This is an interesting discussion. Adding my 2 cents:
This is an interesting development, and one I look forward to seeing. It would be an interesting proof of concept to see if touch controls would actually be preferred over joystick controls by a much wider audience, assuming WR gains that. A lot of different things could happen from that. Also, there is something to be said for the argument that simply having touch controls would potentially bring in more players. Let’s not forget that VG advertised the factor of touch controls in pitching the game, and learning touch controls is a significant jump from joystick controls, and as such is an investment. With the amount of players that decided to invest in VG, with no business significant advertising of the game, there seems to be the suggestion that there is a market for players who prefer touch controls, as it is has proven itself to be a scheme that players are willing to use, even preferential to, with little influence besides the game with which it was used in, which stands as a good indication of its utility.
That said, joystick controls are inherently better than touch controls in some ways, and I would argue the ways that matter most in targeting a large playerbase. They do free up the screen for easier viewing, they do provide a more practical control scheme on non-hand sized screens, and they do provide a simple platform for how games are played, creating a standard that can flexibly be built upon. Touch controls, provide a different kind of playstyle that can provide more precision as well as responsiveness, and lend a different kind of simplicity to immersive actions, however the detracting factor of not being a viable control scheme for non-hand sized devices and being a difficult thing to meaningfully sync with a standard physical control scheme (ex. vainglory being ported to switch, psn, xbox, or pc) makes it a secondary option at best, but an interesting one.
There are some benefits to a secondary touch option, however the downsides outweigh them. Without getting too speculative, there are a lot of different ways having a touch option could impact the game, with the added benefit of some players familiar with a moba style game already showing preference to touch, however managing two control schemes for all the different options for play could become cumbersome, especially when it comes to balancing responsiveness between players attempting to perform actions. Some things can be performed faster and with more precision on a handheld device with touch, as well as allowing different ways to perform complex actions, while joystick sacrifices a base precision yet provides a simpler standard to build upon, and leaves more options for screen real estate, not to mention reaches more devices.
All that said; it is not a necessarily a winning move for Riot to invest in development of a secondary control scheme and deal with the balancing issues that come from the different ways the two control schemes affect screen real estate and gameplay dynamics between players. Touch controls are bound to constrict options on the screen, likely to provide too much of an advantage for some players over others, and complicate matters when it comes to differences in mobile devices. That’s not to say that people showing preference to playing with touch, and the responsiveness it provides, are factors that should be ignored. It is at best a standalone concept, and one that games should capitalize on only if they expect to appeal to a handheld device only audience, or possibly party games on much larger devices, however that doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be a draw for players and potentially become the preferred option to use for the players able to do so. Ultimately it will be an extra headache for riot but it may be a benefit, depending on how they constrain and balance the game.
