In anime and manga there’s a term called “The Big 3,” which was used predominantly in the mid-2000s and early 2010s to describe the three most popular mainstream series on a worldwide scale: One Piece, Naruto, and Bleach. Now, I loved each of the Big 3, and in fact, One Piece in particular is one of my personal favorite animes of all time, but I think it’s pretty fair to say that all three of them are deeply flawed on a fundamental level because of how long-running action anime were made to be at that time.

But as Bob Dylan would say, the times they are a-changin’, and there’s a new wave of modern shonen anime that are paving the way for the next generation. That said, it's important to pause for a second and really take a look at how anime like the Big 3 were made, and how shows like Attack on Titan, My Hero Academia, Demon Slayer, and Jujutsu Kaisen are doing things differently in ways that are raising the bar for shonen anime.

Anime is in an interesting spot right now compared to where it used to be. The ways in which people are watching anime are changing. It’s more popular than ever thanks to popular streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, and Prime Video offering a legal, guilt free outlet for anime fans, in addition to services like Crunchyroll and Funimation offering on-demand access for shows currently airing in Japan. This change in the way people watch anime has kind of opened the doors for a change in how certain anime are produced as well.

You see, anime like the Big 3, along with a couple of other very long-running shows, were unique in the world of serialized entertainment in that they practically never took a break. Sure, they might have taken a temporary hiatus on rare occasions due to a variety of reasons. But if we look at One Piece as an example, this show has been putting out an episode every week since 1999, which is why it currently has 990 episodes.

This frequency of episodes presents a big problem for a show that’s based on a manga series that is also still in-progress: What do you do when the show inevitably catches up to the source material? You either have to create a completely separate continuity, like what Game of Thrones or the original Fullmetal Alchemist anime had to do when they ran into this problem, or you just have to cut the series short.

Neither of these outcomes are ideal, so generally what happens is that anime studios will do their best to try and slow down the progress of the anime. This is achieved primarily in two ways: filler and padding.

A filler arc is an anime original arc that is designed to tell a story that can exist in its own little bubble, not affecting anything outside of it and thereby not getting in the way of the actual canonical story. Filler arcs aren’t automatically terrible, and there actually are some examples of fun filler arcs or episodes that either offer up some truly funny moments or shine a light on characters that don’t get much of a spotlight in the canonical story. But for the most part, they’re generally pretty boring and feel utterly inconsequential by their very nature.

Filler can be a huge bummer when you’re following a weekly on-going show and have to wait sometimes upwards of 20 weeks before the story gets back on track. But at least for shows that are already complete, you can pretty easily find out which episodes are skippable and just ignore them if you want to. Padding however, is harder to ignore.

Padding is when an anime episode adds in fluff to pad out the episode run time, slowing down progress with excessive recaps, flashbacks to scenes that just happened not even two episodes ago, re-using animations to make fights last longer, or just doing anything to stretch sequences of events longer than they need to be.

Oftentimes, filler will be used as padding! To use an example from Naruto Shippuden, there’s a part in the manga where a character named Suigetsu collects a sword from a grave. This takes just a few pages. But in the anime, the sword gets stolen, and the whole episode becomes about Suigetsu trying to get the sword from the people who took it, leading the anime to cover literally a fraction of a single chapter with an entire episode.

The often plodding pacing has not been the only issue either, as the Big 3 and other shonen anime were also rife with inconsistent animation and art. For an example of that, one doesn’t have to look much further than Dragon Ball Super.

One Piece is still going strong, Bleach’s anime ended abruptly in 2012, and Naruto ended in 2017, giving way to its spin-off series Boruto, but since then, no three series have really cemented themselves as a new “Big 3.” Despite that though, the landscape of shonen anime is stronger than ever thanks to a shift in how they’re made.

And really, it’s not even a radical change. The big thing that’s different in shows like My Hero Academia, Attack on Titan, Demon Slayer, and Jujutsu Kaisen is that their studios are willing to take a break. My Hero Academia began in 2016 and its first season was just 13 episodes. Its second season came a year later and was 25 episodes. It has continued like this ever since, and now it’s on its fifth season, with 110 episodes and consistently excellent animation and art. And practically the only filler episodes are meant to catch viewers up on events of prior seasons after a long break.

The same is true for Attack on Titan, which actually took a five-year break after its first season before coming back for Season 2 to ensure that it didn’t catch up with its manga. The result is one of the most faithful adaptations of a beloved shonen manga series. Filler just isn’t a problem when the anime is allowed to take some time off and give the manga some time to get ahead.

Of course, being willing to take a break isn’t the only advantage that these newer series have. They also are being produced by studios that have built their reputations on the sheer quality and consistency of their art and animation. Demon Slayer is done by Ufotable, the same studio that worked on the absolutely gorgeous Kara no Kyokai OVAs, in addition to both Fate/Zero and Fate/Stay Night: Unlimited Blade Works; Jujutsu Kaisen, the most recent shonen anime sensation, is made by MAPPA, a studio with a resume that’s just a laundry list of some of the most impressively animated shows of the last decade, from Yuri on Ice to Sarazanmai to the final season of the aforementioned Attack on Titan; and My Hero Academia is done by BONES, which is a legendary anime studio most renowned for its work on Fullmetal Alchemist and Mob Psycho 100.

There’s definitely something nice about always having a One Piece episode to watch every Saturday night, and truth be told, the series has definitely stepped up its animation quality in the most recent arc. But both it and Boruto still feel like relics of the past that could be much better than they currently are if they took some cues from the new wave of shonen anime that is making the genre’s future look brighter than ever before.

Mitchell Saltzman is an editorial producer at IGN. You can find him on twitter @JurassicRabbit

Amazon UK's store page briefly showed off a number of Alan Wake Remastered screenshots today (September 9) alongside its listing for the game.

As spotted by Wario64 and reported by wccftech, an Amazon UK listing briefly showed off screenshots for the upcoming remaster of Alan Wake as well as a price for the game (£24.99) and its box art. Despite the page recently being taken down, IGN was able to access the listing and verify that the screenshots were shown across the store page for a period of time.

As displayed in a comparative tweet by @BenjiSales, the screenshots across the site showed off some impressive graphical improvements to the title, which originally launched for Xbox 360 in 2010.

Alan Wake Original vs Remastered comparison screenshots

Definitely looks like a nice solid upgrade. Can't freaking wait to play this pic.twitter.com/fax58J0Y6I

— Benji-Sales (@BenjiSales) September 9, 2021

Further screenshots of the title were put together by Wario64 on Twitter and appear to show improvements to a range of the game's features including deeper color tones, fuller foliage and environment textures, more realistic players models, and improvements to the game's tone and lighting. Screenshots of the title's upcoming box art for PlayStation 5 were also captured.

Alan Wake Remastered's Alan Wake vs original Alan Wake

+ box art package pic.twitter.com/oqX5ZRzzrI

— Wario64 (@Wario64) September 9, 2021

With the Amazon UK page quickly being taken down, it is fair to say that the screenshots almost certainly shouldn't have been shared in the first place. If that is to be the case, then this wouldn't be the first leak to affect the game in recent weeks. Remedy and Epic's reveal of the cult classic's remaster officially became public knowledge on September 7. However, only a week prior, a leak spotted through a Taiwanese store listing provided speculation that the title would be launching in October. While the official reveal did not include a release date, the previously leaked store listing suggested that the game would come out on October 5.

For more on Alan Wake, make sure to check out our review of the original game where we gave the title a 9/10 and said that it did a "great job of mixing elements of written work, television, and video games to create an experience full of scares, laughs, and thrills that's just as fun to play as it is to watch."

Jared Moore is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

Microsoft has announced that Football Manager 2022 and Football Manager 2022 Xbox Edition will be available on Xbox Game Pass when the title launches on November 9.

In an article on the official Xbox website, Microsoft said that Xbox Game Pass Ultimate members will be able to enjoy access to both games and fully immerse themselves in the world of football management when the titles release later this year. You can view the brand new announcement trailer for Football Manager 2022 in a tweet shared by the game's official Twitter account below:

Success means more when you earn it.

Overcome the odds in #FM22 – Out from Nov 9th

📲 https://t.co/Xl574NFZkX pic.twitter.com/iChfOPqMGa

— Football Manager (@FootballManager) September 9, 2021

According to the announcement, this year's Xbox Edition of Football Manager's popular menu micromanagement series will feature Xbox Play Anywhere technology, which enables players to transfer their progress between console and PC via the Xbox profile, allowing fans to swap between the two versions of the game depending on their current circumstances. Microsoft has also said that the Xbox Edition of FM22 "takes full advantage of the Xbox controller to make navigating from the tactics board to the touchline a breeze."

FM22 will once again allow fans to jump back into the shoes of a football manager where they'll be able to control everything from the data analysis used to power their recruitment strategy to the matchday tactics and touchline substitutions made on game day. In a similar way to its predecessors, the game will once again allow players to select clubs from over 100 playable leagues at launch. Fans of the series who aren't subscribed to Xbox Game Pass will still be able to purchase and play Football Manager 2022 through other online platforms such as Steam upon release.

#FM22 🤝 From Nov 9th

💻 PC/Mac
📱 Mobile
🎮 Xbox Edition
☑️ Xbox Game Pass
🕹️ Switch™ coming soon https://t.co/LFalEDEOvN

— Football Manager (@FootballManager) September 9, 2021

In other FM22 news, Sports Interactive, the developers behind the series, announced earlier this year that they have begun a "multi-year" project to add women's football into future editions of the game. While details surrounding the addition of women's football into the Football Manager series are currently few and far between, it is understood that the women's game will be added into the main game, as opposed to as a standalone title.

Jared Moore is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

It sounds like time might not have run out on the 24 franchise yet, as talks are currently underway at Fox about the popular action-crime drama making a return.

According to a report by Deadline, there are "active creative discussions" happening at Fox over the show's "potential" to come back to our screens with a new take. Speaking to the outlet, Fox Entertainment President Michael Thorn confirmed that there is "still a possibility" 24 could be brought back in some form.

Thorn didn't clarify his comments to reveal any explicit details of the conversations going on at Fox, other than confirming that they're happening. "There's still some discussions with the producers on a take that we have yet to hear," he said of the show's possible return to the network. "There [are] some active creative discussions that are happening."

The show's executive producer Howard Gordon also recently told Deadline that a new version of the show had been "percolating," though he was careful not to reveal any details about what a return might look like, as he cautioned that they wouldn't be able to make anything official until all of the pieces had come together.

This isn't the first time that we've heard murmurs of a 24 revival though. Back in 2018, it was reported that Fox had been planning some offshoots from the flagship series, including a 24 prequel series starring a young Jack Bauer, with creators Joel Surnow and Bob Cochran returning alongside showrunner Howard Gordon.

Fox announced they had scrapped the spinoff series in 2020 and appeared to call a time out on conversations of a comeback as news about a 24 revival petered out. However, Thorn told Deadline that Fox is keen to celebrate the network's iconic shows and revisit them with "surprising takes and new approaches."

The original Kiefer Sutherland-fronted series ran for eight seasons before being followed up by 24: Live Another Day and then 24: Legacy, starring Corey Hawkins, Jimmy Smitts, and Miranda Otto. Fox cancelled the latter series after just one season, though the network expressed its hope in continuing the franchise with a "new version" that featured a fresh cast.

Adele Ankers is a freelance writer for IGN. Follow her on Twitter.

The Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 3 launched alongside the Galaxy Z Fold 3 to show just how much the Korean smartphone maker’s prowess in foldable technology has come along. Where the larger phone fumbled with a design that didn’t always make practical sense, the Galaxy Z Flip 3 presents a more familiar form – whether you started using a cell phone in 2001 or 2021. And at $1,000, the Galaxy Z Flip 3 makes the series more approachable than ever. Let’s see how this smartphone-turned-flip-phone plays out.

Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 3 – Design and Features

You’ll find two different forms for the Galaxy Z Flip 3. In the way it’ll primarily be used, it feels quite like the Galaxy S21. It’s a tall hunk of phone with a big display, narrow bezels, a solid frame, and a glass rear. The main display itself is actually surprisingly rigid with the crease of the fold providing the only hint that the display isn’t the same sort of glass found on other phones.

The phone is on the tall side. It packs a 6.7-inch, 2640 x 1080 display for a 22:9 aspect ratio. This provides a lot of space for content, whether that’s a movie, a lengthy Twitter feed, or a game. The display is also nearly on par with some of the best smartphone displays, providing a high enough peak brightness for outdoor use as well as an adaptive refresh rate that tops out at a smooth 120Hz. While the crease on the display can be distracting in certain conditions – in very bright environments or with dark on-screen content – it actually all but disappears in many cases, becoming as easy to overlook as notches and punchhole cameras have become in recent years.

When that big display isn’t in use, the phone can fold in half. The hinge is firm, holding in place at almost any angle, though it snaps closed lightly in the last few degrees. Those fond of the old days of folding phones may be a bit disappointed, as the Galaxy Z Flip 3 doesn’t whip open and clap closed quite like they used to. It has a satisfying but subdued snap closing, but the tight grip of the hinge prevents the classic thumb-flip to unfold. I found I generally had to unfold the phone with two hands or crack it open with my thumb and then press against my torso or hip to unfold it the rest of the way. It’s possible to swing it mostly open with momentum, but I’d highly recommend getting a case first.

When closed, the phone actually remains quite useful. There’s a small, 1.9-inch external display (bigger than that found on the Z Flip 2, but much smaller than that on the Motorola Razr 5G) that is effectively a stand-in for the status bar and notification shade. It can show notifications from apps, conveniently letting me check to see if a text came in and needs a response. It also offers shortcuts to a small number of extra widgets from weather and timers to Samsung Pay and music playback controls. Chiefly, the external display can also serve as a viewfinder for the main cameras, making selfie photos and video incredibly easy to capture with those higher-quality cameras. The display is also a Super AMOLED type, so it hides itself superbly when not in use.

Like the Galaxy Z Fold 3 this year, the Z Flip 3 offers a side-mounted fingerprint scanner that works quickly. It’s handy for unlocking the small external display to check notifications, though it’s a bit high up on the frame to reach when unlocking the phone in its unfolded position.

One big addition this year is IPX8 water resistance, which makes this premium product far more practical to take with you in everyday life. It’s enough protection to handle a splash into water, and it can shrug off rain. Dust and dirt are more of a threat though, so steer clear of the beach and bakery kitchens.

Altogether the design is quite elegant. The hinge is still a bit boring to look at, but the multi-tone color scheme comes together nicely. Motorola may have an edge for iconic design and a cooler hinge, but Samsung gets out far ahead of Motorola in this race for many other reasons. Samsung may have the most pocket-friendly smartphone on the market with the Z Flip 3 as its tight dimensions are neck and neck with the Motorola Razr 5G’s. The Flip is just a tad thicker, but also shorter and narrower, and it does that all while packing in more battery (3,300mAh), a wireless charging coil, a much bigger internal display, and more cameras. The biggest fault in the design is that, from opening the phone to reaching for the fingerprint scanner and volume buttons to even navigating the UI, this tall device often requires two hands or a bit of shifting my hand around – it’s no one-handed device.

Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 3 – Software

The Galaxy Z Flip 3 comes running Android 11 with a special version of Samsung’s One UI 3 with special features for the foldable series. Primarily, that means a new taskbar that tucks away on the right side of the screen and provides a quick shortcut for opening apps in a split-screen view. It can be a little confusing to use, particularly because there seems to be no way to get apps that aren’t in the taskbar to enter the splitscreen, even though you can go to Recent Apps and make an app display as a floating pop-up window. A full-screen app can shrink down to a half-screen if a second app is dragged from the taskbar, but it’s a little bit of a clunky workaround.

The extra tall display on the Z Flip 3 actually makes multitasking somewhat attractive, as it’s easy to squeeze a video into a small window at the top of the display and then browse the web or chat on a larger window at the bottom.

The external display could benefit from some more third-party widgets. Having access to things like NFC payments and calendar entries is useful, but not if you don’t use Samsung’s calendar or Samsung Pay.

Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 3 – Gaming and Performance

Let’s not get confused, the Galaxy Z Flip 3 making a big splash with its design doesn’t mean Samsung would neglect to put some muscle under the hood. This phone comes with the same Snapdragon 888 chipset powering the fastest Android smartphones of 2021, and it holds up extremely well in my testing.

Whether the Galaxy Z Flip 3 is launching a pair of apps, running a video in one while I scroll twitter in the other, pulling up the camera, or gaming, it offers responsive performance and a smooth experience. Its 8GB of memory is a bit less than the Galaxy Z Fold 3’s, but it doesn’t need to be ready to run three apps at the same time. Even if Asphalt 9 wasn’t ready to go in memory after an hour of using a ton of other apps, the storage was fast enough to relaunch the game in a few seconds.

The phone holds up in gaming as well. The big screen makes for a great viewing experience, especially considering it’s a quality Samsung AMOLED display. Asphalt 9 runs as smooth as ever, and my thumbs can stay out of the way at the sides, covering up less of the action.

The phone predictably gets warm while in use for more demanding tasks. The camera running, heavy multitasking, and gaming all will see the back glass and frame heat up. It’s not scorching, but it won’t make for the most comfortable gaming experience. The stereo speakers actually pump out some decently loud and clean sound, too, though the earpiece speaker doesn’t contribute nearly as much to the mix as the bottom speaker.

With a 3,300mAh battery, the Galaxy Z Flip 3 isn’t equipped for the same level of daily use as Samsung’s other flagships. That said, I didn’t struggle to get it through a full day of use. A ton of gaming, photography, or video playback on a max-brightness display will hobble the battery, but lighter use should see it to the end of the day with a small margin to spare. The phone is certainly aided by the external display. I’ll often check notifications on that smaller display, which helps conserve battery considerably throughout the day since the large main display doesn’t have to light up everytime I want to see a text or email.

Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 3 – Camera

Right after the battery, the cameras are the biggest corner cut in making Galaxy Z Flip 3. I will say, what the cameras offer is good, but it’s more on par with a $700-800 phone than a $1000 one. That said, selfie-takers are in for a treat.

The Galaxy Z Flip 3 has the following camera setup:

• 12MP wide at f/1.8 with OIS and 1.4-micron pixels
• 12MP 123-degree ultra-wide at f/2.2 with 1.12-micron pixels
• 10MP selfie at f/2.4 with 1.22-micron pixels

Samsung has the main wide camera game on lock. The 12MP sensor provides enough sharpness to capture fine details while it’s color and high dynamic range do justice to photos in even tricky lighting. It’s shooting pretty much on the same level as the Galaxy S21. It does continue to be a bit officious when it comes to shooting in Night Mode, though, trying to use the longer exposure when it may not be necessary to capture a decent shot.

The ultra-wide camera offers quality that’s just a grade below the wide-sensor, which is pretty standard for most of the flagship phones I’ve tested. It doesn’t diverge on how it handles color, but just tends to get a bit noisy when it gets darker before the wide camera does. The distortion from the ultra-wide is minor, but does leave photos feeling just a bit overly dramatic.

Unfortunately, zooming is pretty much out of the question. There’s no optical zoom sensor, and the results from digital zoom even at 2x are a bit lacking.

The phone really shines for selfies, which fits the showy nature of the device. The 10MP internal selfie camera is a competent shooter, capturing crisp and vibrant enough photos for most uses. But, thanks to the external display’s ability to serve as a viewfinder, the two rear cameras are easy to use for selfies. This makes for selfies with excellent clarity and the option of a wide FOV or the shallower depth of field available from the f/1.8 lens. The downside of shooting this way is that Samsung appears to have it locked down to a square aspect ratio for both photo and video with no clear settings to prevent this cropping. It’s more than a little puzzling given the viewfinder has a wide aspect ratio, and it means what you see in the viewfinder is cropped in from what the phone will actually capture, which is itself cropped in from what the sensor sees. It would be great if Samsung provided more flexibility here, but the resulting photos still look great regardless.