Since the open beta release of League of Legends: Wild Rift in Southeast Asia (SEA) back in October 2020, its esports scene has been steadily growing in viewership. The Wild Rift SEA Pentaboom Showdown, a celebrity showmatch where SEA influencers and streamers compete against each other, garnered the most attention with over 38k peak viewership. While the numbers may not look too satisfying when compared to Moonton’s biggest tournament, the Mobile Legends: Bang Bang Southeast Asia Cup (MSC) 2021, which peaked at around 2.28 million viewership, according to Esports Charts, Riot Games continues to improve Wild Rift’s esports scene and deliver a quality experience for both the audience and esports pros.
Both Wild Rift and Mobile Legends may have different in-game mechanics and gameplay that sets them apart from each other but what they do have in common is that they both are competing for that lucrative mobile MOBA esports market. Despite still being in open beta, Wild Rift is currently gearing towards an impending international championship tournament. With regional championships like the Wild Rift SEA Icon Series, Wild Tour Brazil, and the Wild Rift Summoner Series for North America (NA), Riot Games is committed to bolstering its mobile MOBA’s esports ecosystem to its full potential. The same thing can be said for Mobile Legends as it continues to expand to new regions by hosting tournaments like the Mobile Legends Professional League (MPL) in Brazil and Cambodia and tournaments like the M3 Arabia Major for the Middle East.
The esports performance of Wild Rift in the SEA region
Riot Games is pouring a lot of effort into bolstering the Wild Rift esports scene in SEA. This is because the mobile esports penetration in the region is quite high. According to a report from Statista, China has the most number of smartphone users in Asia for May 2021 with over 911 million users. This is followed by Indonesia with 160 million mobile users.
The first official Wild Rift esports tournament circuit in SEA, the Wild Rift SEA Icon Series 2021: Summer Season grabbed the attention of many esports organizations in the region. Organizations such as EVOS Esports' Thailand team, Alliance’s Singaporean team, the Philippines’ Bren Esports, and Indonesia’s ONIC Esports flocked to the inaugural Wild Rift esports circuit, racing to be one of the first to grab the mobile esports’ championship title.
The tournament comprised eight regions with each region having its regional cup, hosted by various tournament organizers alongside Riot Games. According to data from Esports Charts, the all-time high for Wild Rift esports was during the SEA Icon Series 2021: Summer Super Cup grand finals. The match between SBTC Esports and EVOS Legends achieved 25k viewers.
On the other hand, in Mobile Legends’ most recent MPL season, the highest performing regional league was the MPL Indonesia Season 7 with a jaw-dropping peak viewership of 1,838,907. With Myanmar having to cancel its esports league due to the country’s ongoing political issues, the previous season had only four regional MPL tournaments.
The gap gets wider when comparing both esports titles’ regional championships. Wild Rift’s SEA Icon Series 2021: Summer Super Cup peaked at 25,082 viewers while Mobile Legends’ MSC 2021 spiked to 2,284,012 peak viewership making it one of the most viewed esports tournaments in history. Both regional championships have the same prize pool of $150,000 USD, but the MSC 2021 had the upper hand in terms of audience over the SEA Icon Series 2021: Summer Super Cup.
Is there room for Wild Rift in the mobile MOBA market in SEA?
A new mobile MOBA title is definitely a welcome addition to the growing esports market in SEA. Having more competition in the market will promote innovation, forcing other publishers to think of creative ways to attract and keep their audience engaged in the game.
Similar to the two popular MOBA PC titles, DOTA 2 by Valve and League of Legends by Riot Games, both coincide by offering players a different MOBA experience. DOTA 2 is more focused on complex yet highly rewarding and fun game mechanics that force players to be creative in their approach to outsmart their enemies. League of Legends, on the other hand, is quite tame, catering towards casual play with its wide range of simple-to-use champions while also rewarding competitive players by giving them high-mechanic champions that are hard to use but rewarding to master.
A title doesn’t always need to have millions of viewers to be called successful. Wild Rift having a different approach to the mobile MOBA category may prove to be a good concept in the long run as mobile players will have more options on what mobile MOBA title they want to engage in.
Is Wild Rift esports off to a good start?
For five years, Mobile Legends has dominated the mobile MOBA esports scene in SEA, expanding and becoming a household name in the market. Moonton had the first-mover advantage and leveraged it to enthrall and attract millions of esports viewers to tune into the game with some smart marketing. As a result, it has become the go-to mobile MOBA of choice for esports fans in the region, especially with its seasonal MPL tournaments which have even begun to be regularly broadcasted on linear television. This is why we see a huge gulf in terms of viewership in esports tournaments between Mobile Legends and Wild Rift.
Wild Rift’s esports growth in SEA is quite slow but these are still early days. The fact that Mobile Legends has been dominating the mobile esports scene in the region for so long, puts Wild Rift in a predicament where it needs to have something unique to offer that can make Mobile Legends loyalists try Wild Rift and then convince them to stay for good.
Riot Games still has a lot to work on if it wants to compete with the SEA mobile MOBA esports king. On the bright side, various mobile esports organizations such as EVOS Legends, Bigetron Esports, Bren Esports, and Team Flash have started to hop into the Wild Rift esports scene. Western esports organizations like Immortals, Cloud9, and TSM have also made their presence known and are eyeing to represent their respective regions in the upcoming Wild Rift Worlds Championship.
The potential of Wild Rift being one of the most dominant mobile MOBA esports titles in SEA is yet to be fully seen. It is difficult to quantify the success of Wild Rift, given that the game is still new and is still trying to build its foundation in the mobile esports scene. Head of Wild Rift esports, Leo Faria, stated that Riot Games plans on expanding the esports scene internationally and aims to make Wild Rift the first mobile esports title to have the biggest reach globally. However, only time will tell if that journey begins from SEA, or elsewhere given that League of Legends already has a well-established fan base globally, especially in China where Mobile Legends is currently not accessible.
