After many months of speculation, Riot Games has finally revealed its upcoming, competitive shooter, Valorant. And the great news is that you won't have long to wait as it's set for release this summer, once it's been through rigorous beta testing. In fact, you can check out a couple of minutes of alpha gameplay footage in the video below (here's a link).
Now confirmed as a 5v5 character-based tactical shooter and previously known as Project A, the first mention of Valorant's existence came in October during Riot's 10th-anniversary live stream. At the time, it was still in the early stages of development and promised to be a competitive shooter that takes aim at Overwatch. "Shooting in Valorant is precise, consequential, and highly-lethal - we want you to win on your skill and strategy alone," boasts the blurb on Valorant's newly launched official website.
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"Imagine this: tactical shooter meets hypernatural powers. Everyone's got guns and a unique set of abilities, so how do you beat someone with the speed of wind? Use your own moves to outplay them and beat them to the shot. Valorant is a game for bold strategists who dare to make the unexpected play, because if it wins, it works."
The abilities that the characters possess do seem to be inspired by Overwatch but you can see the inspiration from other games, such as Counter-Strike. According to PC Gamer, each characters' ultimate ability has a pretty lengthy cooldown which can span several rounds so you'll need to rely on more traditional means of taking down opponents for the majority of the time. And characters aren't bound to one type of gun either.
"We were already good at doing the service things like Champions with League of Legends," Valorant's game director, Joe Ziegler told Polygon in an interview. "And we're like, 'What if we took a model like that, and we thought about how we would take these games that normally have really closed legacy loops, like Counter-Strike, and turn it into a service - into something you could continuously add to, where people don't hate it if you add a new gun or character?'"
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Riot is putting a huge emphasis on minimising problems with lag and hit detection to make a much smoother - and fairer - gaming experience. And, according to the website, there will be a 'commitment to anti-cheat from day one'.
There's currently no news on when the beta testing will begin or what you need to do to get in on the action when it does but signing up for email updates on Valorant's website is probably a good place to start.
Featured Image Credit: Riot GamesTopics: Valorant, Riot Games