Fate, also called Fate Series, is a media franchise created and managed by the Japanese software house Type-Moon under the guidance of Kinoko Nasu and the artistic direction of Takashi Takeuchi. The saga originates from the visual novel Fate/stay night, to which all subsequent products refer, i.e. prequels, sequels, parodies, other works and adaptations sharing the same prefix in the title, or Fate.
The series focuses mainly on storylines related to events called Holy Grail Wars, which involve Masters, usually experienced wizards, and Servants, manifestations of the heroic spirits they summoned, fighting each other until the last remaining couple obtains the Holy Grail. It is one of the most profitable videogame franchises ever.
The franchise has spanned several anime adaptations which are also very popular, and that inspired this article. In it, we are going to bring you a list of the best anime series like the Fate series that every fan needs to see. The list is going to include a total of 15 different titles which resemble the main Fate anime works in one way or the other.
Best Anime Like the Fate Series
The list is going to contain a total of 15 titles, ranked in random order, i.e. the ranking does reflect the quality of the series themselves. We have tried to pick the best anime that reflect either the genre, the style, or the spirit of the Fate series so that you might enjoy them like you did the original one.
1. Sword Art Online
Original Release: July 8, 2012 – September 20, 2020
Number of Episodes: 96
Sword Art Online (SAO) is a massively multiplayer virtual reality networked role-playing game (VRMMORPG) released in 2022: thanks to NerveGear, a helmet capable of stimulating the user’s five senses through direct manipulation of the brain, the players can impersonate and control their own character in the game directly with their mind.
SAO officially opens on November 6, 2022, but logged in users realize it is impossible to log out. The creator of the game, Akihiko Kayaba, reveals himself to be a psychopath and informs them that he has imprisoned them: if they wish to return to being free, the last level of the game must be reached and passed (represented by the 100th floor of the flying castle of Aincrad, in which the final boss is found).
However in the event of a game-over or forcibly removing the NerveGear, the hardware will cause a brain coma to the player by means of electric shocks to the brain.
2. Re:Zero − Starting Life in Another World
Original Release: April 4, 2016 – March 24, 2021
Number of Episodes: 50
Catapulted into a fantasy world, the young Subaru hikikomori Natsuki is attacked by a group of shady bandits. Helping him is a silver-haired half-elf named Emilia, whose goal is to become the next queen of their country, Lugunica. Discovering that her savior is on the trail of a young thief who has stolen an object from her, Subaru offers to give her a hand as a sign of gratitude by setting out to search for her as well.
Unfortunately it is the worst that takes over the two, and so the mission ends with their death. Despite this, Subaru suddenly awakens in the same place where he was summoned at the beginning: he soon realizes that he has received the power to come back to life every time he dies, rewinding time and regaining consciousness at an unspecified moment in the past without losing the memories of previous timelines.
Aware of the advantages and disadvantages of such a peculiarity, Subaru therefore embarks on a dangerous adventure to save and defend not only Emilia, but also other people with whom he will bond along the way.
3. Mirai Nikki
Original Release: October 10, 2011 – April 16, 2012
Number of Episodes: 26 (+ OVA)
The protagonist, Yukiteru Amano, is an asocial boy, closed in on himself and isolated who keeps a diary on his mobile phone in which he notes everything that happens around him. Yukiteru thinks he has an imaginary friend, named Deus Ex Machina, the time lord.
One day Deus decides to organize a game and returns his mobile phone to Yukiteru, after having personally modified it, but the boy soon realizes some oddities: the diary, instead of containing the information written by him, reports facts not yet happened, and after those facts are fulfilled, the boy realizes that the cell phone can predict the future.
4. The Severing Crime Edge
Original Release: April 4, 2013 – June 27, 2013
Number of Episodes: 13
The story revolves around Kiri Haimura, a boy who loves to style and cut girls’ hair. He meets Iwai Mushanokōji, a girl with flowing hair, known as “the queen of hair”, her hair is cursed and consequently that hair cannot be cut. But Kiri has some very special scissors – the Dansai Bunri no Crime Edge – that have the mystical ability to cut even the girl’s cursed hair. Thus Kiri will find himself defending Iwai from the descent of the vengeful and bloodthirsty “Killing Goods”.
5. Darwin’s Game
Original Release: January 3, 2020 – March 20, 2020
Number of Episodes: 11
Kaname Sudou is a 17 year old boy who lives a normal and ordinary life. One day, he receives a mysterious email from his friend Kyoda, in which he invites him to join a game: Darwin’s Game. Convinced it was a trivial game, Kaname decides to play. As soon as he starts his first battle against Banda-Kun, he realizes that this is not a normal game as he believed, but a deadly game.
After defeating his first opponent, he meets Shuka, a very strong player who immediately challenges him. After figuring out how to use the Seal and defeating Shuka, the two decide to team up. During the “Shibuya Treasure Hunt” event Kaname and Shuka will get to know Ryuuji, Rain, Sui and all together will join forces to complete the event and to stand up to One, the leader of the bloodiest clan in the whole D-Game.
6. Digimon Universe: App Monsters
Original Release: October 1, 2016 – September 30, 2017
Number of Episodes: 52
In the year 2045, technology has evolved to the point of ensuring excellent prosperity for the real world. The World Wide Web, on the other hand, has become the place of origin of the Appli Monsters, or simply Appmon, artificial and sentient creatures that arise from mobile applications. The series stars Haru Shinkai, a high school student.
One day while he is in his room, an Appmon appears from his smartphone and reveals his name is Gatchmon. The latter claims to have found himself on Earth to escape from an evil creature that was chasing him. Later the two learn that the supercomputer Leviathan has gone out of control and started creating computer viruses to make all the Appmon evil, so it is up to Haru and Gatchmon to restore the balance between the two worlds.
7. Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS
Original Release: May 10, 2017 – September 25, 2019
Number of Episodes: 120
The series takes place in Den City, a city where for about 10 years a large virtual reality platform, called LINK VRAINS, has been built, which allows duelists to separate their daily lives from those of the game, allowing them to take on the likeness of a virtual avatar.
High school student Yusaku Fujiki is a guy who doesn’t really like to stand out, but secretly he’s a very skilled hacker who, thanks to the support of another hacker who owns a van selling hot-dogs, Cal Kolter, defends LINK VRAINS from a terrorist group called the Knights of Hanoi, whose purpose is to take over an artificial intelligence named Ignis in order to track down a hidden world in the web, the Cyberse, and destroy it.
Fortunately, Yusaku, known within LINK VRAINS as Playmaker, manages to put a spoke in the wheels of the Hanoi and get his hands on the Ignis before them, thus starting to be hunted by both the Knights of Hanoi, who yearn to take over. absolutely of the program, and at the same time from SOL Technologies, the company that developed the LINK VRAINS, which wants to exploit it for its own purposes.
8. Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion
Original Release: October 6, 2006 – September 28, 2008
Number of Episodes: 50
On August 10, 2010, the Holy Empire of Britain declares war on Japan, which, conquered, loses all rights and is renamed “Area 11”. Lelouch promises his friend Suzaku that he will annihilate Britannia. Seven years later, in Tokyo, the young Briton Lelouch Lamperouge sees his childhood friend Suzaku Kururugi, who has obtained British citizenship and joined the army.
In a dramatic situation, in which the Japanese of the Shinjuku ghetto are exterminated by order of the British Prince Clovis, Lelouch, mistaken for a Japanese terrorist and about to be executed, receives a mysterious girl named C.C. the Geass the “Power of Kings”, which makes him capable of subduing the will of others, of controlling people with only eye contact. C.C. establishes a solid relationship of complicity with Lelouch, so much so that she seems to be her woman, and she, reciprocated in her feelings, she will remain by her side until the very end.
9. Re:CREATORS
Original Release: April 8, 2017 – September 16, 2017
Number of Episodes: 22
At the end of 2016, Sōta Mizushino is a young high school student fan of anime and dreaming of writing his own light novel. While watching the anime adaptation of mecha Vogelchevalier‘s light novel for inspiration, the touchscreen tablet he was watching the series on crashes and takes him into the world of the anime, where he witnesses a fight between the character from the anime, Celejia Upitiria, and a mysterious young girl wearing a military uniform.
After his tablet crashes again, Sōta returns to his world but ends up dragging Celejia with him. They soon discover that several other characters from different stories and forms of media have also been brought into the real world, some of them aligned with the girl in military uniform, who has promised them the means to end their conflicts. world and return home, ignoring his true intentions.
To stop him, Sōta and Celejia agree to find the other characters and bring them to their senses; so that the Princess in the military uniform will not cause any enormous destruction in the worlds that exist.
10. Yu☆Gi☆Oh! 5D’s
Original Release: April 2, 2008 – March 30, 2011
Number of Episodes: 154 + 1 special
In this series, in addition to the traditional duels with the Dueling Disk, some duelists compete on particular moto-dueling disks, called “D-Wheel” (“Duel Runner” in the American and Italian version) and these duelists take the name of “D-Wheeler” (“Turbo Duelists” in the American version, “Duelists Turbo” in the Italian one).
Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D’s is set in the future in New Domino Town. Seventeen years earlier, due to the malfunction of a reactor, called Ener-D inside the city, it caused a strong earthquake that divided the city into two parts: the Satellite, the dilapidated and poverty stricken part, and Neo Domino City, the richest and most urban part. The protagonist is Yusei Fudo, a boy from the Satellite.
He flees to the rich city to seek the freedom of his people and find Jack Atlas, the King of Turbo Duels, as well as his old friend who betrayed him by stealing his Duel Runner two years earlier and the Stardust Dragon card, which represented the only chance for Yusei and his friends to leave the Satellite.
11. Guilty Crown
Original Release: October 13, 2011 – March 22, 2012
Number of Episodes: 22
The story comes to life in the Tokyo of 2039, surrounded by a weakened Japan unable to provide for itself after the tragedy that exploded on Christmas Eve 2029, remembered by all as “Lost Christmas”. In fact, ten years have passed since the whole country was thrown into total panic by a rampant and unknown viral pandemic, called Virus Apocalypse.
An international organization known as GHQ steps in and restores order in Japan, which pays the price with its independence. After taking the reins of command under martial law, the company, with its own military army, takes advantage of the situation in the most varied ways, even going so far as to execute civilians on the spot after having classified them as infected.
Ouma Shu, a seventeen-year-old asocial student, becomes embroiled in a rebellion against GHQ after accidentally coming into contact with Yuzuriha Inori, the lead singer of an online music group called Egoist, of which the boy is a fan. Inori turns out to be a runaway member of the Undertaker, a terrorist group aiming for Japan’s independence.
Tsutsugami Gai is the leader and soul of the resistance, who, to demonstrate his lack of fear of the order established after the disaster, even goes so far as to publicly show his face to the nation during an official announcement of the existence of the opposition.
12. BTOOOM!
Original Release: October 4, 2012 – December 20, 2012
Number of Episodes: 12
Ryōta Sakamoto is an unemployed 22-year-old who lives with his mother. In everyday life the boy does not have any particular quality or characteristic for which he can remain impressed, he usually spend his days at home as he has no friends, but online he is one of the strongest fighters in the BTOOOM! video game one of the most famous video games in the world.
One day, Ryōta wakes up on what apparently looks like a tropical island, although he has no recollection of how he got there. Seeing someone in the distance he calls for help, but in response the stranger throws a bomb at him, without hitting him. Ryōta realizes that he has somehow ended up trapped in a real version of the BTOOOM! game.
For the first time the protagonist, after an entire existence lived between insecurities and isolation from reality, will find himself discovering and facing the difficulties of life, trying to survive on the island to win the game and save himself. Growing up and learning to suffer he will be able to evolve internally, becoming a brave boy, confident and ready to live his life.
13. Ga-Rei: Zero
Original Release: October 5, 2008 – December 21, 2008
Number of Episodes: 12
Kensuke Nimura is a high school student able to see spirits since childhood. This ability is usually more of a problem than anything else, especially when it comes to finding a girlfriend. Everything will change when he meets Kagura Tsuchimiya while being pursued by evil spirits. They accidentally kiss, and manage to destroy an energy source that attracts evil spirits.
A few days later, Kagura is transferred to Kensuke’s classroom, much to her surprise. Kagura is part of a government agency that defends the people against the youkai, supernatural enemies. Kensuke’s skill and attraction to Kagura forces him to follow her to the agency, where he is recruited to fight the Spirits.
14. [C] – The Money of Soul and Possibility Control
Original Release: April 15, 2011 – June 24, 2011
Number of Episodes: 11
Kimimaro is a two-job scholarship student whose only dream is to live a stable life. One evening, on his way home from work, a strange character appears and offers him to win large sums of money on the sole condition that he pays back.
Thus, Kimimaro, somewhat reluctant, will find himself drawn into a strange world, known as the financial district and will have to fight alongside Mashu, his Asset (magical beings helping entrepreneurs during their clashes called Deal). , so as not to go bankrupt.
15. Claymore
Original Release: April 4, 2007 – September 26, 2007
Number of Episodes: 26
The Claymores are half-human, half-demon warriors that villagers call upon to protect themselves from monsters such as demons. Feared and dreaded, they can be distinguished by their silvery eyes and the gigantic sword they carry on their backs, hence their names by humans as “silver-eyed witches” or “Claymore” (the name of the type of sword they use).
Claire is one of them. Called to a village to eliminate the demons who attack and devour the population, she kills the penultimate member, turned monster, of an already decimated family. The last survivor, Raki, finding himself alone, decides to follow her in her bloodthirsty adventures, as a cook. He will gradually discover the secrets and the tragic fate of these singular women.