Valorant’s executive producer, Anna ‘SuperCakes’ Donlan, has revealed the development team’s ambitious plan of releasing a new agent in the game every Act, meaning there will be a new playable character every two months.
During a video update, which covered aspects such as future quality of life updates, player behaviour, and more, Donlan gives some information on how Acts and Episodes will work in Valorant, along with a rough roadmap for when new agents will be introduced. She states that Episodes will last approximately six months, and each will contain three Acts that will last around two months. This means in a calendar year, we can expect around six Acts.
Donlan then reveals that each Act will see a new agent brought into the mix, which means players can expect to see six new agents per year. While this is the Valorant team’s current goal, Donlan admits that this will be flexible and could increase or decrease depending on whether players think the agent pool needs more or less additions.
“This is a place where we’re gonna need a little flexibility,” she explains, “because we really need to follow your cues here. How many agents is too many, how many is too few? But right now, six is the sweet spot so six is what we’re targeting.”
Valorant currently has 11 agents, with the original base of ten agents from the beta and the introduction of Reyna at the beginning of Act One when the game fully released at the start of June.
Executive Producer @RiotSuperCakes checking in from home on the launch of VALORANT and our future plans. Watch to learn more about what’s up next for VALORANT. pic.twitter.com/xPZ13gOQMS
— VALORANT (@PlayVALORANT) June 29, 2020
While this high rate of content on the agent front will be an exciting prospect for those wanting to keep the game fresh, it could throw up one of the major sticking points that causes a lot of criticism in Riot’s flagship game League of Legends: balancing.
With new additions every two months or so, this is something the Valorant team will have to keep on top of heavily.
There was also a teaser thrown in for next Act’s new agent, with the silhouette of an agent appearing on the graphic illustrating how Acts and Episodes work.
Donlan also reveals that each Act and Episode will also introduce some form of content surrounding the story and lore of Valorant. New battle passes will also drop at the beginning of each Act, so much like with agents, we can expect six battle passes per year.