MOBAs are hands down the most popular game genre in eSports and competitive online gaming. They’re fun, addicting, and free-to-play, so MOBA developers support themselves by offering cosmetics like character skins for purchase.
With so many MOBAs available, and more coming out like League of Legends: Wild Rift for mobile devices later in 2020, it wasn’t easy putting together a list of skins worth buying across the genre, but we looked at the most popular MOBA titles and the coolest or most unique skins offered by each.
Note that many of the coolest and most unique MOBA skins usually aren’t available for immediate purchase, but are offered through limited time events. So if you miss out on buying one of these awesome skins, just wait until the developer announces the next event where the skins you want might be available.
Mobile Legends
Moonton’s Mobile Legends is currently the most popular mobile MOBA outside of China, with over 25 million players globally. The largest majority of its player base is in the SEA region, particularly Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines. It’s one of the best 2 player games if you team up with a friend, or you can even form squads for 5-player teams.
Zodiac Signs
Every month, players can purchase special zodiac-themed skin depending on the month of the year. These can only be obtained from the monthly Zodiac event, so you must purchase 1 Zodiac skin per month to complete the collection. Note that there are 2 Gemini skins, one each for Selena and Karina, as they are twin sisters in game lore and Gemini means “twins” in Latin.
The Zodiac skins in order of astrological sign are:
- Aurora – Aquarius
- Lancelot – Pisces
- Hilda – Aries
- Minotaur – Taurus
- Selena – Gemini
- Karina – Gemini
- Zhask – Cancer
- Badang – Leo
- Odette – Virgo
- Lunox – Libra
- Helcurt – Scorpio
- Irithel – Sagittarius
- Martis – Capricorn
King of Fighters
Moonton collaborated with King of Fighters developer SNK in 2019 to release special hero skins, based on characters from the KoF franchise. The skins are fairly expensive, around $25 per skin when they are available during a special in-game event, which they ran in both 2019 and 2020. It’s unknown if they will be available again in a future event.
If you’re too young to remember King of Fighters, you can play here a web version of the once-popular arcade fighter on CrazyGames, and many other awesome io games in your browser.
The list of ML heroes and their KoF skin are:
- Karina as Leona
- Guinevere as Athena Asamiya
- Aurora as Kula Diamond
- Dyrroth as Orochi Chris
- Gusion as K’
- Chou as Iori Yagami.
League of Legends
League of Legends has a tremendous hero roster with over 150 champions, and over 1,000 skins available. Tencent has a history of creating skins inspired by pop-culture, and this has landed them in legal trouble in the past, like when they lost a lawsuit to soccer pro Edgar Davids for creating a skin based on his likeness without his permission. So none of the skins mentioned here are actually officially licensed, they’re just “inspired by”.
Mortal Kombat
If ever you wanted to see your favorite Mortal Kombat characters in a MOBA, Riot made your wish come true. These are legacy skins that are only available during special sale events, so they are not purchasable in the skin shop. League of Legends offers the following champion skins “inspired by” (wink wink) the Mortal Kombat franchise:
- Akali – Jade / Skarlet
- Galio – Onaga
- Gangplank – Kano
- Shen – Sub-Zero / Scorpion
- Syndra – Sindel
- Viktor – Cyrax
- Zed – Noob Saibot
X-Men
Marvel’s X-Men was one of the best-selling comic books in the early 90s, and the franchise’s popularity continues today with blockbuster movies, video games, and TV series. These skins will make the following champions look like the corresponding X-Men member.
- Tempest Janna – Storm
- Phoenix Quinn – Dark Phoenix
- Night Hunter Rengar – Nightcrawler
- Original Twisted Fate – Gambit
- Demolisher Nunu – The Juggernaut
Arena of Valor
Tencent’s most popular mobile MOBA in China is “Honor of Kings”, but they developed a westernized version called Arena of Valor with cosmetic changes to appeal to a western audience. Thus, while Honor of Kings and Arena of Valor are spiritually the same game, there are differences, such as pop-culture skins in AoV that appeal to a western audience.
DC Heroes
Tencent originally included Marvel characters in the beta version of AoV, but Marvel took back their license, so Tencent turned to DC instead. These are not skins, they are actual heroes in the game, but they also have their own skins available.
- Superman
- Batman
- Joker
- Wonder Woman
- Flash
Heroes of the Storm
Blizzard’s Heroes of the Storm is a popular MOBA alternative to League of Legends, with around 2+ million daily active players. Being a Blizzard game, of course, there are plenty of champions and skins based on other Blizzard titles, which include:
- Diablo
- Starcraft
- Warcraft
So not only can you play as Diablo characters like Tyrael and Diablo, or Warcraft heroes like Malfurion and Thrall, there are plenty of skins for those characters as well.
