CLANG! “A new quest has been added to your quest tracker!” proclaims the seductive announcer. Clicking on the new quest, the environment freezes and turns to a yellow tint as my camera moves over to the quest marker, “Defeat the Lizard Elder,” before returning color to the world and centering on my summoner.
League of Legends, a multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA), is releasing a new tutorial called Battle Training this week. It will help players learn the glossary of the game, give tips on defeating monsters, and warns the player about the dangers that lurk behind every bush.
As a new player to League of Legends, I found the Battle Training tutorial more comprehensive, active, and easier to get into than the previous skimpy training tutorial (and let's be honest, these type of DOTA games need a good tutorial for new players). The screen highlights important areas to look at with a light blue aura and includes a distinctive CLANG sound so the player's ears and eyes are directed at the new items of interests.
The tutorial is set on the regular 5v5 map, Summoner's Rift, and the tutorial coaches me through selecting my character, choosing spells, and buying items before minions, little lovable soldiers that run off to battle, are even spawned into the arena. As I exit my territory, one of the early quests tell me to go fight the Lizard Elder, and being the obedient quester, I head off to do battle with this wise lizardman.
As I approach the quest marker to “Defeat the Lizard Elder,” a pop-up warns gives me a tip about hiding in the bushes so the enemy can't see me, tells me that each row where the NPC soldiers travel down are called “lanes” and is separated into top, mid, and bottom.
The tutorial is targeted towards players who have little or no experience in playing battle arena type games and the Battle Training tutorial does a good job at showing players basic hints to help them survive a bit longer than if they were following the default tutorial.
Using what I learned from the tutorial, I played my first game of League of Legends with Josh Augustine, and former intern Erik Belsaas and I was able to understand what my team was talking about when they started tossing out terms like “top is MIA”, “they are jungled at bot”, and “gank mumu at mid.” Although the tutorial does not give much on tactics like working with your team to isolate and kill an opposing player, it is a very good start that lets new players get a foothold in League of Legends.
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