'DOTA: Dragon's Blood' Teaser: New Anime Based On The Popular Video Game Franchise Is Coming To Netflix

Netflix has been trying to corner the anime market for years, and its latest attempt has all the potential to be the streamer's next hit. First, it comes from the studio that animated The Legend of Korra and Netflix's own Voltron: Legendary Defender, and second, it's based on a popular video game franchise that is ripe for an anime adaptation. Netflix revealed the upcoming release of DOTA: Dragon's Blood, based on Valve's Defense of the Ancients video game franchise, in a short teaser revealing a March premiere date. See the DOTA: Dragon's Blood teaser below.

Netflix announced that it will be giving the anime treatment to the popular DOTA 2 video game franchise with DOTA: Dragon's Blood, an all-new anime series that will launch globally on March 25, 2021. Per Netflix's press release, the 8-episode anime series "tells the story of Davion, a renowned Dragon Knight devoted to wiping the scourge from the face of the world. Following encounters with a powerful, ancient eldwurm as well as the noble Princess Mirana on a secret mission of her own, Davion becomes embroiled in events much larger than he could have ever imagined."

The first teaser, seen above, doesn't give us much more info — simply showing Davion arriving to introduce himself as the Dragon Knight — but it does give us a glimpse of the stunning animation by Studio MIR, the studio behind The Legend of Korra and Netflix's Voltron: Legendary Defender. But apart from the anime art style, you can only loosely define DOTA: Dragon's Blood as an anime — like many of Netflix's other releases under that medium, it comes from a largely Western production team, with Ashley Edward Miller (X-Men: First Class, Thor, Black Sails) serving as series showrunner and executive producer.

"Fans will love how we've imagined the DOTA 2 universe and woven together an epic, emotional, and adult-oriented story about some of their favorite characters," Miller said in a statement accompanying the teaser release. "The cinematic animation, acting and music are simply next level and I'm grateful to Valve for supporting our creative ambitions."

Valve's Defense of the Ancients was released in 2003 as a World of Warcraft mod that would inspire the  for the MOBA (multiplayer online battle arena) genre, eventually launching as its own independent franchise with DOTA 2, a sequel released in 2013. DOTA 2 was met with near-universal acclaim from critics, and has been cited as one of the greatest video games of all time.

Ryu Ki Hyun also serves as co-executive producer for DOTA: Dragon's Blood. There's no word yet for a voice cast for the upcoming series.