Arcane is the most expensive animated series in history!

Riot Games broke the record, spending $250 million to create Arcane, making it the most expensive animated series ever produced.

Variety journalists spoke with the creators of Arcane and learned some interesting facts about the animated series:

• Creating the two seasons of Arcane (18 episodes in total) cost $250 million, of which $180 million was spent on technical production and the remaining amount on marketing.
• The first season's cost was $80 million, while the second season cost $100 million. Analysts explain that the high costs were due to the studio's inexperience in creating such media projects, leading to inflated expenses.
• The animated series is the most expensive in the world.
• Riot Games covered most of the marketing expenses (around $60 million), while Netflix invested much less.
• The majority of the marketing budget went into promoting the first season. Interestingly, Riot barely advertised Arcane within the game, which surprised analysts as this approach would have been much cheaper. However, it seems the company was not confident in the success of the project and didn’t want to disappoint fans.
• Over the course of working on the animated series, Riot Games underwent management changes in the media division, which explains the inconsistent strategy toward products outside of games.

Comment from Mark Merrill, co-founder of Riot Games:

"Our ambitions in entertainment haven't changed—we never intended to operate like a traditional studio with traditional timeframes. We realized that to get it right, we needed much more time than we originally expected. That’s why we recalibrated our development, goals, and teams based on this new experience."

Despite universal recognition and success, Arcane did not bring Riot Games much profit. However, the company plans to continue expanding the League of Legends universe through movies, series, and animated shows.

And a reminder: the first episode is coming very soon, on November 9. You can check the schedule for all Arcane Season 2 episodes in our blog.