Riot Strikes Again with Mordekaizer’s “Scam Uzal” $250 Skin
Published On: February 20, 2024
Riot Games has unveiled the Sahn-Uzal Mordekaiser skin for League of Legends, transforming the formidable top-laner from his spectral lich form back to his original human state. But instead of excitement, the release is sparking outrage in the community—mainly because of how expensive it is to get and how bad it looks.
The Sahn-Uzal skin is categorized under the ‘Exalted’ tier, accessible exclusively through the League’s gacha-style Sanctum system. Players have calculated that obtaining an Exalted skin may require spending approximately 32,000 RP, equating to $246.15 USD. This isn’t the first instance where Riot’s pricing strategies have come under fire. In June of the previous year, the introduction of an Ahri skin priced up to $500 sparked considerable backlash. In defense, game director Pu Liu explained that such pricing is “justified” because the majority of revenue comes from a small percentage of players, as most spend nothing on the free-to-play game.
Most players would call BS on the idea that League relies on a small percentage of spenders, as Pu Liu claims. The truth is, most League players have spent money on skins—often at prices comparable to buying an entire new game. If League really wasn’t making a profit, as Riot suggests, why would Tencent continue hosting the LCS and other major events every year?
At this point, League is just getting lazy. From uninspired champion animations—something YouTube channels like ExoLL keep pointing out (looking at you, Viego)—to overpriced skins that offer too little, the quality has clearly declined. Not even three years ago, legendary skins had unique animations for walking, auto-attacking, and more, all for under $20. If you wanted a skin that changed its look mid-game with new voice lines and animations, you’d pay around $50. Now, Riot is selling a skin that only has some new voice lines and barely noticeable effects. If you remove the changing particles, you wouldn’t even notice the difference—and yet, they’re charging $250 for it.
We all know who this targets: the whales. This is the same predatory strategy that kept Diablo Immortal afloat. The combination of high-priced cosmetics and gacha mechanics has been a major issue in the gaming industry, and Riot is leaning hard into it. This skin preys on FOMO—once the shop rotation expires, the “Ancient Sparks” currency will no longer drop it.
It’s pretty clear something has shifted at Riot’s upper management. They’re relying more on exploiting players’ addiction to the game rather than making a genuinely good product. And let’s be real—League isn’t bleeding money, even with Hextech Crafting. Sure, I’ve personally gotten ultimate skins from free Hextech loot boxes that Riot’s finance team supposedly cries about, but I’ve also bought skins with real money because I’m not going to wait for RNG to maybe give me what I want. And even those “free” skins weren’t actually free—I paid for them with my time.
This is just the latest in a string of bad decisions by Riot. A recent update meant to simplify the game actually made it harder for new players to earn anything outside the battle pass. Calculations show that under the new system, a new player would need to grind 882 hours just to unlock a single champion. To unlock all 170 champions, they’d have to play 149,940 hours—which is 6,247 days or about 17 years.
We all know what Riot is doing by bringing back outdated systems that most games have abandoned. Dota 2 is completely free. Overwatch 2 got rid of hero unlock requirements. Marvel Rivals launched with all heroes available from day one. At this point, all we can do is hope Riot realizes their mistakes and reverses these systems—otherwise, in a few years, we might all be jumping ship to a League of Legends killer.