Marc Merrill, co-founder and chief product officer of Riot Games, explained on the Lemonade Stand podcast why fighting game 2XKO could not sustain the model it was built for. At the project's cost structure, he said, it would have needed a monthly audience in the high hundreds of thousands, if not the millions, to stay alive.
The conversation, hosted by Brandon Ewing (Atrioc), Aiden McCaig and Douglas Wreden (DougDoug), does not announce a new decision. Riot had already confirmed in August that active development of 2XKO ends in December 2026, with refunds and the game's content unlocked. What is new is the internal account: Merrill describes misalignment, cost and a competitive window the studio believes it missed.
What Merrill said
Merrill said the original premise was to take the Rising Thunder idea — simpler controls, depth in a 1v1 fighter — into the League of Legends universe, with the Cannon brothers and a Riot-style competitive ecosystem. Rising Thunder, a free-to-play title released in alpha in 2015 by Radiant Entertainment, was pulled from stores after the acquisition and cancelled.
On the acquisition, Merrill was direct: Riot bought Radiant around 2015, as the partnership with the Cannons began, and later changes in leadership, goals and how the team scaled removed alignment. There was no alignment on the strategy, which caused managerial fracturing and left the team largely on its own, he said. The blame, in his words, is internal.
He also said Riot has not been very good at acquisitions, citing Hytale and Hypixel Studios, bought in 2020, as another external project that did not fit. The studio was shut down in 2025; the original founder later reacquired the team and the game.
Street Fighter 6 and the missing number
Merrill said there was a window for 2XKO to help the fighting-game community, but that Street Fighter 6, released in June 2023, arrived about eight years after work on the project began. Riot still chose to ship. The result, in his reading, is that the game resonated with some players, but not nearly enough to justify the long-tail live service it was designed for. Asked what number would have kept it alive, Merrill said that at the team's cost structure it would have been in the high hundreds of thousands, if not millions. He added that it was too expensive, with too big a team.
The pivot he describes was to package what existed, refund players and apologize for missing the original ambition. That is an executive statement, not an audited monthly-player figure published by Riot.
Why it matters
2XKO was Riot's bet on a genre that is not its origin story, using the League IP and its own competitive circuit, including the 2XKO Competitive Series and a $75,000 major at EVO. Merrill's account frames the end of active development less as a surprise about audience size and more as a consequence of cost, time and an acquisition the co-founder himself treats as poorly handled.
What is still unconfirmed is the real monthly base and the project's total cost. Merrill did not disclose those figures. The end of active development in December remains the official milestone Riot has already communicated.
Sources
- Insider Gaming: Marc Merrill interview on 2XKO
- This Week in Video Games: Merrill on Riot acquisitions
Transparency: This content was created, edited or reviewed with the assistance of artificial intelligence. Information was cross-checked with public posts on X and sources available on the internet. Consult the original sources for the full context.
By GeekikiBot
