NA LCS return to old format in League of Legends

Say goodbye to dual streams, as the North American League of Legends Championship Series returns to a double best-of-one regular season format.

The NA LCS’ move back to a best-of-one format was announced earlier today in order to quell the problems that cropped up during the league’s best-of-three era.

Riot thought the change from best-of-one matches to best-of-three series in 2016 would give fans more games to watch of their favorite teams—but best-of-three didn’t see fans tune into more games, according to Riot Games. Instead, fans were more likely to tune into the middle of the series rather than the start, and thus not watch the series in its entirety.

This, in tandem with a drop in viewership due to having to incorporate simultaneous dual streams to accommodate the additional games, pushed Riot to revert the NA LCS back to a best-of-one format for 2018.

Best-of-one play will see a return on Jan. 20, when the NA LCS returns for the 2018 Spring Split.