League of Legends is over 15 years old. The game is nearly old enough to drive or vote, and its developers at Riot Games haven’t been shy about applying retcons or reworks to champions or other aspects of the game as needed. Even longtime players can find themselves surprised by these overhauls. For instance, one champion was in the game for 11 years before he was suddenly replaced with someone completely new, but with the same name. The new Viktor has been taken from Arcane, which is much less confusing to new players — but what happens to longtime fans of a champion when their beloved main character gets replaced with a “better” version?
If you’re an Arcane fan, this is a natural decision that makes sense. If you’re a League of Legends veteran, it inspires questions as to the game’s greater canon. I reached out to Riot to learn more about the process of reinventing Viktor, and how Arcane’s new lore fits into the greater League library.
viraltrendingcontent: How did the “new” Viktor come about? Was this a creative decision by Fortiche that Riot decided to adopt for League of Legends, or was the new design a collaborative effort?
Paul Bellezza, executive producer of League of Legends: Lore-wise, we knew that we wanted Viktor at the end of Arcane to reach the Viktor we see in-game. But how he got there in the show was ultimately led by Christian [Linke, co-creator of Arcane] and the Fortiche team. And when his character development, both visually and narratively, started taking a slightly different course, we were all in and excited for this new iteration of Viktor to also be in-game rather than keeping them separate. So the adoption was definitely a creative decision by Riot and Fortiche. It began with a Viktor main who worked on League of Legends, who then joined the animation team, which led to the development of what the “super” form of Viktor could look like, and resulted in folks being very excited to adopt him into the game. It was very much a game-alumni led effort in collaboration with the Fortiche team.
Arnaud-Loris Baudry, production designer: A long-time, influential illustrator on the League of Legends splash art team and Viktor main joined the animation team with his own idea of how “super” Viktor could look like. The human version of Viktor was already designed and he was joining when we were trying to imagine how we’d take Viktor into this journey visually. And it took actually, I would say, four years of work to get from the initial ideas to the final design.
Gem Lim, art director on champions (League of Legends): This was definitely a different perspective to champion updates. We had to keep things more under wraps than usual because we wanted to support Arcane and avoid spoilers in service of creating a major moment for players with his new look. It was risky not being able to show his progress and get as much input from the players, but one of the best things about Riot is that we’re not afraid to try something new. And I would rather we try something like this when the opportunity presents itself.
Image: SixMoreVodka/Riot Games
At what point was it decided that the “old” Viktor would be removed in place of the Arcane version of the character? Were there any internal debates about keeping the original themes?
Bellezza: Basically, once we knew what was going to happen in the show and the team’s vision for Viktor’s story arc, we went all in on collaboration with the Riot animation team and Fortiche. We wanted to celebrate his story and this new version of Viktor in-game and said to ourselves, ‘we’re going to make this an amazing moment for viewers and players.’ And so, this was an intentional decision that all of us made together because we were excited about the evolution of the character.
Kiahna Manker, creative producer of film/TV: Also, I’d say Arcane season 1 had released at this point and so, we were seeing a resurgence of Viktor as a character that players really, really were gravitating towards. So there was a lot of trust that the game team had put into Arcane, as well as the trajectory that this character would have in the future.
Are Arcane Viktor and new League Viktor the same character? Is Arcane canon in the “Welcome to Noxus” storyline currently being set up? If so, is League Viktor technically dead in the current canon?
Bellezza: The Noxus storyline that League is doing and the CG we did for Season One 2025; it’s all one universe. So yes, Arcane Viktor is the Viktor you see in-game. And we directly tied together the end of Arcane to the beginning of our Season One 2025 cinematic, “Welcome to Noxus,” with Mel arriving on the shores of Noxus to flesh out this universe. For this particular video too, we were really excited to partner with Fortiche and felt it was an especially natural fit given some elements are a follow on from Arcane.
Is League Viktor technically dead in the current canon? We don’t know what definitively happened to Viktor in Arcane; so like the audience, we have to interpret what the show showed us of Jayce and Viktor’s conclusion. Ultimately, the game is a representation of the IP.
Image: Fortiche/Riot Games, Netflix
There are a couple of design elements from the original Viktor (the hair out of the back of the mask, the third arm), and I’m curious why the team decided to keep those particular pieces?
Lim: Something we know from doing visual updates in the past is that players (especially mains) feel very strongly and passionately about the original design of their champion. So, even as the story for Arcane was developing, the teams intuitively understood that the Viktor you see in Arcane should at least start off, visually, with what’s currently in the game. While they might not have known which specific elements they were going to keep initially, it was always planned to ensure that some of the original design would stay. There is also a champion silhouette readability consideration when updating champions in-game. We don’t want to deviate too far from what players are familiar with, otherwise, you might as well be making a new champion.
Baudry: With that in mind, when we looked to explore the redesign of Viktor’s final form in the show, we wanted to show his transformation through the evolution of his physical aids: the braces, the crutch, etc. become actual elements of his newfound power. His crutch transformed into a staff and his braces on his torso actually became almost an armor. Visually, we wanted to depict the journey of someone whose physical challenges became symbols of strength and transformation, becoming an almost godlike being at the end. And fortunately, some of those original design elements really fit with this story we were telling through his transformation.
There has been fan feedback that Viktor now shares some thematic overlap with champions like Malzahar and Lissandra. How did the team work to keep him distinct? Is there another champion who might take over the “robot overlord” thematic role?
Laurie Goulding, narrative director of League Studio: When we talk about character themes, we’re not just thinking of our champions in terms of the MOBA, but the wider IP setting. I like the opportunities within a world like Runeterra to show that sometimes the same lessons are not learned and interpreted across thousands of years of in-world timeline. Just because somebody made a similar mistake in the past or followed a similar journey to another character somewhere else in the world doesn’t mean that nobody else is ever going to make that same mistake, or try a similar course of action in the future. I like the kind of cyclical nature of some of the moral lessons that our characters fail to learn or take in similar, but slightly different, directions. It’s not necessarily the same, but it rhymes. That feels authentic to me.
Image: Fortiche, Riot Games/Netflix
Riot developers have spoken in the past about how champion reworks can cause the original mains of that character to express dissatisfaction or quit the game. What did Viktor’s player base look like before Arcane and the rework? Why was he eligible for this drastic change, and was it worth the backlash from longtime Viktor mains who preferred the original version?
Bellezza: This year, not only will a champion be considered for an update based on age, readability, outdated gameplay, etc., but we’re considering thematic fit to a season so that players are seeing a cohesive drop of content. So similarly, prior to that official decision, Viktor was a champion that we thought would be a good fit for an update during the Arcane timeframe, like when we updated Caitlyn in the first season of Arcane. And he was obviously going through this big transformation in the show that we wanted to be able to put in the game, as well.
Every champion update is bound to be risky and face backlash. We try our best to mitigate the risk, by trying to preserve the core elements that players love and ensuring we don’t lose the essence of the original character while updating to our current standards. Sometimes that means we push further than some long-time fans are comfortable with, and it’s a fine balancing act to try to manage. While we are proud of the evolution of Viktor via Arcane and his new in-game appearance, we will continue to reflect on what components were resonant or not-resonant with our players and take the learnings along the way.
