History of Champion Splash art in League of Legends

Introduction

With League of Legends, the art for the game has changed and developed drastically over the years. When the game first released the champion splash arts only showed the champion, usually on a dark or plain background. The quality may have seemed low but expressed the champion well enough to be recognisable through colour and shape alone.

The reason I decided to look through these art pieces was to try and find parts of them that apply to what I want to create at the end of this project. Why were these art pieces made, and how do they convey a character and their story?

One of the earlier examples of this is of the champion Ashe.

Ashe

From her base skin you can see she’s an archer, that has a glowing blue bow and a black and gold cape. You can see she’s female. If you’re well versed in League of Legend lore, you can also see she has the Freljord symbol on her hood. Her post is very stationary and the background is plan black. This is the version of her splash art that was released in 2009.

This second image is the splash art of Ashe released in 2011. As you can see even with just a few years difference Riot had started to create more of an identity for champions in their splash arts. In the background you can see her home of Freljord, and her bow is a lot more solid and detailed. The champion is wearing the same clothes but the artstyle has started to evolve into something more polished but not quite realism. It’s a very detailed but painted style.
The pose is much more dynamic, conveying the feeling of frost magic using archer much more convincingly, especially when combined with the background.

What I Can Use – Ashe

Even though this splash came a long way in style and skill, she kept a lot of things that still made her easily identifiable as the same character. She kept her colour palette, weapon, and backstory. These are really important things for her to have as without them she wouldn’t be the same character. This is something I need to be aware of in my art.

Another example is the champion Gangplank.

Gangplank

In his original art, Gangplank is easily identifiable as a pirate. With the hat and cutlass, big coat and gun, and his impressive beard. The gun and cutlass were a part of his original gameplay kit. His auto attacks were cutlass melee, and he had an ability to shoot once with his gun. The background is incredibly vague, it looks almost as if there’s a dock behind him, but you can’t really tell. Clarity on this orignal is really low.

The second version of Gangplanks splash art is a lot more dynamic. He lost some of his cartoonish and stereotypical pirate outfit, to be replaced by something more modern and cool.
His new outfit has a shorter beard and a less cartoonish hat. The gun he uses as an ability is toward the front. He kept his red coat but it’s been ripped in what looks to be a ship battle.
He’s standing on the deck of his ship, an obvious captain. Cannonfire in the background landing on the deck and treasure behind him. He’s stood in an action pose.
He looks complety a pirate on a stormy sea. A much more polished version of the original character.

In 2015, Gangplank got his third and currently final (2022) version of his splash art.

In this art Gangplank appears in the foreground. His long beard is back but he looks less like a cartoon pirate, and more like an incredibly dangerous man to know.
The detail added in this splash is incredible, the rain on his clothes, the gun pointed at the barrel which is a part of his updated kit. To shoot the barrel you get bonus gold in game. The orange in his hand is a reference to another part of his kit, eat an orange to regain health, which was a fan favourite ability. In the background is a destroyed ship, in the lore Gangplank died at this point, his ship destroyed.
This splash art doesn’t just show the evolution of art in League of Legends, it shows the evolution of narrative. Which became a huge part of their future events, art, skinlines and gameplay.
Each piece of art created has begun to tell a story, even the skins, which aren’t a part of the base lore at all but have their own stories.

What I Can Use – Gangplank

Gangplank is both similar to Ashe and incredibly different. His character has developed and been given an identity. He started out as just a pirate, he was identifiable but as other pirate characters started to be created, or even just other champions in general with more solid identities, he stood out as lacking. It took a few years for them to get it right, but when they found it they gave him a solid identity as an unstoppable pirate captain, and gave him an updated art to match.

In my piece are a few things I can use, mostly, first idea isn’t always best idea. That reviewing what you have and adding to it can be beneficial if a character feels shallow or surface level. I can also use the progress in art style. The details that they thought of to add in the rain and the oranges and barrels, the destroyed ship in the background. I can use this as an example of what kind of things to think about adding, environmental things such as the weather, or what a character might own and the kind of things they would surround themselves with.

In 2011, a champion called Ahri was released. And alongside her release she came with a skin. These reskin champions, give them a fresh look in game and the skin splash is shown on the loading screen. This is a premium item in the game. Paid for with real money.

Ahri

As with Gankplank, in the 2011 version of this skin you can start to see a story being built, and some movement to the characters pose. It’s a solid base of what they built on. Ahri is stood in a reaching pose, and in the background there are some temples suggesting this is someplace in Asia.
The original idea of Ahri is a Nine Tailed Fox, I had assumed that this was based on the Japanese version, but looking into the history of it, this Nine Tailed Fox is a creature of Folklore across a lot of East Asia, and it looks in this image as if she’s wearing some form of Hanbok, which is Korean traditional dress.

As League of Legends lore developed, so did Ahri’s backstory. Her name is derived from Korean. Her home area of Ionia also developed, as a mix of East Asian and Greek influences. This explains her vagueness in 2011, but in 2021 the Dynasty Ahri splash got another update.

This art truly show how much the art in League of Legends has evolved and where it came from. With Ionia fully developed, and Ahri developed as a Korean Kumiho, and her Dynasty skin really allowed them to go wild with the concept. Ahri is running across the rooftops of what looks to be ancient Korea. She is wearing Hanbok and appears as a beautiful woman with fox ears and a tail. In her hand is a ball of magic she uses as an ability in game, and at her feet is a trail of pink and heart shapes which refers to another ability she has.
In the folklore of the Kumiho, nine tailed foxes are evil creatures that appear as beautiful women to convince men to serve them. She also has her own army of foxes chasing her.
The detail in this artwork is amazing. Nothing has been overlooked, and the style is fully realised. Painted realism with the Riot Games flare. The gold on her skirts is shiny, the arrows flying through the air after her. It’s the perfect example of exactly what I wish to capture in my final artpiece. So much study has gone into the backgrounds and the character herself. So many details added to make her feel real.

Also the archers behind her are wearing Korean military outfits, easily identifiable by the hat.

What I can Use

There are so many different things that I can apply to my own work from Ahri’s dynasty piece. If the character is based in a real world setting, research of their location, history, and culture. Who are they as a person and where have they come from. Creating a dynamic pose that makes sense in their universe. Creating a background that interacts with the character themselves and using an appealing colour palette that suits the setting.
To make the art have motion but the character still stand out as the focus of the image. To have details in every part of the image even if people wouldn’t look there.
Polishing art to perfection, this is something that I always found difficult. As focusing on one thing for too long can be difficult for me. But in another one of my posts I hope to review the process of art creation for League of Legends splash arts specifically.

Conclusion

The addition of narrative in the areas these characters live, and the time and effort spent to polish the art pieces to perfection to capture entire the essence of a character in a single image is what defines Riot Games and League of Legends art.
Art at Riot Games has progressed from a thing of purpose, to a selling point, and something to be proud of. This is something I intend to explore in other posts.

This is what I intend to try and create, an artpiece with narrative and heart. With reasearch and care, and details you may never notice even after viewing it hundreds of times. A piece that evokes emotion, postitive or negative. And most of all a piece that shows a fully realised character and story in one glance.

References

Riot Games (2009) Ashe Champion Splash [Digital Art] Available Online: https://i.imgur.com/kky5Pyi.jpg

Katie De Sousa (2011) Ashe Champion Splash [Digital Art] Available Online: https://leagueoflegends.fandom.com/wiki/Ashe/LoL

Riot Game (2009) Gangplank Champion Splash [Digtal Art] Available Online: https://i.imgur.com/0eFyHeV.jpg

Riot Games (2011) Gangplank Champion Splash [Digital Art] Available Online: https://www.surrenderat20.net/2011/11/gangplank-is-getting-makeover.html

Joshua Brian Smith (2015) Gangplank, the Saltwater Scourge [Digital Art] Available Online: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/nJN3e

Riot Games (2011) Dynasty Ahri [Digital Art] Available Online: https://lolskinshop.com/product/dynasty-ahri/

Yuhong Ding (2021) Dynasty Ahri for League of Legends [Digital Art] Available Online: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/B33RyD

New York Times (N.D) One Garments Journey Through History [Article] Available Online: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/09/style/one-garments-journey-through-history.html

Thomas Duvernay (1997) The Way of the Bow. Available Online: https://www.atarn.org/korean/IA_kr_1.htm

Riot Games (2009) League of Legends [Video Game] Available Online: https://www.leagueoflegends.com/en-gb/