Arcane has come to an end with the release of Season 2, but League of Legends developer Riot Games is far from done with animations based on the hugely popular MOBA.
In an interview with League content creator Necrit, Riot creative director and Arcane creator and showrunner Christian Linke revealed the three Runeterra regions it's exploring as settings for future shows: Noxus, Ionia, and Demacia.
Arcane is set in Piltover and Zaun. Season 2 teases Noxus, the home of Ambessa Medarda and her daughter Mel, as a potential future setting. Riot describes this region as a "brutal, expansionist empire,” home to the likes of champions Darius and Draven.
Ionia, an island continent “of natural beauty and magic,” is where the likes of Yasuo, Ahri, and Zed hail from. They remained largely neutral until their land was invaded by Noxus.
And finally, Demacia is Runeterra’s “proud, lawful kingdom with a prestigious military history.” It’s where Garen, Lux, and Lucia are from.
In the interview, Linke revealed that Reddit threads in which players voted for where they’d like to see Arcane follow-ups head next were spot on.
“I’ll give you a little something,” he said. “I’ll tell you this: we are investing quite a bit in Noxus, Ionia, and Demacia. We start really with character stories. But, I’m very confident that we’re investing in the right stories, because simply those were the answers we have seen in those threads.
“We have a lot of data. We know which characters our audience like and play a lot. It takes quite some effort to understand the difference between people picking champions because they win, versus people picking champions because they like them. But we pay attention to that. So we don’t just go with who’s popular because they win, but, where’s resonance, and how do you define resonance?
“But I’m very confident that we’re looking at the right regions, where there’s a lot of fandom, a lot of interest, and I’ll guess that’s where I’ll leave it.”
Before that tease, Linke confirmed that “right now we’re [Riot] developing the follow-up project.”
“We’re exploring a bunch of directions,” he said. “When you work on something for nine years it’s pretty normal and pretty expected that you’re gonna have ideas for other stories.
“We’re looking at every region. We now have the ability to now focus on the ability to make a slate to tell many more stories. We’re far from done. This is right now a really exciting time for us because we can really focus on what’s next.”
The question, of course, is when might fans see Riot’s Arcane follow-up? It may be some time, given the huge expense associated with the painstaking production of Arcane. And let’s remember that Riot has made no announcement of any follow-up actually being in production. All this may end up going nowhere.
Last week, Riot Games co-founder Marc Merrill called ongoing arguments over Arcane’s huge budget "silly." While Arcane has been a massive hit for Netflix and Riot Games — an unabashed critical darling that's been embraced by League of Legends fans and otherwise — it didn't come cheap. Earlier this month Variety reported it cost an eye-watering $250 million to make and market Arcane's two seasons, for a total of 18 episodes.
That figure undoubtedly makes Arcane the most expensive animated series of all time by a longshot, but it is also vociferously debated, with many pointing out that Arcane is cheap in cost-per-minute terms compared to animated feature films from the likes of Pixar.
Image credit: Riot Games.
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
