2XKO's Name Took a Year, 400 Options, and a Lot of Debate
Riot published a new dev diary walking through the entire naming process behind 2XKO, and the team apparently looked at somewhere around 400 options before landing on the one everyone's still got opinions about.
Long before it was called anything close to 2XKO, the game existed under the codename "Project L," a placeholder Riot uses for any title still cooking behind the scenes. By the time the studio was ready to move on, plenty of people had already grown attached to that name, so letting go of it wasn't a clean break. It was always the plan, though. A codename can't stick around forever, and Riot knew it'd have to build a real identity eventually.
Five Buckets and an Audience Decision
The process started with conversations about what the game meant to its own leadership team, which led to five possible directions a name could lean into: social play like duos and lobbies, a sense of freshness, a tougher and bolder tone, ties to League's world, or straight-up fighting game language. No name could hit all five, so Riot had to pick a lane. Since the game was built with fighting game fans as the priority audience, the studio leaned away from heavy League branding, even while keeping League's cast front and center everywhere else, including the box art.
That's a small but telling choice. Prioritizing the fighting game crowd over League familiarity suggests Riot wanted this to stand on its own rather than ride in purely as a spinoff, even if the roster says otherwise.
400 Names on a Whiteboard
Once the direction was set, the creative team reportedly cranked out around 400 potential names. Some were straightforward, like Rising Legends and Runeterra Rumble, but those felt too safe for what the team wanted. Others swung hard the other way, with options like FIGHT4, DARE2BE, and MYMAIN in the mix. None of it got dismissed outright, since the whole point of a wide net is to see what actually lands once it's on the page.
How 2XKO Won the Room
From that pile, ten favorites got tested in visuals, text, and video before 2XKO rose to the top, beating out contenders like Double Edge, Ascendion, and simply Duality. The appeal made sense on paper. It nodded to duo play, borrowed "KO" as a term fighting game fans already know, and looked sharp written out. From there it was a matter of clearing legal, regional, and copyright checks before the reveal.
Not Everyone Was Sold Right Away
Riot's own retelling doesn't pretend the name landed perfectly. Reaction on reveal was mixed, and the studio compares the moment to Marty McFly playing to a room that didn't quite get it yet. Over time the name seems to have grown on the people behind it, between the way it reads on a logo, the different regional pronunciations floating around, and the satisfaction of dropping a "2XKO" title card after a good comeback win.
There's no universal formula for naming something like this. It sounds like it came down to a long, deliberate process and a final call that not everyone loved immediately, which tracks for just about any bold name in gaming.
Also on the Calendar
A few dates worth knowing if you're following along: Patch 1.2.5 is live now, VSFighting XIV runs July 24 and 25 as a 2XKO Challenger Event, and KOMITÊ ARENA 2026 follows on August 1 and 2.
