What is League of Legends?

A free-to-play MOBA developed by Riot Games and released on October 27, 2009, built as a standalone follow-up to the Warcraft III mod DotA Allstars.

Where did League of Legends come from?

It grew out of the DotA Allstars scene, with designer Steve "Guinsoo" Feak joining Riot founders Brandon Beck and Marc Merrill to build a standalone client; Riot announced the game on October 7, 2008 and launched it on October 27, 2009.

What does League of Legends mean?

It refers to Riot's fantasy MOBA where playable "champions" from across a shared setting fight in team arenas; the game is commonly abbreviated "LoL".

How do you use League of Legends?

Outside of playing it, fans use champion catchphrases like Gangplank's "I ate some oranges and it was K" and Rammus's flat "ok" as in-jokes on r/leagueoflegends and older LoL forums.

Is League of Legends still popular?

Yes, by 2015 the World Championship finals drew 36 million viewers worldwide, and r/leagueoflegends had already sat in the top 10 non-default subreddits by December 2014.

League of Legends

2009video gameclassic

Published September 5, 2026

League of Legends, usually shortened to LoL, is the free-to-play MOBA that Riot Games launched on October 27, 2009 as a standalone descendant of the Warcraft III mod DotA Allstars1. The forum culture around the game spawned a chain of long-running in-jokes ("it was K", "Dance Master Phreak", "Jesse Perring") that fed a top-10 gaming subreddit and an e-sport that beat NBA Finals viewership.

league of legends memes gaming esports memes forum era memes subreddit origin memes

Overview

League matches pit two teams of five champions against each other on lane-based maps, but the game's fingerprint on internet culture came from its forums and subreddit rather than gameplay footage. Riot's r/leagueoflegends passed 600,000 subscribers by December 2014 and sat in the top 10 non-default subreddits2. The community's meme output looped back to specific champion voice lines and ability quirks, from Gangplank's citrus-heal to Rammus's clipped one-word taunt.

The player base also grew a heavy YouTube ecosystem, with creators like Dunkey and SivHD posting gameplay comedy and rage clips that drew audiences well past active players1. By 2018, champion reveals were treated as pop-culture drops in their own right, with trailers for Kai'Sa4 and Neeko each pulling millions of views inside a day.

Gallery

Origin & Background

Platform

Riot Games client / official LoL Forums (viral spread)

Key People

Riot Games

Date

2009

Riot Games was founded by Brandon Beck and Marc "Tryndamere" Merrill6, who brought on former DotA Allstars lead designer Steve "Guinsoo" Feak and DotA community manager Steve "Pendragon" Mescon to build a standalone MOBA free of Blizzard's engine3. League of Legends was announced on October 7, 2008 and released for Windows on October 27, 2009, with a Mac OS X client added later1.

The DotA lineage stretches back through Blizzard's StarCraft scenario "Aeon of Strife", Eul's Warcraft III port, and Feak's expanded DotA Allstars build. Guinsoo passed the mod to Icefrog before joining Riot to design League from scratch, and the studio's model of free access with cosmetic micro-transactions set it apart from the paid RTS games it grew out of.

How It Spread

Riot's official forums seeded the earliest wave of League memes. Riot employee "Skribbles" posted "The Saga of Jesse Perring" on September 29, 2009, casting developer Jesse Perring as League's Chuck Norris analog. September 4, 2010 brought a Garen "MS Paint hate" thread by user "DontShoot", and a week later "DrowElfDrizzt" asked why Rammus was missing "/t" and "/j" emotes, kicking off the "ok" derailment gag. On January 21, 2011, "cbr1000rider3" opened a "Dance Master Phreak" comic thread that later spawned a fan video with over 500,000 views by February 20143.

E-sports pushed the game past its own fandom. The Season 3 World Championship in October 2013 sold out the Staples Center in Los Angeles in about an hour, and by 2015 the finals drew 36 million viewers worldwide. Reddit amplified the same moments in real time: the "Stream Off" thread during the 2012 Season 2 Quarterfinals hit /r/all in eight minutes, beating out a Jamie Hyneman AMA2.

Character launches kept the meme cycle fresh into the late 2010s. An /r/kaisamains subreddit went live on February 16, 20185, and Kai'Sa's Champion Spotlight video4 hit the /r/leagueoflegends front page on March 52. The Neeko reveal trailer on November 19, 2018 pulled over 3.9 million views in 24 hours7, with Riot writer Matt Dunn tweeting the same day that the character "identifies as a lesbian".

How to Use This Meme

LoL meme formats typically hook onto champion voice lines or ability quirks. "I ate some oranges and it was K" turns Gangplank's citrus-heal ability into a shrug at any complaint about crowd control, while Rammus's flat "ok" gets pasted into any thread that needs derailing2. Newer formats tend to run on champion-reveal reactions and pro-play highlight clips rather than forum copypasta.