Aug 9, 2022

In the new Docu series, the creators reveal how they assured that "esoteric" is not another crippling video game adaptation.

Riot Games has released the first episode of 5 episodes in the new Youtube doc series Arcane: Bridging the Rift.It details the trajectory from Netflix's creative marvel Arcane's first pitch meeting to the final touches.

Watch part 1 below:

A yearning for deeper storytelling, and a dynamic career in the League of Legends video game that has already inspired the series

"I always had this sense of duty to the players," says Yee in Episode 1 . "It felt like we created these characters and the players responded to us by spending a lot of time with them and loving them."

But, as the two further explain, even a great idea can take something convincing to get off the ground.

The behind-the-scenes series interviews key players at Riot, including founders Brandon Beck and Marc Merrill. The series will also talk to many creative leaders from Fortiche, an innovative animation studio headquartered in Paris.

In the first episode titled "Part1–I Only Dream in Risky," Linke and Yee talk about how their project is off the ground at Riot. The video also highlights the process of pushing the boundaries of the collaboration workflow with Fortiche, the process of moving from a short music video collaboration to a full-fledged animated series, and concerns about adapting one of the world's most popular video games as a series.1 I have heard from you.

"We knew Arcane would be the first deep story representation of League of Legends. There are enough video games that audiences have been asking for movies and shows for years and years, and then they make it and it sucks. And guess what - people stop asking," says Linke. If we at least made something not good, we're really doing harm to the League's IP."

It's no exaggeration to say that the Riot and Fortiche teams avoided that pitfall. The series is not only the most in-demand animated series on streaming in the first half of 2022, it has now been nominated for 2 Emmy Awards, including Best Animation program.

New episodes of the Docu series will be released every Thursday at 8AM PST/11am EST.