League of Legends developer Riot Games is officially working on a new fighting game, a Riot representative confirmed at EVO 2019. The announcement confirms a longstanding rumor on the internet, stemming from Riot's acquisition of fighting game developer Radiant Entertainment. No further details about the in-development project were provided. It could be a League of Legends fighting game or it could be an entirely new IP. It could be planned for the near future or it may yet be years away.

Making the announcement was the founder of both the EVO Championship Series and Radiant Entertainment, Tom "inkblot" Cannon. Following years of supporting the fighting game community through the annual EVO esports event, Cannon founded Radiant Entertainment in 2011 alongside his brother Tony Cannon and form Capcom community manager Seth Killian. The studio's first game would be Rising Thunder, which was eventually canceled when Riot Games acquired Radiant in 2016.

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Since Radiant's acquisition, the studio's individual developers have remained quiet about what they were working on within Riot. An open-source version of Rising Thunder was quietly released in 2018, which couldn't have happened without Riot's blessing. It was a hint that efforts to create a fighting game continued within Riot. Hints that have now been confirmed.

By all accounts, Riot is taking the development of its fighting game very seriously. Rising Thunder was a small project with big aspirations. Under the Riot umbrella, the potential for innovation in the fighting game genre is significant. As Cannon describes, Riot isn't going to settle for less:

"Fighting games deserve to be enjoyed by way more people. As big as things are, we think they have the potential to get bigger."

Perhaps Riot Games will be able to show what it's working on come EVO 2020.

Riot Games continues to have unprecedented success for a studio that, for the most part,  remains focused on a single game - League of Legends. The studio just recently released Teamfight Tactics, which while based heavily on League of Legends gameplay, stands apart in several ways. It stands to reason that a Riot Games fighting game will be similar in that regard.

Possibly based on League of Legends, but unique enough to be regarded as Riot's next big thing, this new fighting game has a ton of potential despite its quite announcement. Expect more information as Riot's ready to share it.

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