Kindred, The Eternal Hunters

One aspect of League of Legends that I love is the fact Riot Games is constantly striving to improve the game through patch balances and new additions to the game. They recently revealed the next champion that they are releasing, a character know as Kindred. Kindred is unique among the cast of League champions, as it is comprised of two individuals; Lamb, the stoic archer, and Wolf, the savage spirit.

Riot Games

The lore for Kindred is immensely interesting, as it is revealed that they used to be one being (Most liking the physical representation of Death in this mythos). Everyone ran from this being, as no one wanted to meet with Death. This caused Death to become lonely, so he split himself in the middle. This resulted in his personality being split as well. Lamb, the physical female personality, hunts the souls of those to die and gives them a peaceful rest if they go to death willingly. She has a long memory but lacks many emotions. Wolf, the spirit-formed male personality, tracks down the souls of those who try to escape death and give them an awfully painful death. He leaves memories for Lamb, focusing on the present and the hunt at hand. He is also more playful than Lamb, but brutal.

Official Splash Art

The other aspect of League that I love is the community involved in it. The artistic talent of people all over the world comes together and creates such amazing pieces of art. Kindred's release was less than a week ago, and the internet is already exploding with art about Lamb and Wolf (The furry community has been fairly kind too, and there isn't a crap-ton of porn about them. Yet.) 

Also by Inkiness

By Inkiness

vurdeM

Lighane

Mkuchima

Gumae

Pyroan

Rin

KiyaKoda

Skyen

Rin

There is already so much more art out there about Kindred since I went and collected these few images. Feel free to Google some art, and let me know if you find some really cool interpretations of Kindred. Or send me some art you've found about your favourite champion in League.

Toodles!

Yosnakorn Sothonwong

A form of art that I always find interesting is gender-bending, or gender-swapped, characters. It is the process of taking a well established character and switching their gender (usually from cis male or cis female to the other).

Something about those chains just works better with Female Thresh

Yosnakorn Sothonwong is an artist on Deviantart that makes some absolutely amazing work. The above gender-bent Thresh is an example of his work. Anyone who has played League with me (or just has been following my blog for a while) knows that Thresh is thematically and mechanically one of my favourite champs. 

The cavalry has arrived, indeed.

I do talk a lot about League on my blog, as it's probably my favourite game. But artists do more than just League art. This is a character known as Tracer from the game Overwatch. Tracer is a spunky Australian with the technology to rewind her place in time by several seconds. She is able to reload her weapons, undo damage done to herself, get out of ambushes, or surprise enemies with a position reversal into a flank. If you're familiar with League, she seems to play very much like one of the newer champions, Ekko. Anyway, Yosnakorn does an impressive job of capturing many aspects of Overwatch and it's characters with this single image. The smirk on Tracer's face hints at her playful attitude, the light lines from her weapons imply her impressive speed as a character. There's even a subtle "time shadow" behind her, as her ability to rewind is a core mechanic for her in the game. On of the other characters, Winston, is in the background ...appreciating... Tracer's athletic build. All in all, the artwork captures the spirit of the game and it's characters well. The colouring and shading is beautiful, and it never hurts to have more art out there of a sexy character.

Yosnakorn also likes to merge different fandoms in his art. This piece combines characters from League with the Avenger's franchise (He really likes to combine League with Marvel stuff). The champs that fit each character in the movies are portrayed well in the image. Gnar is hulking out, quiet literally, as his rage-fuelled transforming ability is incredibly similar to The Hulk. Xer'ath is using his magical lightning to power an Iron Man suit. Braum grabs yet another shield to add to his repertoire as Captain America. The hammer of Thor, with it's flexibility of fighting style and powerful emissions is a logical choice for Jayce. Miss Fortune fits the body type, attitude, and weapon style of Black Widow, with Varus and his amazing bow backing her up Hawkeye-style. Lucian's stoic attitude makes him a great choice for Nick Fury (Sorry Ekko, you're a little too punk rock for that one). Master Yi takes over the role of the fast running Quicksilver, with Morgana taking the role of his sister, Scarlet Witch. If that wasn't enough, Malzahar takes flight as Vision, and Azir commands his minions as Ultron. The fact that all of these characters work so well in the art and as crossover personalities is really impressive to me.

From gender-swapping chain wardens, to the most attractive Rengar I've ever seen. Yosnakorn's art is always a pleasure to peruse. Some of his art is NSFW, but the Deviant art filters hide his more revealing works from underaged eyes. This particular character is a favourite of his, with several pieces dedicated to the female Rengar. Yosnakorn also uses the Fem-gar, as it's also known, to cross over skins within League. Here is the Battle Bunny skin that Riven uses, but adapted for Fem-gar. It really makes me wish that one: Fem-gar was a character in League, and two: That this skin happened ASAP. There is also a Heart Seeker Fem-gar, complete with heart eye patch and accents.

This artist really likes to do gender-swaps, and makes some really sexy artwork (a little too sexy for some of my more conservative readers). Give his page a look and support. Maybe one day Riot will pay him for some new skin ideas...


Toodles!

League Community Art

League is obviously one of my favourite games. Part of what makes it so great is the majority of the community that follows the game (There's always toxic people, let's just ignore them). One of the amazing things about a game as huge as League is that people all over the world get inspired by it, and some do absolutely amazing things as a result. Since I don't have a specific post lined up for today, here's a small collection of the awesome things people do with their love for League.

I do apologize for all the artists who made such great work, I don't have the link to the sources or the artist names in question. I will be VERY CLEAR that I DID NOT MAKE ANY OF THIS. Don't abuse Creative Commons, people. Just enjoy the art, and don't steal for profit.

DJ Sona rocking the house

The Meeps are pretty awesome little buddies

Seriously people. Supports aren't the only ones who can buy these

Don't mess with these ladies. They'll destroy you with their balls.

Unnnng. Thresh is so good....

Dat yellow card lock tho

No art collection is complete without some gender-swapping

I'm glad Diana can't go full eclipse in game. Hard counter to Leona. 

SHOOT ALL THE THINGS

Gotta save that ADC when he does the dumb

How can you hate that face? LOOK AT THAT FACE 

Only a technomaturgist would see eye to eye...

Some awesome contest art Riot received. Everyone wants Teemo dead.

And of course, my buddy Nautilus getting ready to STOMP.

Got any awesome video game art? Shoot me a link in the comments!

Toodles!

Renegades into the LCS // Female Gamers

This week was the conclusion of the LCS Challenger Series in North America. This is a long collection of matches that take the best teams in North America that currently aren't in the LCS, and matches them up against the lowest winning teams in the LCS from the previous split. Essentially, the Challenger teams are fighting for a chance to become part of the LCS, and the relegated LCS teams are fighting to get back into the LCS and have another season as professionals.

A relegated team from this last season, Team Coast, made it up to the final round and only had one team left to beat. Up against them was Team Renegades, a challenger team that now only had to defeat coast to become an LCS team. The finals are played in a Best of Five games, and it got taken all the way. Renegades won 3-2, and secured their spot in the NA LCS in the upcoming season. A big congratulations to them, and I look forward to watching them play once the regular season starts up again.

Now, you may be wondering why I'm mentioning and explaining all of this. Team Renegades represents something new to League of Legends eSports. The Support player on their team, Remilia (Current team picture on the right) is a female. This is the first time since League began that a team has made it to the professional circuit with a female member. I'M SO FREAKIN' PUMPED. I know how toxic the gaming community can be towards women who game, so I give her all the support in the world. I hope she just takes the encouragement from the positive members of the community and ignores the idiots that exist in any culture.

There was a team entirely made up of women that tried to get into the LCS, but they unfortunately fell to infighting and their in-game performance suffered too greatly. They now feed the terrible stereotype on Twitch that women just use their bodies to get followers instead of good gameplay. Those who follow the League scene know who I'm talking about, so I won't be mentioning any names.

Best of luck to Renegades, and kick some ass Remilia! Keep on rocking that Thresh!

Renegades website here

Toodles!

Imagine Dragons

If you watched the League of Legends World Championships last year, you would know that the live show was amazing. For those who didn't see it, a group known as Imagine Dragons performed with their band, a full orchestra, and a collection of taiko drummers (It was in Korea). Imagine Dragons is an incredibly talented group of musicians who turned out to be massive nerds. During an interview, the members admitted to being late to perform for a concert because they were finishing up a game of League. 

I'm going to let their musicianship speak for itself below, so I'll talk about how awesome these guys are as people. They love League so much that when Riot Games asked them to make what was basically the theme song for the World Championships, they agreed wholeheartedly. The song was released to the public FOR FREE (Because Riot loves it's fans, and Imagine Dragons love League). Imagine Dragons is also known for it's more publicly popular song, Radioactive (shown second below).

For a group of guys to be this generous, this nerdy, and this talented, Imagine Dragons is doing music right.

Seriously, listen to these awesome nerds.

Toodles!