well. It also clearly communicates when the individual ticks of the debuff occur, pulsating bright orange and yellow each second. This should give players a good idea of the duration of the spell, allowing them to react accordingly, use Cleanse, heal up, or simply disengage.
League lead VFX artist Oliver “Beardilocks” McDonald outlined all the visual updates coming to Patch 10.18. The goal of “these smaller scope updates is to improve the overall gameplay clarity of VFX whilst bringing them up to modern League of Legends standards,” Beardilocks said in a Reddit post.
The update, according to League VFX artist Sirhaian, will “improve [the spell’s] visual quality while greatly reducing how noisy it was, but trying to keep its importance level.”
The new and improved Ignite is vastly more vibrant and colorful than its live server version. It’s clearer and easy to see, and in a messy teamfight with spells and visual effects exploding left, right, and center, it’ll almost certainly stand out.
Hopefully Riot will begin delivering more visual updates to long-overdue kits and other summoner spells as well. While receiving nerfs and buffs for multiple champions is important all the time, quality of life buffs are just as important. It’s easier to play a game where everything is clear and concise instead of outdated with old graphics.
