Preface: The S15 season has officially started, and it’s believed that the vast majority of players have been paying attention to the recent confrontations. The tournaments in major regions are approaching their end, with fierce competition in the LCK region. From the current overall matchups, T1, Gen.G, and HLE are still the elite teams in LCK, making it difficult for others to rise. Recently, the official league released the T1 team's S14 World Championship skins, but upon release, they were met with widespread criticism online. Although the skin colors are acceptable, the overall visual effects are quite mediocre, especially Faker’s Ultimate Sylas skin, which feels inferior even to the regular series. To maximize competitive performance, T1 also announced a pause on all team members’ live streams.

Faker’s Ultimate Sylas Skin Is Really Poor Quality

Most players are quite familiar with T1, recognized as the world’s number one team, with outstanding achievements over recent years, having won five World Championships. It’s unclear if the official designers are in short supply, but the pace of championship skin releases has slowed down significantly in recent years. Previously, there were repeated marketing efforts around Faker’s championship skins, but only now has the official artwork and special effects been fully revealed. After the launch, global players mocked the skins, feeling that the quality has declined year after year.

This championship skin set includes six champions: Top lane Gnar, Mid lane Yone, AD Carry Varus, Support Pyke, Jungler Vi, and the Ultimate T1 Sylas. The official concept art looks decent, but that’s just a render; the in-game visuals are quite different. After watching videos, many felt the color scheme was too dark and lacked brightness. The most popular comments said it was awful — the colors lacked the elegance and refinement a championship skin should have. The last FPX black and red skin disaster is still fresh in memory... The worst is Sylas, whose concept art and effects are a mess, showing no sign of being an Ultimate skin. By contrast, Yone looks more like an Ultimate skin... No wonder the fans are disappointed, especially after such a long wait and high expectations.

Even professional players are dissatisfied with the official skin production, let alone the fans who want to buy them. It seems the LPL region’s official designers have run out of ideas, as their skin designs over the years have lost innovation. Luckily, T1 hasn’t been too affected; the team officially announced a pause on streaming throughout August to focus fully on upcoming matches and regain their form. Their recent loss to KT was a setback, but I believe their goal this year remains the World Championship title.

It seems this time T1’s skin sales may not be very strong. The esports industry’s popularity has dropped significantly, plus T1 already has quite a few skins, and the five-player roster split during the transfer period means no marketing boost for a year. Honestly, the color scheme of this skin is hard to praise. When FPX used the red and black palette before, it received a lot of criticism. It’s puzzling why the official designers continued with this style—do they want to prove the color scheme isn’t the problem and blame the players instead?

Goodbye Thoughts

Who would have expected T1’s championship skin to turn out like this? No wonder Xiaolübu openly expressed dissatisfaction with the skin design earlier; it clearly isn’t great. The official has cut many talented hero designers, so probably few skin designers remain. Also, the frequency of skin releases is too high now, with good ideas and designs being used mainly for profit. Championship skins may really lack inspiration these days.

What do you, the viewers, think about this situation?