There have been plenty of oddly named fighting games over the years. Names such as Garouden Breakblow: Fist or Twist, Kakuto Chojin: Back Alley Brutal, Tongue of the Fatman, the various subtitles that follow every single Under Night In-Birth title, or the incomparable Dong Dong Never Die. With the exception of Under Night, most fighting games with weird names tend to be intentionally silly, occupying a space some would call Kusoge fighting games. Still, for all the weird names out there, Riot Games might have just taken the cake with the reveal of Project L’s real name: 2XKO.
Lads. Come on now. You’re better than this.
For the unaware, 2XKO is the 2v2 fighting game being developed by Riot and a host of fighting game veterans, including the Cannon brothers, who helped both found EVO and create GGPO, the rollback netcode that helped revolutionize online fighting gameplay. The game will feature champions from League of Legends doing battle in 2.5D tag battles, with the developers using easier control inputs to encourage all skill levels to try it out. From the pedigree behind the scenes, and the gameplay that’s been shown, 2XKO looks like it’ll be a banger when it drops on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X & S in 2025, but seriously, that name is bad.
For a genre that can be so tough to appeal to new players at the best of times, a good first impression is the most important thing you can hope for, and 2XKO is probably about as off-putting as it gets. Sure, the name’s a reference to the fact it’s a tag fighter (I assume anyway, because it’s the only sane reason for a name like this), but uninitiated players are just going to see a collection of letters and numbers, shrug their shoulders and move on.
The fact that you have to pronounce each individual letter too is silly to me. Surely pronouncing it as Double KO would be better? If anything, it would get around the smooth-brained moments that me and Jimmy have been having when discussing this name, as we keep defaulting to 2KXO instead, like it’s a 2K game about a Beyonce song or The Weeknd’s record label. Yes, I did just look up those facts to make this joke. As for other jokes, some have already taken to calling the game Tesco, after the British supermarket chain. Rumors of the year 2 edition being called “Big Tesco” are unfounded, and were started by us.
If anything, the biggest problem with the name 2XKO is the fact that it has nothing to do with the game’s biggest selling point: the fact it’s tied into the League of Legends franchise. LoL already has a massive install base, so you’d think it’d make sense to have some kind of League branding front and center to let players know this is part of the same world.
It doesn’t have to be the most obvious name in the world, like “League Of Legends: We’re Doing A Big Tag Fight Though”, or “League Cross Tag Combo Battle: Championship Edition,” but something/anything that isn’t 2XKO. Jimmy’s suggestion of “Lee CarvaLho’s Fisting Challenge” might be a non-starter, though fighting game content creator Matt McMuscles suggested on Twitter that “League Of Legends: 2XKO” would be a good compromise between the two.
If we’re being honest, Riot nailed it on the first go: Project L. It doesn’t take players too long to associate the “L” with League of Legends, as again it’s one of the most popular games of all time, while “Project” connotes that this is something different and fresh. It’d also lead to a lot less confused faces when you explain to people what fighting game you’re playing. 2XKO meanwhile just doesn’t land the same.
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