Every once in a while, Riot blesses its fans with a chance to get a personal glimpse into the development of Valorant. This glimpse comes in the form of Riot’s Ask Valorant Q&A. It’s been a while since fans have seen one of these compilations. This most recent Ask Valorant focuses on a few hotly requested features, as well as the one question that’s been on everyone’s mind since the release of Arcane, the hit Netflix show from League of Legends.
[Related: Valorant Neptune Skins Leaked]
The first Valorant Q&A question is in regard to the idea of a map picking feature for Valorant. Competitive Designer Jon Walker explained that for competitive play, random map rotation should be the standard. It forces players to learn all maps instead of avoiding the ones they don’t like. He added that the team was working on a map pick system fit for an environment of “complex team strategizing.”
The next Valorant Q&A question was about the ability to gift gun skins, a topic brought up in a previous Q&A. That was in 2020, and back then, the answer was “yes, probably by the end of the year.” However, it’s been two years and the feature is still nowhere in sight. Valorant product manager Stephen Kraman explained that the system was put on the back burner while their team prioritized other parts of the game. That likely means that the feature won’t be added for a long while. Fans of the game’s flashy guns shouldn’t hold their breath.
Even since the days of beta, Valorant fans have been asking for a built-in replay system; Not everyone can afford a fancy capture card. Like the elusive gifting system, the Valorant team promised that replays would be added “soon” after the game’s release. In a similar fashion, the new answer is that the feature is not currently being worked on.
The next segment talks about reporting players in the game. There are a variety of reasons to report a teammate in Valorant: toxicity, suspected cheating, and farming experience while AFK. For the former, if the reported player gets punished, the whistleblower will be notified. However, the same isn’t true for the other options. The Valorant team confirmed that they’d be soon adding notifications for whistleblowers for whatever reason they pull the red flag.
Another sought-after feature that the Q&A addresses is the ability to set gun skins for attacking and defending respectively. The response from the team was mostly positive. The art and cosmetics team replied that they want players to be able to show off their skins more, but those features need to be balanced against the game’s tight optimization. They did, however, confirm that there are similar concepts in progress.
Lastly, the fans were dying to know: would Valorant ever get its own TV series? The release of Arcane, the Netflix original set in the world of Riot’s League of Legends, set a high standard for adaptations from the monitor to the TV. David Nottingham, Valorant’s creative director, was enthusiastic in his support of the idea, but tentative about a timeline. He confirmed that, currently, the Valorant team wanted to focus just on the game itself. Any big spin-off content won’t come until much later, Nottingham promised.
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