What is League Of Legends, the game Netflix series Arcane is based on?

Arcane Season 2 poster shows all the main characters standing together — Arcane has some very deep video game lore (Netflix)

Arcane Season 2 is about to start on Netflix but did you know it was based on the hugely popular free-to-play game League Of Legends?

Netflix’s Arcane Season 2 is finally set to release on November 9. It’s been three years since the animated show took the world by storm, pleasing not just fans of Riot’s League Of Legends, but also critics and general audiences.

The show’s beautiful art style was created by French animation studio Fortiche and was matched with a dark storyline about two sisters torn apart by conflict, making for an award-winning surprise success. Perhaps surprisingly, Jinx and Vi’s story was compelling enough to stand on its own two feet, even if you had no idea it was based on the hugely popular video game League Of Legends.

If the show does pique your interest though you might be surprised to find out that not only is League Of Legends completely free to play but it’s a very complicated strategy game, that can be quite difficult to get into at first. So here’s everything you need to know the game that Netflix’s Arcane is based on.

What is League Of Legends?

League Of Legends (often referred to as LoL) is the world’s most popular MOBA, which stands for multiplayer online battle arena. It’s also one of the world’s biggest esports. Last year, the League Of Legends World Championships drew over 6 million viewers during its peak.

In its most popular form, a mode called Summoner’s Rift, it’s a 5v5 team game, played from a top-down perspective. Each player plays as a unique fantastical character that comes with its own set of abilities that you can upgrade throughout a match.

There are a staggering 169 ‘champions’ in the game, including Jinx and Vi, so you’re bound to find one you jive with. The goal is to push through three lanes of computer-controlled enemies, destroying defensive towers and respawning minions that protect a Nexus within the enemy’s base. The team that destroys the other team’s Nexus first is the winner.

There are other popular modes like ARAM (All Random, All Mid), which simplifies things by putting everything in one lane, but the base mechanics stay the same. If you’ve ever played a strategy game, League Of Legends will look somewhat familiar. That’s because it, and the entire MOBA genre, started out as a fan mod for Warcraft 3.

The key difference is that in a real-time strategy game like Warcraft you control the minions or build structures, whereas a MOBA has you in charge of just one champion, destroying AI minions, prebuilt structures, and other players.

How can you play League Of Legends?

You have two ways to play League Of Legends. The first is the main game. This is available for free on PC or Mac through the Riot Client. You simply need to head over to the League Of Legends website and hit the ‘Play for Free’ button. After making an account, you can then choose whether to install it on PC or Mac, where you just need to complete the 12.7GBs install to start playing.

The other way to play is on mobile, with Riot’s dedicated Android and iOS versions. This is called League Of Legends: Wild Rift. Although Wild Rift is a little more condensed, with matches not lasting quite as long, it’s basically the same game and a good place to start for new players. The same tenets of destroying towers to get to the enemy Nexus remain and the controls are neatly simplified for mobile.

Both versions are free and you can play a lot without needing to spend any money. When you do, it will mostly be to buy extra champions or get skins. It’s worth noting that if you’re playing on a PC and have a Game Pass subscription, you get exclusive bonuses, the most useful being that you get access to all of the heroes.

How are Arcane and League Of Legends related?

League Of Legends is set in Runeterra, a fantasy world filled with various regions where the champions come from. Riot offers an overview of the world online, where you can explore each of the regions and the characters from it. Arcane is set in the region that features the affluent Piltover and the undercity of Zaun.

The show pulls from the existing background lore but that’s largely where the connection stops. League Of Legends is not a story-driven game. It is a competitive team experience and a deeply complex one at that. You won’t find too much in the way of rich narrative moments or a real exploration of the world of Runeterra that matches the style of Arcane.

The Netflix show uses the biographies and established lore of the universe but most of that comes from outside the game, including in novels and webcomics. So while Jinx and Vi are two champions, and their backstories are the same in both the show and the game, you won’t learn much more about them by playing League Of Legends.

That said, there are other titles set in the world of Runeterra. There’s the card game Legends Of Runeterra and the upcoming fighting game 2XKO, which uses the characters of League Of Legends as a backdrop – but again, these aren’t story-rich explorations of the world.

However, there are a couple of short spin-offs that are a little more narrative focused. Convergence, The Mageseeker and Ruined King are standalone titles that come under the A League Of Legends Story banner. While not complex role-playing games these are more likely to scratch your itch if you want something to play after Arcane.

That said, Riot is looking to expand the world of Runeterra in the future, so a more traditional, story-driven experience could well be on the horizon.