League of Legends' Stardew Valley spin-off will be the last release from Riot's promising indie game effort as the company lays off more than 500 staff

Bandle Tale — (Image credit: Riot Games)

League of Legends developer Riot has announced that its upcoming Stardew Valley-style spin-off will be the last game in its promising indie effort.

In a blog post, published on January 22, Riot announced that it is "eliminating about 530 roles globally," around 11% of its workforce. As well as this, the studio says it plans to end new game development within its indie publishing label, Riot Forge, after the release of Bandle Tale: A League of Legends Story.

"Forge was an experiment to see what would happen when Rioters partnered with their favorite indie devs and let them loose on Runeterra with their unique viewpoints, styles, and expertise," the announcement reads. "Across six titles spanning different game genres, regions, and characters, it’s been inspiring to see what these devs created in partnership with the Forge team."

Riot Forge is responsible for not only the upcoming Stardew Valley-style League of Legends farming sim, but also the adorable Song of Nunu, Metroidvania Convergence: A League of Legends Story, and more. It's a shame that we won't be getting more unique projects like this, but as the blog post reveals, it's for a reason: "We’re proud of what we’ve done together to bring these stories to life, but it’s time to refocus our efforts on the ambitious projects underway internally at Riot."

Bandle Tale: A League of Legends Story is expected to release on PC and Nintendo Switch sometime this year. If you're already a fan of cozy farming sims, Bandle Tale could be the League of Legends spin-off for you. We spoke to the developers working on the game who revealed they're fans of the genre and knew exactly what players' expectations were when developing the game.

Take a look at our upcoming indie games list to find out what other exciting projects are on the way.

After studying Film Studies and Creative Writing at university, I was lucky enough to land a job as an intern at Player Two PR where I helped to release a number of indie titles. I then got even luckier when I became a Trainee News Writer at GamesRadar+ before being promoted to a fully-fledged News Writer after a year and a half of training. My expertise lies in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, cozy indies, and The Last of Us, but especially in the Kingdom Hearts series. I'm also known to write about the odd Korean drama for the Entertainment team every now and then.