Valorant, the competitive first-person shooter of Riot Games, appears to be getting prepped for a release on PlayStation and Xbox consoles.
According to a new job listing (via PlayStationLifeStyle) from earlier today, Riot Games seeks a senior game designer to “design, tweak, and optimize the player experience” of Valorant on console.
Valorant was released for PC back in 2020. Riot Games revealed at the time that it was “prototyping” a console port but made no promises. There were reservations about players experiencing a competitive first-person shooter the same way on consoles as on PC. Riot Games though has never shut down the possibility of porting the game on consoles.
“There’s a way to experience [Valorant] that we are not entirely sure translates completely to console play,” Riot Games stated at the time.
Riot Games must have either found a working solution for Valorant to keep its PC-style intact on consoles or intends to carve one out by hiring a game designer. The candidate will after all be tasked to “design and refine systems that delight and satisfy players’ needs for competition.”
Furthermore, as spotted earlier today as well, Valorant data miner Shiina discovered back in February that the game files were updated with new strings to mention PlayStation Network and Xbox Live. These strings however were later clarified to be “mainly for backend purposes.”
Update: The "PSN" & "Xbox Live" strings added to the game files are not primarily used for text that appears in the game, but mainly for backend purposes.
Console version is still happening, but not VERY soon!
I learned this in a brief conversation with @ValorLeaks 🙏
— Shiina – Valorant News & Leaks (@ShiinaVLR) February 16, 2022
Just like League of Legends, Valorant is completely free to play and features microtransactions as its earning model. The game has managed to sustain a sizable esports presence since its release and had the honor of hosting its first-ever championship last December where Acend defeated Gambit Esports to become the current Valorant world champions.
