Valorant gets two launch trailers showing off its tactical action and stylish heroes

A pair of Valorant launch trailers are here to give the tactical shooter from the League of Legends studio its proper debut: one for gameplay, and one for story.

The gameplay trailer follows one round of play as the Attackers try to plant and detonate a bomb and the Defenders try to stop them. Yes, it is pretty much Counter-Strike, but with two key differences: 1) everybody has superpowers and 2) everything is stylish as hell. If I had to sum up Valorant's aesthetic in a few words it would be "streetwear G.I. Joe" and it is really working for me.

 The second trailer gives you some background by narrowing the focus onto two characters: Phoenix and Jett. They're fighting over a mysterious package that seems to lead to a healthy chunk of Venice being uprooted from the earth - leading to the creation of Valorant's Ascent map. 

The story trailer's slightly more cartoonish look reminds me of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. That is an excellent thing to be compared to, and I'm sure we can expect more story snippets to roll out this way now that Valorant has fully arrived. I should also note that it looks like it's Valorant getting out ahead of that Overwatch lore problem, where all the cool story beats take place long before the part you actually play, which is good news.

Valorant is available to play on PC right now. Riot Games has not announced whether the game's also headed to consoles in the future, but we'll keep an eye out for any announcements as the game rolls on.

Check out Valorant's new agent, the vampiric Reyna, in action.