Doublelift’s Retirement Home Tournament highlights an unfortunate truth: LoL fans care more about old favs than new stars

Seemingly inspired by the success of recent streamer-focused League of Legends events such as Tyler1 All-Stars and Jynxi’s LoL event, legendary North American ADC Yiliang "Doublelift" Peng has announced a new Retirement Home Tournament showcasing classic names from the game’s competitive past.

Featuring some of the biggest names in NA (and European) LoL, four teams, captained by Zachary “Sneaky” Scuderi, William “Meteos” Hartman, Trevor "Stixxay" Hayes and Eugene "Pobelter" Park will compete to see which old-school team can claim victory. But does the excitement for this event showcase a problem with modern competitive LoL?

Doublelift announces Retirement Home Tournament filled with familiar faces

Unveiled on June 12, the Retirement Home Tournament will take place on June 27 and June 28, with a round-robin tournament to decide which team of classic NA LoL players is the best. Sponsored by Alienware, there’s a $20,000 prize pool available (which rivals some of the old NA LCS prize pools!).

Broadcast on Doublelift’s Twitch Channel, from 12pm PT, even the casters are throwbacks, with Rivington "RivingtonThe3rd" Bisland III, David Turley, and Joshua "Jatt" Leesman, three of the original NA LCS commentators, returning to the mics for this event.

With teams drafted on the evening of June 12, here’s the current lineups:

Team Meteos

• Top: Hauntzer
• Jungle: Meteos
• Mid: Hai
• Bot: Maplestreet
• Sup: Xpecial

Team Pobelter

• Top: Hotshot
• Jungle: Akaadian
• Mid: Pobelter
• Bot: Keith
• Sup: Smoothie

Team Sneaky

• Top: Voyboy
• Jungle: Svenskeren
• Mid: Froggen
• Bot: Sneaky
• Sup: LemonNation

Team Stixxay

• Top: Darshan
• Jungle: Xmithie
• Mid: Bigfatlp
• Bot: Stixxay
• Sup: Link

There’s definitely a huge amount of talent on show here, and it’s hard to even pick which teams could be the best, but fans of the 2013-2016 era of NA LCS are sure to be happy.

But the excitement and instant recognition of the names here also highlights on big problem with the current LCS: The lack of personalities and personal connections to these players. Almost every name in the “retirement” home is either instantly recognisable to a certain vintage of LoL fan, given they were all some of the biggest streamers of LoL back in the day.

Compare this to modern LCS where even dedicated fans would struggle to identify some members of the rosters. Still, this throwback event will definitely be one to watch. As mentioned above, Doublelift’s Retirement Home Tournament will be broadcast between June 27 to June 28 on his Twitch channel, and is sponsored by Alienware.