Riot Games announced on Monday that they have made an equity investment into Fortiche Production, the animation studio responsible for their award-winning League of Legends animated series Arcane. Riot now controls a non-controlling stake in the studio.

“Fortiche has been an integral partner for a long time, but this agreement ensures we’ll be working closely for decades to come,” Nicolo Laurent, CEO of Riot, explained in a press release. “We hold a high bar for everyone we work with and insist they understand players deeply and focus on them relentlessly, and from day one, Fortiche has exemplified Player Experience First. In working with Fortiche, we collaborate to push the boundaries of what’s possible and raise expectations for how games can be represented in media. As proud as we are of Arcane, we know the best is yet to come.” 

Fortiche has been working together for a long time, first collaborating on the Get Jinxed music video in 2013. They have since worked together on the music videos for WARRIORS and Enemy featuring Imagine Dragons, along with D/DA's POP/STARS, and the 2018 League of Legends World Championship song RISE.

Arcane is by far the largest project Fortiche and Riot have worked on together. Arcane recently won 9 awards from the Annie Awards at the 49th Annie Awards hosted this past week. Arcane Season 2 is currently in production and is expected to release later this year, though a solid release date has not yet been announced by Riot Games.

Given this new investment from Riot, we can expect collaborations between Riot and Fortiche Production for years to come.