• ‘Arcane’, a television adaptation of Riot Games’ ‘League of Legends’, is back on Netflix.
• The series was created by Christopher Linke and Alexander Yee, two Riot veterans with no TV experience.
• ‘Arcane’ reportedly came with a hefty price tag, but it was well received by fans and critics alike.

In 2010, Christian Linke, co-creator of Arcane, had to make a change.

The German-born musician played bass in the German rock band Panik for many years and worked as a songwriter and producer. But in 2010, he began to have doubts about the music business — and thus the longevity of his career — when he saw musicians using personal computers to produce their own songs.

So he left music, picked up his life and moved to Los Angeles. When he arrived, he got a customer support job he found on Craigslist. Although he didn’t know it at the time, that job set him on a career path that would lead to his first Emmy Award twelve years later.

The performance was at Riot Games, a young video game company founded in 2006 that had launched its debut title “League of Legends” the year before. Today, ‘League’ is one of the most played PC games in the world, with Riot announcing it had reached 180 million monthly active players in 2021. But back then, Riot was small and ‘League’ was still a new title. . And luckily for Linke, an early “League of Legends” player, there were thousands of unanswered German-language customer support tickets queuing up.

“Somehow they hired me,” Linke told Business Insider. “I think because of all the people interviewed, I was the only one who actually spoke German.”

Fourteen years later, the now creative director has graduated from answering tickets to running one of television’s most successful video game adaptations. “Arcane,” which Linke created with fellow Rioter Alexander Yee, premiered on Netflix in November 2021. By the time the first season aired, it had amassed millions of viewing hours and ranked #1 on Netflix’s global top 10. English television list.

It wasn’t much of a surprise when Netflix announced that it had renewed “Arcane” for a second season once season one wrapped. In addition to winning four Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Animated Program, it received near-universal critical acclaim. And for good reason: its focused, character-driven story and distinct visual identity, courtesy of French animation studio Fortiche, make it accessible and compelling television for newcomers and longtime ‘League’ fans alike.

But before the show became a hit, it was a passion project that Linke and Yee began working on in 2015 — one that grew out of their time at Riot and the relative creative freedom they were given during the company’s rise.

“When we started the project, there wasn’t a single adaptation that had ever succeeded,” Linke told BI of his and Yee’s plan to create a series based on the game. “But it didn’t really matter because the desire was always very clear. It was like, ‘We want this to exist.'”

Linke has worn many hats at Riot and has grown his career at the company

When Linke started at Riot in 2010, his role quickly expanded to include customer support. After a stint in the billing department, he eventually moved into data analytics, working cross-functionally on various teams.

But in 2011, he saw an opportunity for the company to invest more in music projects – think theme songs, music videos and ‘League’-inspired bands – and in turn leverage his own creative background.

“No one asked,” Linke said, but no one stopped him either. By 2015, Linke had built a team under him and proven himself within the company. What he missed was a challenge.

The same applied to Yee, who had focused on creative design at the company. Together, after years of playing in various creative sandboxes within the “League” universe, they began conceptualizing the television show that would become “Arcane.”

It was unprecedented work at Riot, which at the time had yet to expand into traditional television or film projects.

“We really had to take small steps,” Linke said. “We had to build not only creatively, but also the way to convince leaders who have never worked on a TV show and invested in a TV show. So a lot of it just started at the grassroots.”

That included animation and dialogue tests — “We’d never heard our characters talk,” Linke said — in addition to coming up with the show’s story. After about a year and a half of work, the company committed to making a pilot episode in 2016 – and it’s clear that it ultimately worked out well for them.

Still, Linke and Yee took risks along the way, the most important of which was gambling on the French production studio Fortiche. Prior to “Arcane”, the studio had worked on music videos and promotional materials for Riot and artists such as the Gorillaz, as well as some television projects. But none matched the scope of what would become “Arcane”: nine episodes in the first season, animated with a quality more reminiscent of film than television.

“People were very concerned about it, but what Fortiche had that you can’t fix with money is passion,” Linke said. “I knew they would put their lives on hold to make the most of their careers with this project, and I’ve worked with other animation studios where that’s simply not the case. It’s a performance, but Fortiche had something to prove. “

‘Arcane’ was an expensive labor of love that Riot hasn’t yet replicated – but it’s a great proof of concept

Nine years after Linke and Yee started working on ‘Arcane’ in 2015, the series is ending after two seasons of nine episodes. The project did not come without significant costs: Fortiche’s feature film-quality animation caused production to proceed at a slower pace, more typical of animated film than animated television.

Citing sources familiar with the production, Variety recently reported that the show’s first season cost more than $80 million to make, and the second cost almost $100 million. (Riot did not immediately respond to BI’s request for comment regarding the reported costs of “Arcane.”)

Even if Riot doesn’t make an immediate profit from the series, that might not be the company’s main goal anyway. Film and television are not Riot Games’ main activities; video games like “League of Legends” are. A really good television series like “Arcane” not only engages current players who might spend money on in-game cosmetics, but brings new eyes to the franchise. The real cosmetics, like the season two release of “Arcane” with Fenty Beauty, probably don’t hurt either.

“Arcane” remains Riot’s most brilliant and only successful adaptation. By putting the first major ‘League’ adaptation in the hands of people who knew best and wanted to get it right, ‘Arcane’ sets a precedent for how to make something beloved by fans and critics alike. Reportedly high production costs and a long timeline gave them the time and space to do this — even if, as Linke told The Washington Post ahead of the first season, it meant leaving a “big hole in Riot’s pockets burned”.

Ultimately, Linke says the show was a product of “selfish desire.” The fact that it is motivated by passion and not pragmatism is why it is so good.

“For us, we love the game,” he said. “We wanted to see those characters come to life. That’s it. That’s enough to say that this should exist for ourselves.”

Season two of ‘Arcane’, ‘Act One’ is currently streaming Netflix. Part two premieres on Saturday, November 16.