There's rumors of a League of Legends Classic, and I'm not sure how I feel about it

In many ways, the ‘Classic’ trend began with Old School RuneScape. Stripping away all of the game’s shiny new bells and whistles and harkening back to the good ol’ days of chopping down trees and leveling up professions, Jagex kickstarted one of the most prolific trends in online videogames. World of Warcraft Classic appeared in 2019, quickly becoming the premier Warcraft experience in the wake of the MMO’s infamous Shadowlands expansion, and the somewhat mediocre Dragonflight that came after it. Since then Blizzard has capitalized on the ‘Classic’ idea, bringing it to Overwatch in 2025, while Epic had released Fortnite OG just a year earlier. Now, rumor has it that Riot is planning League of Legends Classic, and I’m not sure how I feel about it.

First mentioned on-stream by former League of Legends pros Kim ‘Doinb’ Tae-sang and Jian ‘Uzi’ Zihao, Doinb claims that a “Classic server” is set to drop “next month,” presumably meaning July. It’s not the first time the champion midlaner has leaked things that have turned out to be true; he’s received multiple fines over his several years in the spotlight for chatting about LPL business, and is known to be a reliable – if not compulsive – leaker.

“When the Classic server launches, I might bring back some WE [Weibo Gaming] players or some of the old veterans and invite them to stream together, just like the old days,” he says, noting that “the exact release date hasn’t been confirmed” but that, per his sources, it’ll be “early next month.” Uzi echoes the idea that a Classic server does exist, but states that he “can’t talk about this.” All he says is that “it should be coming soon.”

Riot hasn’t responded to these rumors – its focus is on shipping Locke – but iconic WoW Classic streamer Tim ‘Esfand’ Esfandiari did attend a mystery event at Riot HQ on June 6, lending further credence to something Classic could be cooking. Of course, he may have just been trying out Locke ahead of his official reveal on June 9, but I can’t see any evidence on his YouTube that he tried the new League of Legends champion. Sure, there might be an impressions embargo set closer to Locke’s release date, but let my imagination do its thing; at least for now.

According to former League of Legends pros Doinb and Uzi, Riot is reportedly working on a “League of Legends Classic” version that could be released in the near future.

No official confirmation yet, but the rumor is already generating massive excitement among longtime fans eager… pic.twitter.com/Kdc5ELhPz8

– Strafe Esports (@strafeapp) June 7, 2026

There’s various iterations of what LoL Classic could look like. It could be a limited time mode, its own unique server as Doinb and Uzi allude to, or it could be an entirely new gameplay experience. Similarly, it could be set at any point in the MOBA’s history: do we rewind the clock back to 2009, where there were just 40 champions? Do we push even further and limit it to the 17 OG OGs? Will it be the base crop of items; the original balance patches?

Any and all of the above sound like an absolute blast; I’d love to play release day Morgana (two-hour long Black Shield, anyone?), or the constantly-teleporting, stun-card slinging, global-slowing Twisted Fate. I’m excited to see what League of Legends looked like without the balance refinements of the past 16 years; I want to know how it felt to play the game that I love all those years ago.

I have, however, grown somewhat tired of the ‘Classic’ idea, and the videogame industry’s consistent lean into nostalgia-bait more generally. As I said in the wake of the Xbox Games Showcase at Summer Game Fest: every ‘new’ game is either a remake or a remaster, or a new installment in an OG franchise, ‘reimagined’ for a modern audience. Classic, at its core, is the same thing: it’s a step back to what’s arguably a better time for live-service games, where microtransactions didn’t rule supreme, and balance was haphazard and scrappy.

Nostalgia gets me, too; I loved re-exploring Mists of Pandaria in MOP Classic, and if Riot released a Classic LoL server tomorrow, I’d be the first to log in. But, more generally, the lesson to take from the excitement around ‘Classic’ games isn’t that players just want more and more nostalgia; they want the current game to feel as good as it did back then. It’s a trip down memory lane then, potentially, a harsh reminder of how the game has changed.

Instead, I’d hope that developers look at what people are loving about these Classic modes – the reckless balance, the pure joy and fun of chaos – and implement that back into their games. This doesn’t have to come at the expense of competitive integrity; Riot can’t just rewind time and delete a load of champions. Instead, it’s a case of analyzing what players love about that era, and using that to inform development forward. In a world where multiplayer games are all beginning to feel similar, why not draw inspiration from the past where they were at their primes?

Does League of Legends Classic sound good? Yes; absolutely. Do I hope, however, that Riot – and developers more generally – look at what’s exciting about these modes and let it inspire them? Yes, I do. I’d love to see Riot take the risks it used to – killing off Gangplank, for example. I’d love to see a world where it loosens the reins a little and lets the playerbase run wild; it’s taken steps to do that by ‘canonizing’ some of the more bizarre builds in recent patches.

I think that’s a move in the right direction – it feels like, with League Next on the horizon, Riot is making the decisions we want it to. But in order to really bring the magic back to League of Legends, I’d argue it needs to draw inspiration from the past. Let LoL Classic be your guide.