The upcoming League of Legends fighting game has created a lot of hype.
Evo Japan 2024 was special for quite a few reasons, and having the latest build of 2XKO playable at the event was one of them. Some information from this public test was revealed officially — like some trailers and interviews. Much more can be discovered from the feedback of professional players and content creators who traveled to Japan and had a chance to play 2XKO.
Having everything of that in one post will help you satisfy your curiosity for Riot Games’ fighter and help you understand why the whole fighting games community (FGC) is so excited about it.
What’s new in 2XKO?
The previous big public test for 2XKO was during Evo 2023 in Las Vegas. The game was known as Project L back then.
The developers had around eight months to make changes and polish the demo version. So, here is a concise list of what new has been discovered in the latest build of 2XKO at Evo Japan 2024:
- Champion animations are smoother
- Various UI elements have been changed
- A new playable champion has been added
- Adjusted many fighting mechanics, like movement, normals, and Specials
The game is not a ready project. Still, those who played 2XKO at Evo Japan say that they understand why Riot takes so much time working on it. The general impressions are positive, even if the path to release is still long.
A 2XKO match was shown during the Evo Japan 2024 stream.
2XKO characters
Only five League of Legends champions have been officially confirmed for 2XKO.
- Ahri — A quick rushdown character with versatile magic attacks. Endless pressure brings results with such an archetype, and Ahri has enough options to open up her opponents.
- Darius — A massive fighter who deals massive damage. Darius has somewhat slow movements. His mix-up game is rather limited. But when he finds an opening, he easily destroys an opponent’s health with huge moves and simple resets.
- Yasuo — He has notable quick movements, and his sword reaches quite far. This combination helps Yasuo mix up effectively to find openings and create long combos to deal bigger damage. Yasuo can manipulate wind and use its power for defense and offense.
- Illaoi — An unusual character. She combines massive high damage moves with summoning spirit tentacles that attack separately.
One of the character trailers mentioned Jinx , so she is kind of confirmed. We still know nothing about her gameplay.
Justin Wong was present at the Evo Japan venue. In between all his interviews, he played the newest games such as Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves and Hunter x Hunter: Nen x Impact. He also played 2XKO and created this informative video about Illaoi.
How to play 2XKO
2XKO is a tag-team 2D fighting game. Each player can pick up two characters to assist each other and replace each other during a match.
This formula has no big changes in the Evo Japan demo. However, the developers created a special 2XKO guide for the event.
Players’ feedback
Nothing can convey the essence of a fighting game better than playing it and feeling it. Here is what professional players and attendees of Evo Japan 2024 have to say about 2XKO.
“I think it’s a really, really fun game right now. It’s fun to see how from build to build they implement different feedback and different changes.”
“I do love how fluid and responsive it is when I do something.”
“I was really surprised that they listen to a lot of our feedback. I’ve been talking with the devs and saying, 'You should add more dash momentum to my normals [...and] to my jumps, bigger throw tech animations.' And a lot of those things are already in.”
“The game is snappy… the movement feels good.”
“It’s very very good. It moves very fluidly. The combo system is very cool, and then it’s a tag team, so the possibilities are endless.”
And here is feedback from Japanese players. It feels like Darius is pretty popular among them.
SonicFox also enjoyed the game. They played 2XKO with G01. Would this become another epic rivalry, like in the early years of DBFZ?
This player has recorded a 2XKO demo, including colors and skins for the champions.
2XKO will be out sometime in 2025. Before that, we can expect to have new demo builds at Evo 2024 in July. Also, the developer promised to conduct an open demo for everyone from their homes this year. For everything interesting and exciting about 2XKO and fighting games in general, stick around on esports.gg.