Three major North American League of Legends organizations have partnered up with this weekend’s LCS Game Changers finalists, providing each squad with extra support and backing as they hit the Rift for the final time in the third installment of the program.
The three squads—Arcana, Astrocats, and Serenity—linked up with LCS franchisees NRG, Team Liquid, and Golden Guardians respectively ahead of the round-robin grand final stage taking place on Saturday, Sept. 23 at the Riot Games Arena in Los Angeles, California.
The orgs have hosted the Game Changers rosters in the lead-up to the finals, providing each squad access to the same facilities and support on offer to the region’s best LCS teams. Riot Games has worked on this initiative alongside SIDO, an esports research group with a focus on creating an “equitable, diverse, and healthy esports environment” for all.
For the third year running in 2023, Riot’s Game Changers program has brought women and those of marginalized genders together, providing them with more professional career opportunities within the esports space. The roles extend beyond the high ELO players, inclusive of coaches, management, and on-screen talent to hone their skills.
Exhibition matches have taken place every week since Sept. 3 to determine the seeding for the live finals, which is free for fans to attend—at the time of publishing, only a handful of seats are left.
Astrocats dominated the triple round robin, played in a best-of-two format, with their 3-1-2 record qualifying them for the grand final. Arcana and Serenity will play out a best-of-three qualifying final first, with festivities kicking off at 2:30pm CT. The show will include an opening ceremony and will be streamed live on the main LCS Twitch channel.
Riot Games has extended this initiative to its sister product in VALORANT, with the VCT Game Changers Championship set to take place in November live from Riot Studios in São Paulo, Brazil—a point of controversy upon its announcement due to the venue’s small audience capacity.
With vocal and passionate fans, the product will continue to grow with its fanbase and hopefully sow the seeds of gender-diverse talent yet to be discovered.
