Rapid-Fire Skin Review: Empyrean

[@sirloinsteak7233]

"Babe wake up, new oil spill skins just dropped"

[@ObviOneKenobi]

gold

[@FreshlyWaxxedTesticles]

@@ObviOneKenobiNo it's oil

[@Coker1181]

i prefer the slightly heated steel look LUL

[@JelproXy]

Which you can't afford

[@cercri_2]

To me, the main issue with Empyrean is that it's a nice aesthetic, just not for character models. Black with flaming neon effects sounds like a great idea for a champion's ability effects and/or splashart, but it doesn't really fit with League in terms of readability with the way its characters work in-game.

[@WolfGeek64]

It's like turning an extravagant hand bag into an entire dress. Only a small few can pull that look off, and at all other times, it's either tacky or incomprehensible.

[@myrb2622]

Wow it's wild that they revealed the new KDA member with a prestige skin.

[@gearguts7259]

If they wanted Empyrean to always be this aesthetic they should have stuck to it being ONLY on champions with widely, easily identifiable sillouettes like Zac and Vex. Velkoz, Ornn, Reksai, stuff like that

[@greenwren5072]

Yesss, I love that idea. I can't tell any of them apart otherwise.

[@MrLuismancei]

I believe it needs to be champions with particle effects so it can fully use the aesthetic. I think Heimerdinger, amumu, Taric, Yorick (as the filler skin) would look great in this aesthetic and they're recognizable

[@johancito16345]

You only want unpopular champions to be on all skinlines right?

[@gearguts7259]

@@johancito16345 I mean, champs like Warwick and Renekton could fit too, those are not unpopular. My point isnt about popularity is about sillouette, if you only pick humanoids they're all going to look the fucking same bc the whole aesthetic is "mass of dark blue decorated with neon colors"

[@johancito16345]

@@gearguts7259 yeah maybe, but the problem is not the skinline, is riot concept artist man

[@omarjimenez6861]

I said it before in a community post, but empyrean being a multiversal skinline really cant be translated in game. Like, not even the splashes represent the multiverse properly. Even if only a few are hunting their alternate selves, the fact that only two or three splashes show them in other dimensions (and they're all from the OG batch) just feels like the whole universe hoping storyline was tacked on very late into the conceptual stage because they needed a trailer to hype up the pyke legendary. On a different note, multiverse aside, I think this skinline looks nice on paper, but it could've been more interesting if it wasn't populated mostly by standard human shaped champs. I feel like the skinline would excel more if it focused more on champs with more distinct silhouettes beyond "hair is different" or "is a ninja" Reksai could've been cool with her tunnels being her digging into other dimensions. An empyrean Briar where he hunger leads her to hunt other versions of herself. And this one would be mainly for me as a Zilean main, but an Empyrean Zilean, where he experiments on the Icathia of other universes in an attempt of recreate his own, but it always results in him destroying these alternate icathias instead. I know its a tall order to make skin like that look cool on his N64 model, but I would buy it

[@Nuklyhr]

I could imagine how amazing a legendary empyrean zilean could be with your backstory, his voicelines just circling back on constantly failing and growing tired/frustrated with each cataclysmic attempt. Hoping that at least 1 will bring it all back.

[@luckypeanut9943]

Fellow zil player here, that'd be kinda dope but Im desperate for them to do an elderwood/druid skin like he has in LoR

[@omarjimenez6861]

@@luckypeanut9943 honestly I feel like Zilean could be an interesting spring faerie, with the clock changed into like a tree stump carved or "woven" into a bird house. Tristana has fae bombs already so you could recycle the idea like how lux recycles vfx.

[@ilsu2178]

I think empyrean could have been really improved if the characters had different animation styles. Like how in spider-verse there are different styles of animation for different characters (Porky Pig being toon animation, Penny Parker being anime inspired), but I feel if they did that, then they'd just get called unoriginal. Though, these skins are unoriginal already, so...

[@frufru4860]

tbh pulsefire was a better attmpt at some time/universe shenanigans, I feel like they should bring it back now

[@YuletideGlory]

I love the colors on the black background. The neon flames look really appealing. I especially love the sfx on all the skins, empyreans sound dope as heck. I'm not disappointed at all here, this is probably my favorite skin line.

[@KumaSan13]

We did not needed another Brand skin... his literal last Skin was CRAZY COLOR BRAND COME ON RIOT

[@GentlyUsedFrog]

It's okay we'll get Lux's 18th skin or whatever next.

[@mesuper455]

your asking for too much, best we can do is another skin for Yone and maybe just maybe a lux skin, enjoy and have fun!

[@phiphi2209]

Truly one of the most modern Akali skins of all time, slapped in skinline for no reason besides popular champ XD and the community has the same reaction as ezreal and lux getting another skin, and this just came out after Faerie court lux got announced “yippee”

[@Armorion]

I'm happy Varus got a legendary but WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE THIS SKINLINE?

[@raeste.claire7093]

bad day to be a varus fan

[@pinoproxy2828]

its an amazing skin visually and sounds great

[@Armorion]

@@pinoproxy2828 Does it look good? Yeah I can't deny that, but I personally dislike the skinline and how they design the characters. It's just RGB Glowing Shadow #14.

[@MrSmilykid]

And I am all for it​@@Armorion

[@pinoproxy2828]

@@Armorion i get it at first i was like that too, but the more i used these skins the more i liked em

[@Spooky_Bard]

I think facelessness in character design is actually fascinating, but the problem is the lost expressiveness has to be made up for somewhere else. It usually works best when they’re designed from the ground up with that in mind rather than just slapping the aesthetic on something else. Then again, the legendaries *also* fail to do that, so who knows.

[@luckypeanut9943]

I think that's why vex worked super well in the skin, she actually keeps her face and the chromas have differing expressions

[@nickylag3912]

I rather they have no face than another generic pretty girl face but yea they really underused the faceless feature

[@Pootytangtang]

Prestige Empyrean Kayle? ❌ K/DA Kayle: ✅

[@evilofalfa]

😋

[@crimsoneclipse0618]

Empyrean should be for champs with unique silhouettes like monster champs.

[@hunterkinsella5303]

I think empyrean might actually look good on oorn or volibear. Or both, since yknow they have lore in canon.

[@ImperiousMax]

Empyrean has a wonderful aesthetic and colour scheme to work with-- the bright neons and contrast would make for fascinating skins... if they all didn't look the same. The repetitiveness of them all really makes the skinline suffer, not to mention the thematics they decided to go with for this skinline... collapsed universes...? Really? Not a a celebration of the bright neons and dark purple contrasts? Heck, it would've been a better colour scheme for a paint related skinline more than an Into the Spiderverse ripoff.

[@bluevern904]

The Area Zero theme fits really well with Empyrean, just noticed when you played it

[@arigogrr]

Kayle’s prestige is just straight up the main villain from Kill La Kill

[@No-gx8ck]

The thing that confuses me the most about this skinline Is that in the first wave we had a new ward which Is very obviously Mordekaiser's head, so I expected him to show up if It would have eventually come back, and it did, in fact, come back, but without him even being mentioned.

[@SytianIvanov]

I was initially upset Nocturne wasn't the legendary, specially knowing the lore of the skin and how perfect the aesthetic is for him Maybe Riot doesn't want to give champions that could get a VGU sooner than later legendaries since that would put more work on the update, that's the only reason I can think of why he didn't got the legendary.

[@johancito16345]

Yes, maybe they thinked that a little bit more and they arent giving legendaries to characters that are going to be reworked in the near future. Hopefully

[@yayanekkthesecond6604]

As an Empyrean aesthetic enjoyer and a Varus main that owns almost every piece of media available for this gay man I am very proud of my purchase, skin feels so smooth to play with as well as feeds my ADHD even better than I thought Tho I have to disagree on the best chroma since I find the Neon Facade being the best your take on this skin is very valid and especially insightful which is rare in these times, so I glad we can apprecieate it a little and I'm very happy for this skinlines comeback :) (Also how tf am I so lucky I play only botlane and my go to picks are Varus adc and Pyke support and both of them got a legendary in probably one of my favourite skinlines fjkrhfnduxbekjh)

[@Quantuman]

@NickyBoi, taking into account that victorious skins are now a theme enhancer for the champion in question... have you seen how cute victorious KogMaw looks? Doesn't it take away your fear that if they rework KogMaw they won't take away the cute factor in his theme?

[@thetwistedsavant5821]

I like the skin line personally but can very much see how people find it to be like Star Guardians. Much like them however I think if nothing else having more than one release gives modders much more to work with, and that way if some Joe Shmo decides he wants Empyrean Yuumi they can have the tools to make it/have it made reasonably easy.

[@blakefrederiksen3550]

The new animation for his q whether he charged it or not is really sick but that also feels like a pay to loose feature cause enemies will be able to tell which q you are shooting.

[@AQWOMAR9]

Its not pay to lose cuz enemy will try to dodge ur normal q too

[@MrLuismancei]

With this new batch of Empyrean it just make realize that a lot of champs could be great in this aesthetic,. If they were not just beta Soul fighter. With weapons and everything Yorick Legendary amumu would be awesome with the particles Leona(yes she already has a lot of skin ns) Shyvana Heck even heimerdinger as a scientist trying to fix everything

[@luckypeanut9943]

Kayle shows how empyrean can be done right, zac and vex were amazing last bout and a good chunk was because they had FACES

[@taetaesblessedhands1635]

empyrean would be awesome if it's populated by more monster champs with unique silhouettes. with more neon twinks being added to the skinline, i'm starting to have problems telling them apart.

[@HimitsuHunter]

Funny story... I'm no longer playing League anything at all cause Ive already had 1 vanguard/graphics card related Blue Screen. Which is sad cause I really like TFT and play it often in my off-time.

[@alexcat6685]

4:35 And I now got why, they don't take the concept into a varied degree in the same issue that celestial has. The concept of individuals expanding their characters has so much pointetial and then they don't use it, How about each universes's empyran has some relationship with the Pyke of their unverse, that'd would be then pushed or used on the Perpreator that removed them. that would leave so much area to add to skins in using it's thematics like why not have brand being entirely burned by universe collapasing so his skin enirely burned all that's left is his organs(or colored versions so the kiddes aren't scarred),Vex's shadow being the vengful spirit of that universes's Pyke that lacthed to her, influencing his friend into letting his anger and Spite overtake her apathy in solving the problem whic in the skin shadow would resemble the Shark creature original Pyke rides in the recall. It's like the celestial vanguards, Sion could've been a cool Himbo Rockstar who now expands his music while teaching Bel'veth about live's beauty, Nunu and williump a kid with his toy monster now come to life as he can expand his amginations to planet leanghts, All of this reduced down to pretty colors. SO dissapointing.

[@Tentoir]

those varus animations are beautiful

[@paperknigth2263]

I think that the rule number 1 on any skin from any game should be that the character is still easily recognizable. I can't tell who is any of this people. Like yeah, I see the Bow and I can assume that is the only champion with a bow without Boobs in the game, but other than that, they are not only indistinguishable from each other, but also extremely superficial in the representation of the characters. You take the cockroaches out of Malzahar's splash and it could easily be Shen. It's like the Invictus Game skins, that took me a while to figured out who was the woman in the bottom corner and turns out it was Rakan.

[@assumptio7595]

Inserting Jevil on bg when you said "Chaos" just sold the video to me. Definitely a like from chaos clown fan 😎

[@cds7012]

Damn I did not know Empyrean's lore was fire af!

[@CFodd01]

3:37 wait wait wait, is that actually the prestige?? That isn't kda or something??

[@usnerdswillbenerds4889]

I don’t generally like RGB, but I love Empyrean. Sleek design, faceless characters with a hint of rainbow to break up the black’s monotony. It works for me. I’m not a competitive league player so personally readability be damned. I usually have a good idea of what’s going on anyway. Especially with how rare it is for a team to match skins.

[@thoreamoechi3533]

I liked the first Empyrans but now its just oil on water with no cool skins, but i do like this Akali, it "match" her aesthetic better than coven at least.

[@riadbk8295]

jesus that opening line about MSI hits different after having watched flyquest...

[@LeonardoGomez-yh3nb]

a full team of empyrean on both teams would lead to the funniest team fight of all time

[@Roanin50]

Im pretty fond of the empyrean skins just because the aesthetic is like a solid 7-8 for me. They DO all look the same but since that same is pretty good for me, im never upset when i pull one. A solid skin is better than a bad skin or no skin! 🤷‍♂

[@npchrix]

"it could be worse, it could be brazil" C'MON NICKYBOY, i felt that

[@_Athicus]

A skinline that's meant to be sleek and smooth and cool doesn't really work when half the champs you pick for it have models that belong in an aged care facility

[@Moxie2017]

I do believe for MOST skin lines, skins need to actually use a characters attributes to their advantage and need to have uniqueness from one another. However, they could make an empyrean or cosmic skin for every champ and I'd love it because the aesthetics are so nice.

[@jackdeangelo7377]

I understand your point nickiboi, but for me, this thematic is my forth favorite out there. I love fire and empyrean pyke is my second favorite skin in the game. (My favorite themetics best to worst are soul fighter, spirit blossom, odyssey, empyrean.) My favorite skins in the game are. Soul fighter Viego, empyrean pyke, odyssey kayn, high noon yone, and soul fighter samira. These are my highest mastery champions so no baieses for em lol.

[@derhund3777]

idk this skinline is so boring. I mean they look good but nothing really special

[@jackdeangelo7377]

Fair enough. I like em. No one else has too.

[@Ani_Thari]

It does sound like you're a (not so very) closeted pyromaniac with those choices. Fingers crossed you get some soul flame / fiery jack-o'-lantern skins for Halloween.

[@Corethegamer007]

Hey Nicky what did you think about the new calligraphy skin line in WR?

[@14Ghost14]

I think this skinline works only in monster champions or people with big features, like viego, senna and gwen. But if they return this again, i think a half corrupted version, like, in the middle, would be the way to go

[@SamElZombie]

pls no, we don't need to give riot more ideas of how to put yone in every single skinline.

[@GretaA.]

I may be the odd woman out, but I do adore this skin line. It’s kind of hard to get a LOT of these champions with a cool and “faceless” appearance. That, and having what is basically a “symbiote” level cohesive skinline with crazy neon lights encourages me to play some characters I just don’t dig that much from a visual standpoint as they come. In that sense they are in the same boat for me as the Warden skins in that they completely commit to their own aesthetic and “borrow” the champion its used for.

[@LaffingGas73546]

Nocturne would have been a better fit for the legendary, glad it wasn’t another Akali one but holy missed opportunity

[@victim3492]

The Empyrean skins DO really look alike, so alike that if during a hectic clash an empyrean Zed, Brand and Pyke would be difficult to tell apart

[@Nomnomnomnomie]

Legit wasn’t looking at the left with the brand particle effects and thought the top was the old for some reason

[@ThundererR64T]

I do recognize that Empyrean is repetitive, but hell i love this style man, black with color gradients all around it i absolutely love it.

[@MarshallCubed]

Empyrean was good when pyke did it. Other champs just makkes the skinline an abomination

[@hecatia666]

I feel that this line of skins is just rgb lights galore AND my reason to complain on that weird ass statement riot made about champion skins not trying to change champion's siluettes when they clearly do in lines like these

[@xkabuto]

00:05 is the editor Mordekaiser HUE?

[@MsElViktor]

0:05 - Just cuz BPI dont sound good it doesnt mean it wont work

[@devinjacquet5253]

I was so thirsty for a good varus skin that I honestly will take it... An visual update for Varus would have made me a lot happier though. 100% agree with Noc deserving the legendary.

[@Shadow-the-scribbler]

I generally like empyrean, neon glowing traces on black is my shit, it makes lizard brain happy. Akali is easily the worst one, nocturne really needs a visual update, idc about varus really, i kinda like malzahar, mostly since he doesn't have anything better, and kayles is my new favorite from her skins just because i guess, even if it's not objectively anything great. I elect to pretend the prestige one doesn't exist.

[@pianishim0]

Malzahar screaming FUCKIN SENT ME

[@Matt-sr9zf]

A good day to reload randomly

[@greenwren5072]

I can't even tell these splasharts apart anymore. Faerie court also has me genuinly confused. "Who the heck is that? They all have the same face!!!"

[@Ai-wu6gv]

I feel like even if some individual skins in this line can be good and get like an 8 from me, the skinline as a whole gets a like.. 2 These skins just suck so much as a package because (especially in wave 1) if you put their heads next to each other, nobody would quite be able to tell them apart.

[@Onemanzoo]

Do bundle-exclusive chromas (like Kayle's 2024 MSI Chaos) come back or become purchasable in some other way?

[@_mod3rik_712]

I very very adore Empyrean skinline. Well, non of my favorite champions didnt got their Empyrean skin... But I'll love to see Samira, Gwen, Orn and Nunu get their Empyreans. For me its 9/10 overall (Fuck Akali and Lux) Empyreans must be for champs as Orn, Voli and other monster champs. . . . . Rek'Sai - the pretador of the everglow. The one who existed even before Pyke. The unknown creature that hunts down every new Empyrean. She has Portals, 2 forms and SO MUCH potential for this skinline, dayum.

[@ericwilson9903]

As a kayle main glad new skin,wings look nice and they pop but is that kda kayle as well? Sickkk two skinlines at once let’s gooooo 😭

[@GabrielHenrique-pq5bo]

are you telling me that the one that started it all in this universe doesnt get the legendary skin ? i wonder when did i saw something similar *looks at kayle sun eater maybe i'm imagining things, and i imagine a better skin line for varus would be snowmoon/bloodmoon, idk i just feel like it

[@Scorpoid]

Empyrean is pretty high on my list of favorite skin lines. There are some hits and misses but overall I love them.

[@SiMeGamer]

Isn't the main draw for these skins the SFX rather than the visuals? I always found the sounds of this line to he really neat because you hear them better due to the visuals (mainly the model) lacking.

[@dafroakie9984]

Sometimes there are champions who are absolutely perfect for a skinline. Sometimes skinlines will pass a champion that would've been perfect for them. Empyrean Nocturne feels like this in a bad way. When I was told Nocturne would get an Empyrean skin, I already knew exactly what it looked like. Nocturne's base design definitely fits Empyrean, but to the point that it has literally zero room to anything interesting.

[@oendj]

Cant wait to get in a game where the entire team is empyrean and i cant figure out who is who

[@asherism]

ever since vanguard, league takes up 99% of my disk ❤❤❤❤

[@gh0stgamez424]

I just like the pretty colours

[@johancito16345]

I dont have really a problem with them all being humans but maybe it would ne cool if they have more diferences in certain body parts, like ksante mask and pyke mask looks too similar to me but i ersonally think isnt as bad. Edit: personally i dont think the rgb aesthethic isnt that bad imo

[@lilrezyy2774]

prestige kayle looks so sexy bro idk what riot thought while making it

[@Vexalon-q3v]

yeah my computer blue screened 3 times when i got vanguard for val when it released im not gonna download that shit again after i got rid of it i had not bluescreened since

[@naerolf09]

cant have a new skin drop without having a popular champ being shoe horned into it 🗣🙏

[@weather1635]

I did not know the lore for the empyrean skins and now that I do I'm even more mad. How do you make a skin about multiversal refugees look so samey

[@somebodyudontknow4293]

3:39 For a second I actually thought it was kai'sa

[@uksinimene1196]

i think this time the prestige skin is actually good tho idk why youre hating on it so hard, like compared to what we've been getting recently it seems really nice, like its a BIG imo stepup from: Prestige Soul Fighter Shaco Prestige Immortal Journey Sona Prestige La Ilusión Renata Glasc Prestige Coven Akal Prestige Heartsteel Yone Prestige Winterblessed Camille Prestige Dragonmancer Rakan

[@Caramelulllll]

It's the fact that it's an Empyrean skin that makes it mediocre. Kind of like Prestige Empyrean K'Sante. Standalone it's a pretty good skin, it just doesn't fit the skin line, like, at all.

[@NeuralNotes5]

I mean my first game with Vanguard crashed for some reason (old mac), but afterwards everything seems fine.

[@AdMechTechSupport]

The only detail about the prestige skin that I find interesting is that it starts with cleavage and then covers it up on the final form. What’s Riot trying to do? Why have cleavage if you’re gonna cover it?

[@Loliston]

Although I agree with your criticism of this thematic, I just like them

[@csolace5131]

I cant find the original empyrean video- where is? :

[@AFewSmallFish]

I dont generally care for the Empyrean skins, but I am probably going to pick up Malz because I like the effects on his skills. But yeah other than that I'm ready for them to put this skin line to sleep.

[@TaxEvader420]

Just found out about empyrean Vex, wtf were they thinking??

[@rheawilkins3413]

RGB lights are my taste, I love this skin line so much.

[@rutifer1327]

3:38 yo is that kaisa?

[@dimitris2709]

Can you do a review in the calligrathia skins in wild rift

[@roeidayan699]

Wait did I miss it or did he not review the previous Empyrean skins?

[@naomhangreaney1255]

I only saw the prestige kayle skin a couple days ago and honestly thought it was a prestige kai'sa skin

[@seesawrosy]

the type of skin you'd be allright with getting in a chest

[@supremeoverlordvader5552]

Wait so they are all Pykes? Is Empyrean Vex just small Pyke with huge head?

[@FunkyPotato8]

Wouldn't it be cool if empyrean skins showed up to existing skin line verses and imploded them we get one empyrean skin and the rest of the skins are of the collapsed universe

[@vituxosd]

i like rgb therefore i like empyrean skins, but i don't know why noc hasn't gotten the legendary (because varus skin sells more)

[@jamiesadf5829]

I was hoping this skinline would be a one and done kind of thing. Never to return. It would have been better that way. It only devalues the original set by releasing more. Besides, we all know these arent really worth the asking price. Its literally the champion, but simpler than their normal design because its basically just black with a few color smears. Its 100% some easy to make outsourced thing that cost them $100 total to have made.

[@Ejodai]

I think Kayle looks very cool (looking respectfully) and Prestige can go (derogatory) in a fire.

[@MommyControlMage]

i honestly would've said it was a Kai'sa skin had he not said it was her prestige

[@nyykyn]

I think Empyrean is that type of skinline that would be amazing if it just had the legendaries.

[@rainestorm7777]

Man it could’ve been cool if we got a new skinline for MSI, but I can’t lie, the sfx are really pretty. Legendary should’ve gone to Nocturne tho

[@Lin_Nascimento]

I love how jhon roblox ascended the status of brazilian meme, now we just need to popularize cavalo

[@lakidaalakisda700]

I love the first batch of the skins and I'm personally mad about how bad all of these are (except, weirdly enough, the prestige skin? idk why i just think its neat). They messed up the looks, the sound design is off, and they picked champs that all have the same body-type and didn't *evolve* the looks, just put some shitty fire on it :( I have a whole rant locked and loaded i should post it on twitter also the way they put varus in a white zentai suit before dipping him in the empyrean tank is weird. every other part of the skin is good.

[@prtyproductive]

I’m pretty sure Akali has the most skins in the game now and I’m genuinely shocked at how indifferent I am to this fact. I love the champ and her character but Empyrean and Coven especially have felt so wrong for her and honestly obligatory. I’d trade the last 4 skins she’s had over the last 2 years in a heartbeat for just one as good as Star Guardian or K/DA.

[@nyr1256]

I like the combination of Black, Neon and stylish suits. Plus the sfx for most champs are super satisfying. First time I am completely disagreeing with your skin review.

[@DerangedDurain]

Yeah, I have a hard time liking the Empyrean skins. They remind me a lot of the Super Smash Bros multi-man mode CPUs, and those guys were literally faceless grunts that you plowed through en masse (unless you did cruel smash, in which case you got your ass kicked). I'm a Vex player, and I'd love to get a skin for her, but when her only options are Dawnbringer and Empyrean, I really would rather just wait for something else. I mean, it's been 500+ days since her last skin, it can't be that much longer... right?

[@alessandroarroyo1731]

Wild Rift Skins Ranking...?👉👈 (Add the Callygraphia pls)

[@roaringwater6519]

Ok now can you do wild rifts *CALLIGRAPHIA* skins 🙃