The next League of Legends music group is a virtual boy band
By Jay Peters, a news editor who writes about technology, video games, and virtual worlds. He’s submitted several accepted emoji proposals to the Unicode Consortium.
Riot Games is announcing its next in-universe League of Legends band: a boy band called Heartsteel comprised of the in-game characters Ezreal, Kayn, Aphelios, Yone, K’Sante, and Sett. Riot will debut “Paranoia,” the first song from the virtual band (which features the real-life musicians Baekhyun, ØZI, Tobi Lou, and Cal Scruby), on October 23rd at 11AM ET.
I haven’t heard the song yet myself, but here’s how Riot Games describes Heartsteel’s vibe. “HEARTSTEEL is a group of dynamic daredevils dedicated to unapologetic individuality and creative expression,” the company wrote in a press release. “Their mission is to blaze a path to success on their own terms. The group’s personality and sound draws inspiration from modern music collectives, and a range of influences from across genres and eras, culminating in a bold, one-of-a-kind identity.” I guess we’ll see what that means!
Heartsteel joins Riot’s lineup of virtual League of Legends music groups that already includes a K-pop group (K/DA), a heavy metal band (Pentakill), and a hip-hop group (True Damage). Those other three groups have all performed at the League of Legends World Championships in some way — check out K/DA’s impressive augmented reality appearance from 2020 as an example — so I have a hunch that Heartsteel might be putting on a show at this year’s finals event on November 19th. (Maybe we’ll see real-life K-pop group NewJeans perform there, too.)
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