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Like just about everything, anime has also taken a hit this year with production delays. Despite the let down, there are still a few fantastic anime that have been released this year so far. Eerily, they all have at least one thing in common: animal people. OK, they’re not all quite as “furry” as Beastars, but the delightfully weird Dorohedoro features a guy with a lizard head, the action-packed Tower of God has a spear-bearing, crocodile-looking guy, and so on. I guess it’s just that weird of a year–but don’t let that deter you, because these anime are for everyone.

We’ve enjoyed returning anime like Fruits Basket and Kaguya-sama: Love Is War, but here we’re showcasing brand new anime that require no prerequisite to watch. This list covers anime debuting through June 2020.

Here are the best new anime of 2020 so far, in no particular order.

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Beastars

Think Zootopia, but gritty and melodramatic with plenty of romance and mystery. Melodrama is a rare strength in Beastars’ case; the dramatic camera angles and well-performed monologues only enhance this telling of a wolf that struggles both with his carnivorous instincts and desire to fit into society. Told through the lens of naïve high school upperclassman Legoshi, Beastars paints a world filled with strife and a society hiding an ugly underbelly. Things only get harder for Legoshi when a herbivore classmate is brutally murdered and suddenly all carnivores are suspects.

The anime’s CG animation is surprisingly satisfying, and the unique opening theme and animation is so catchy that we never let Netflix skip it. It’s worth noting that Beastars can get quite violent and rather sexual, so while this anime may feature animals, it may not be suitable for younger viewers.

Streaming on Netflix

BNA: Brand New Animal

Unlike Beastars, BNA is devoid of romance. What it does have is snappy, visually stunning action scenes–as to be expected from Studio Trigger, the team behind the critically acclaimed Kill la Kill and Promare. BNA is especially a treat for the eyes, and even the ears–I can’t get its soundtrack out of my head. Its story holds up incredibly well too, though. In the world of BNA, Beastman once hid away from human kind, but now they are a marginalized species whether they are mink or migratory bird. To combat the prejudice, Anima City was established for beastman to inhabit without fearing the judgment of humans. This is where the main character, Michiru, flees to when she inexplicably changes from a human highschooler to a raccoon/tanuki Beastman (it’s up for debate, according to her). Cue the mystery of why and how she transformed, and who the mythic Silver Wolf, the protector of the Beastmen, really is.

Streaming on Netflix

Somali and the Forest Spirit

Out of all the anime on this list, Somali and the Forest Spirits may just stick with me the longest. It’s a mystical tale that tells the story of a 998-year-old golem forest guardian traveling through a grandiose fantasy world with a small human child who may be the last of her kind. Somali and the Forest Spirit’s tone is reminiscent of Studio Ghibli films. It has quiet, yet beautifully powerful storytelling, whether the subject is its main characters or the imaginative friends they meet, even if just for a moment. I would especially recommend this anime to any parents, especially fathers with daughters, but as a childless lady I still thoroughly enjoyed Somali in the Forest Spirits and it tugged at my heart strings just the same.

Streaming on Crunchyroll and VRV

Dorohedoro

Dorohedoro is weird as heck. It begins at a very small scope, but as the anime continues, the larger and more creative and interesting the world gets. Kaiman is an amnesiac with the head of a lizard. We soon learn this is probably because of a practicing sorcerer–people from another dimension that constantly visit the “Hole” to test their magic, causing mass havoc and hordes of disfigured people. However, there is an extra twist to Kaiman’s disfiguration: there’s a strange man inside of his mouth, who seems to judge the people he eats.

Expect brutal and bloody fight scenes, crazy magic, and heartwarming shared meals. Yeah, it’s nuts, but I can’t dispute that the end of season one left me wanting so much more. The main mystery of who disfigured Kaiman, and what exactly is inside of him, is interesting enough. But the side characters, like his best friend Nikkaido, and even the villains, are just as intriguing. It’s odd how an anime can be both so savage and so charming at the same time, but somehow Dorohedoro makes it work.

Streaming on Netflix (Yes, Netflix is killing it this year.)

Tower of God

In true shonen fashion, Tower of God follows a boy with a singular goal in mind who must overcome harrowing obstacles and become stronger to meet them head on. It’s action-packed with power struggles, special weapons, cool techniques, magical powers, and more shonen staples. The premise is also out-of-this world: Inhabitants of “The Tower” attempt to climb it by completing extreme challenges on each floor. They may be tasked with choosing the correct door in a room full of them, or collecting a ball from beneath a giant sea monster, for example. There’s a lot more to Tower of God than just that, but that concept alone makes for continuously interesting and entertaining scenarios.

Tower of God is an adaptation of the South Korean manwha made popular in the West by digital comic service Webtoon. Like the manhwa, the anime thrusts viewers into its world without explaining much of anything. But the character relations and action scenes are enough to carry it while it slowly trickles out information about the world.

Streaming on Crunchyroll

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Those are the five best new anime of the year so far, at least in our opinion. What have been your favorite anime so far this year? There are, of course, even more promising anime coming out this year like the God of High School which just premiered on Crunchyroll. Be on the lookout for our article on the most promising summer anime sometime in the near future. And be sure to also check out the best anime on Netflix right now!

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A few weeks ago Joe, Dale and Cardy gave their thoughts on The Last of Us Part 2. They also asked for your thoughts and now that Alex, Matt and Jesse have also finished the game, it’s time to share your opinions with the world. If you’ve yet to finish The Last of Us 2 don’t worry, because there’s a brand new Endless Search game right at the beginning of the podcast. That’ll keep you busy for 10 minutes. Let’s go!

Remember, if you want to get in touch with the podcast, please do: [email protected].

IGN UK Podcast #547: The Last of Us Part 2 Spoilercast Part 2

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• IGN UK Podcast #546: Iron Man and His Bouncy Balls
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• IGN UK Podcast #543: Our PS5 Reveal Reactions

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A new piece of Wonder Woman 1984 promo art has surfaced online, offering fans a closer look at Kristen Wiig’s Cheetah.

The DC League Twitter account shared the latest marketing image of Wiig’s Barbara Ann Minerva fully transformed into the villainous Cheetah for Patty Jenkins’ upcoming sequel.

The holographic-style shot provides a fresh glimpse at the human-cheetah hybrid, with a full look at the character’s furry spotted body, slicked-back hair, and black-lined eyes. In the comics, Minerva is a British anthropologist who gains powers after an expedition to an African jungle where she transforms into a cheetah with orange skin and black spots, a tail and claws, as well as superhuman senses and reflexes.

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There have been four main incarnations of Cheetah in DC’s comics. The first two, Priscilla Rich and her niece, Deborah Domaine, had no superhuman abilities to speak of, whereas Barbara Ann Minerva and Sebastian Ballesteros offered more modern embodiments of the character, with Urzkartaga granting them supernatural abilities along with their transformations into half-human, half-cheetah hybrids.

Jenkins previously spoke about Wiig’s character pre-transformation, saying she is “sometimes a friend, sometimes a colleague” of Diana Prince who “becomes Diana’s nemesis” along the way. For comic book fans, it will be interesting to see how the character’s arc plays out on screen but, unfortunately, we still have some time to wait until the Wonder Woman sequel is released.

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Wonder Woman 1984 is just one of the dozens of movies affected by COVID-19, with Hollywood shutting down numerous productions and constantly shifting dates in theatrical release calendars due to the impact of the global pandemic.

The DC superhero sequel was originally slated to open November 1, 2019, before getting postponed to June 5, 2020, and then to August 14, 2020. In the most recent shift, Warner Bros. pushed back the release of Wonder Woman 1984 from August 14 to October 2, 2020.

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Adele Ankers is a Freelance Entertainment Journalist. You can reach her on Twitter.

Tabletop roleplaying games are flexible. You can get started with a sheet of paper, some rules, a handful of dice, a few friends, a pencil, and go nuts with it. That’s as far as you need to go. But, if you’re like me, you can also scale up and start exploring the wonderful, albeit expensive world of miniatures and miniature terrain to add a level of tangible, three-dimensional playable space to your game. Whether your flavor is Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, Call of Cthulhu, or any system under the sun, there’s just something undeniably cool about plucking the game out of your group’s collective imagination and bringing it to tiny life in front of you.

That’s where WizKids’ new WarLock Tile system comes into play, a new line of three-dimensional terrain that bridges the gap between prohibitively expensive terrain sets, and the alternative of 3D-printing or crafting your own. And that’s pretty much why I gravitate toward WizKids’ suite of TTRPG products in the first place, over the last several years the company has quietly become a top-tier developer in the space, producing some of the best miniatures that strike a balance between affordability, quality, and style.

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Check out this slideshow gallery to see everything included in the WizKids WarLock Dungeon Tiles I set.

So for its debut line of modular terrain, I got to check out the soon-to-be-released WizKids Warlock Tiles: Dungeon Tiles I set and the Doors & Archways expansion pack ahead of its launch. And from the hours I spent building, breaking down, and rebuilding the sets I’ve handled, I think the WarLock Tiles system is an excellent place to start if you’re looking to get into miniature terrain.

What’s on the Table?

WizKids’ opening salvo of terrain sets is fairly robust. Though you can pre-order every set now – and you’ll find links below to do just that – when they hit online and retail stores soon the offerings fall into two categories: Base Sets and Expansion Packs.

The Dungeon Tiles 1 set is the base kit priced at $100 USD that comes with an enormous amount of materials to build a very respectable-sized dungeon for your miniature monsters and player characters to murder one another within. There’s also a tavern-themed kit called the WizKids Warlock Dungeon Tiles: Town & Village (also for $100 USD) that’s functionally identical in size and scope to Dungeon Tiles 1, but exchanges the stone aesthetic for a wood-and-plaster look.

The five introductory expansion packs are each priced at $50 USD, and consist of Doors & Archways (more doors and archways for your dungeon), Dungeon Dressings (a collection of scatter terrain to fill out those empty dungeons), Stairs & Ladders (for the vertically minded dungeoneer), Summoning Circles (three 4×4 reversible tiles covered in runes and symbols), and the Expansion Box 1 (which includes more select pieces that come in the base sets.)

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Keeping It Locked

The biggest takeaway from WizKids’ WarLock Tiles are the easy locking clips that encompass the “Lock” portion of the WarLock name. Every floor tile and exterior wall and door contain grooves that these clips slot into, so you can snap them together and your build will hold its shape while it’s in play. The connections are so sturdy that I was even able to pick up an entire dungeon I built ahead of time and carry it out to my game table when I needed it.

While locking tiles aren’t new, WizKids WarLock Tiles are really well thought through. The clips go in with minimal effort, are sturdy enough to stand up to moving the whole build or surviving an accidental collision with your players when they’re reaching across the table, and come apart pretty quickly. They’re also entirely optional. Builds are less sturdy if you don’t clip them in, sure, but each terrain piece supports itself well enough that if you’re looking to quickly build up and break down rooms as they’re encountered you can forgo the clips without worrying about the whole thing falling apart on you as you dismantle old locations to construct new ones.

The only downside I found to this locking system is the same one you’ll find with all terrain locking clips: pulling the clips back out of the pieces can start to be uncomfortable on the ole fingers if you’re yanking out a couple dozen of these clips by hand in quick succession. But since the WarLock clips are very sturdy hard plastic, if you’ve got a pair of pliers you can effortlessly tug them out of place forever without worrying about the clip standing up to the pressure and being damaged.

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Built to Last

Having used a number of different terrain brands over the years, I’ve seen quality swing wildly from pieces you could throw off a building and they’d be fine to terrain that starts to crumble after a few weeks. But I’m happy to say that WarLock Tiles are well-built and sturdy, extremely light, and really compact so they store easily – while the box they come in doubles as a carrying case. And WarLock Tiles are also really efficient for the cost thanks to the modular design and reversible tiles, meaning you can mix, match, and customize a number of different builds with the pieces available.

I appreciate the level of thought that’s gone into this set. For example, those reversible floor tiles can be flipped between stone floors and wooden tavern floors to visually separate different areas of a build. The kit also comes with a number of stone edge caps that you can stick into the outward-facing slots on the floor tiles just because it looks better. On top of that, the eight outer doors included are fully functional and swing open and closed. These little flourishes are such small considerations in the grand scheme, but it’s really the level of thoughtful design on display makes me think the WizKids has big plans for the future of this line, and it’s being built with that in mind by people who actually care about miniature terrain as something more than just a place to put your minis while you’re whipping d20s across the table.

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And most importantly, the set offers a really respectable value based on how far your money goes for what you get, compared to other terrain sets out there that cost considerably more for the same or less playable space. That coupled with the fact WarLock Tiles are compatible with the OpenLock and DragonLock 3D-printed terrain (with the included adapter clips) means if WizKids doesn’t offer a certain piece that will really pull your dungeon together, the odds are pretty good you can buy it from an online 3D printing marketplace to add the finishing touch.

In short, if you’re looking for a place to start blowing your disposable income on miniature terrain, the WarLock Tiles is an excellent jumping-off point that’s future-proofed enough that you’ll be able to mix and match your sets with future WarLock Tile sets as they come. And that’s really the only drawback I could find at this precise moment. Since this line of terrain is new, it’ll likely be some time before WizKids gets around to developing full environmental sets for the Enchanted Forest, the Subterranean Caverns, the Glacier of Frigid Doom, the Digestive Tract of the Tarrasque, or whatever they have in store. But, honestly, if the worst thing about this set is that there isn’t more of it, I think it’s in pretty good shape.

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Brandin Tyrrel is a Senior Editor at IGN and really enjoys making small plastic creatures fight for his amusement in small plastic environments. You can find him on Unlocked, or chat over on Twitter at @BrandinTyrrel.

Blightbound, a new multiplayer dungeon-crawler from Awesomenauts developer Ronimo Games, is heading to Steam Early Access on July 29. The game, which will be showcased as part of the Devolver Digital Direct on July 11, will let you and two friends venture into the Blight and face the horrible monsters within.

The Blight is a mysterious fog that has spread over the game world, and as you might expect, various abominations have emerged from it. It can be played with local or online multiplayer, and there will be plenty of loot to acquire and new heroes to find and add to your roster of 20 playable characters. There will be puzzles to solve, too.

You can check out a video with a developer walkthrough below.

Over time you’ll be able to build up your mountaintop refuge, and there will be item crafting to enjoy too. There will be three different lands to conquer, each with unique dungeons: they’re called Gravemark, Underhold, and Blood Ridge.

The game will encourage working together and figuring out how classes compliment each other, and you’ll need to be smart to overcome some of the game’s bosses.

A release date for the final version has not been announced yet. The game is, for now, exclusive to PC.

In early 2019, Annapurna Interactive released Outer Wilds, an action-adventure game about exploring a strange solar system. Months later, Obsidian Entertainment came out with The Outer Worlds, an action RPG about exploring a strange solar system. Both had mechanics that played with time, were released with Epic Games Store exclusivity, were featured on GameSpot’s best games of 2019, and have Wikipedia pages that start with “Not to be confused with [the other game].”

Even their logos had some degree of similarity, though the Game Maker’s Toolkit’s Twitter account has just confused that issue even more with these mind-bendingly flipped logos.

The similarity between the two games was one of last year’s biggest gaming inside jokes, especially as both of them were critically acclaimed and well-recommended. Gaming sites like Polygon even published guides for distinguishing the two games. Outer Wilds narrative designer Kelsey Beachum confused matters even more this year by announcing that she was leaving the Outer Wilds studio for a job with The Outer Worlds’ Obsidian.

If you’re still confused, here’s a quick rundown: The Outer Worlds leans much more heavily on Fallout-style RPG elements, with a customizable main character exploring a colonized solar system and making friends and enemies along the way. The game’s style is more detailed and photorealistic. Outer Wilds, on the other hand explores a mysterious solar system stuck in a 22-minute time loop, with the gameplay focusing on exploration over combat, and boasting a more stylized visual signature.

Both of them are worth playing, however–you can get The Outer Worlds on PC, PS4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch, while Outer Wilds is on PC, Xbox One and PlayStation 4.

Crysis, Crysis 2 and Crysis 3 are now all available to Xbox One players with an EA Access subscription, as announced in a tweet that referenced the classic 2007-era “can it run Crysis?” meme.

EA Access is a paid subscription service that brings a collection of EA games to players on PS4 and Xbox One, though the Crysis trilogy is currently only available for Xbox players. A subscription for EA Access costs $4.99 a month, or $29.99 annually.

This year Crytek announced it would be releasing Crysis: Remastered in 2020, with the game set to come to PC, PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch–making it the first time a Crysis game will be playable on a Nintendo console.

However, the remaster has not been smooth sailing for Crytek. After a number of screenshots and a trailer leaked ahead of a scheduled July 1 reveal, the developer rescheduled both the reveal and the remaster’s release date due to negative feedback to the leaks.

Upon its original release in 2007, Crysis was known for its cutting edge graphics–to the point where the computing power needed to run it became an ongoing meme. With Crysis’ history as a graphically intensive game, the leaked footage of the remaster just wasn’t up to standard for many fans.

This release does not include the Remastered version of Crysis, though–rather it is the Xbox 360 port of the original.

A statement released on Twitter by Crytek acknowledged the feedback, saying “we’ve seen all the reactions – the good and the bad – and we’re listening!”