Honkai: Nexus Anima

HoYoverse

HoYoverse, the developers behind games like Genshin Impact, Honkai: Star Rail, and more announced a new game last week called Honkai: Nexus Anima and this time it looks heavily inspired by the likes of Pokémon, Palworld, and other creature collection-focused action games.

Honkai: Nexus Anima

In this game, the creatures are called Anima and they’ve been scattered all across the world when the balance of the magical ‘Nexus’ is disrupted. You, as an Animaster (get it?) will set off on your adventure, collect a bunch of Anima, and utilize their unique powers in both battles and minigames.

In the gameplay footage (embedded below) we can see lots of very active traversal mechanics around the game world, minigames like racing, lots of conversations and silliness with NPCs, actual character customization, and a unique battle system that seems to use an isometric camera angle and potentially a mixture of real-time and command-based interactions.

On the game’s website, there are already dozens of Anima listed with artwork, names, aspects and traits, height, energy, and so-on. There seems to be a lot of depth here and of course the promise of a deep, “immersive” story to follow.

I’ve embedded the big list they’ve got so far under “Anima Overview” on the site up above to get a feel for the style they’re going for. In the footage below, you can also see the player gliding and riding on various Anima as well during exploration.

The official press release describes Honkai: Nexus Anima as a “creature-collecting adventure strategy game” which is quite a mouthful of genre combinations.

According to the brief email I got, you’ll have to explore the rupture of “unseen bonds” between things like Light and Dark or Life and Death—which is appropriately vague for a new game announcement like this.

Presumably, because this uses the same ‘Honkai’ moniker as Star Rail, that means this takes place in the same universe and is a directly-related spin-off rather than just another game in a similar style.

Recruitment for the first Honkai: Nexus Anima closed beta, referred to as the Nexus Bond Test, is now live and you can sign up over on the official website here for both PC and iOS. Registration lasts until September 12, 2025.

I’ve signed up and am definitely interested in checking out Honkai: Nexus Anima for myself.