Heart of Sport

Sep 10, 2021
7
min read
Summary

How Riot Games’ LATAM Team partnered with a beloved soccer club

There are a lot of places where players expect to see Riot Games, like esports arenas or streaming platforms. And while we love to meet them there, we also try to meet them where they are already spending their time. In other words, we want to connect with players even when they’re not playing or watching video games.

As an example, soccer is enormously popular in Latin America (LATAM). So when Riot’s new game VALORANT — a shooter with huge esports potential — released in 2020, the Riot LATAM team wanted to see if they could find a way to blend the passion for one sport with an emerging new one.

During the discovery phase, the team reached out to Chivas, the second largest soccer club in Mexico. Chivas has an enormous following that has built up over its 115 year history; its red-and-white striped jersey is a common sight on the streets of Latin and even North America. In these conversations, Riot LATAM was pleased to learn that Chivas was also looking to expand their audience — into esports! A collaboration was instantly on the table, and the new partnership quickly moved forward with a joint project.

That joint project became a five-part video series chronicling the creation of a VALORANT esports team wearing those famous white-and-red stripes. Throughout the series, a large list of prospects were whittled down to a core team of newly minted pros. It’s a series about dreams; it’s a series about struggles and triumphs; it’s a series, in other words, about the very heart of sport, which both Chivas and VALORANT understand perfectly.

The series first aired on Chivas TV, the club’s broadcast and digital channel, which normally only runs soccer content, and it later went to their social and YouTube channels as well. Across all mediums, the series ended up garnering 23M views. We couldn’t have been happier with how this partnership turned out, a testament to the Riot LATAM team’s ability to put players first. By being a part of the local community, they found a way to meet players where they were already spending their time.

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