A baseless rumour had been circulating on social media that suggested Tencent had given Riot Games $200 million to create a competitor to Valve's upcoming hero shooter Deadlock. However, the rumour was very far-fetched from the beginning, considering the screenshot accompanying these claims came from a fake PC Gamer article using a featured image no outlet would ever use.
Riot Games' communication manager took to social media to unequivocally clear up the rumours, essentially saying every aspect of the claims is preposterous.
"I see lots of crazy rumours, but this is extra fake," Hixson writes. "The article in the screenshot doesn't even exist. Tencent doesn't fund our dev like this... that's not how this works... that's not how any of this works. There's a lot cooking in R&D, but nothing like Deadlock."
Riot Games is a strange target for a rumour like this, considering they have a highly popular MOBA in League of Legends and a highly popular hero shooter in Valorant. These are the two genres that Valve is mashing together in Deadlock, so it would seem a peculiar choice for Riot to target that niche when there are plenty of other genres the company has yet to...
