Arcane, the League of Legends animated series, has been postponed to 2021 due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
Riot Games’ Vice President of IP and Creative Development, Greg “Ghostcrawler” Street, posted an official message on the studio’s blog on Wednesday, explaining the team’s decision to push back the release of Arcane from late 2020 to some time in 2021.
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“Everyone here at Riot is bummed,” he said. “We were really looking forward to bringing you the show this year, but we need to balance our excitement for the story with the safety and well-being of our teams and partners. Our revised plan is to release Arcane in 2021, so stay tuned to our channels for more specific updates as we get closer.”
Street then went on to highlight some of the complications of working from home on such a production. In particular, he referenced the challenge of trying to manifest the same creative energy on a video call that would be generated in a studio, noting that this was one of the major setbacks for the team, along with technical issues.
“Creative development and production is hard, especially in a world where you can’t see your coworkers IRL,” he admitted. “We have video meetings now, which help, but they are no substitute for being in a room where we can really get the creative energy flowing. Combine these issues, along with the technical difficulties of production at the international scale, and the problem becomes a lot bigger.”
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Arcane was one of the new projects announced at Riot’s League of Legends tenth-anniversary celebrations last year, along with Legends of Runeterra, the studio’s new multi-platform game, and Valorant, a tactical first-person shooter game.
In our review of Valorant, out worldwide on June 2, we said that the “flexibility of its magically-infused cast paired with a deep arsenal makes for a magnificent competitive canvas,” which makes you want to “keep playing until there’s nothing left to master.”
For even more on these projects, check out our complete rundown of announcements from the Riot Games League of Legends livestream.
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Adele Ankers is a Freelance Entertainment Journalist. You can reach her on Twitter.
Source: IGN.com League of Legends Animated Series Delayed Into 2021