Wild Rift Esports Roster Expansion – New Teams Bolster Game’s Outlook

LoL Esports
March 18, 2021
Jordan Ashley

Wild Rift esports has seen fast and strong growth since the beta launch. While a mobile version of LoL seemed risky at first, the game is thriving and esports organizations are quickly picking up the title.

This is more evident than ever, with the current explosion in Wild Rift teams. Recently, a number of new Wild Rift roster expansions have happened. As events for the title grow, more and more esports names are trying to get involved. These are the major expansions, and what they mean for the game.

Wild Rift Esports Roster Expansion

Wild Rift Esports Roster Expansions

Over the past month, nearly twenty new Wild Rift rosters have been announced across the globe. Interestingly, unlike most mobille esports, Wild Rift is picked up established esports organizations quickly, unlike other mobile esports titles like Arena of Valor and FreeFiree. which took months to gain traction.

Navi Enters Wild Rift

The Navi Esports Club announced their roster for Wild Rift a week ago. Their team brings together five players from China to compete for a team based in Europe. The current players signed include Garren, Ghost, Mumu, Juzi, and SkyFL. Some of these players originate from the regular League of Legends game. However, some of them hail exclusively from mobile gaming such as Garen and Ghost. This new roster debuted at March’s Mobile Mayhem Championship, and will be competing at the next major EU event too.

Buriram United & Geek Fam

Two SEA powerhouses both announced their rosters in the past month. Buriram United is one of the largest Esports names in Thailand, and they’ve just launched their Wild Rift roster. They’ve taken part in a few early events, but have now solidified their Wild Rift roster expansion. This includes the players NoeL, H2K, Coldenfeet, JIMJIMJIM, KenKilla, and Ancafe. This team secures Buriram as one of the big names in Thailand’s Wild Rift scene.

At the end of February, Geek Farm also announced their finalized their Wild Rift team. It contains some LoL pros such as Nyx, but also newer placers like Mono and TheShang. There’s then Rumpel and OzoraVeki also playing for the team. This roster follows the same themes as the other recent announcements, combining mobile esports players with LoL veterans. This is a secure approach to this style of game, and so far it has paid off.

Interestingly, these two organizations are now the default rivals in the greater South East Asia region.

Alliance Wild Rift Roster

Dota 2 powerhouse Alliance also turned their attention to Wild Rift recently. They’re expanding into Southeast Asia with a fully Singaporean roster consisting of Shinsekai, Raven, Rich, and Kryonics. This is a pretty big development itself, given that the org is Swedish.

The main goal for Alliance seems to be publicizing the teams development and path into WR esports and also having a representative at the SEA Icon Series, the first Wild Rift esports event.

In fact, most of these new rosters seem to be built around participation in the Southeast Asia Icon Series Preseason starting on March 26th.

Wild Rift Esports expansion and the game’s future

Wild Rift has had a fast growth. Every patch seems to bring it closer to being a full experience of LoL on mobile. Its fate though seems like a bellwether for taking mobile esports global.

So far, Wild Rift has smashed through the barriers that some thought would hold a mobile esport back. These expanded team rosters show a great belief in the game’s growth from established esports orgs.

Wild Rift’s continued growth will validate these early efforts to get involved. The choice of payers combining mobile players with LoL players show a cautious approach. However, it clearly shows that even the bigger esports orgs are trying to get involved with mobile games. Rather than being a specific niche in esports, this continued confidence shows that mobile esports will soon be a major part of the culture.

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