Today's pick in the Daily Anime Pick-Series where I pick one anime each day that I think is worth watching is Fate!

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For the 22th Anime Pick I've chosen the well known Fate-Series. We are going to have a look at all the different Fate parts and have a discussion about the watch order as well as what the parts are all about. The get on the same page I'll explain what is meant by the term route in this article. In a visual novel where the player can make choices that affect the outcome of the story a particular series of choices will show a storyline that is considered to be a route. So basically a route is a possibility of how the story could develop. The Fate franchise started out with a visual novel in January 2004 and anime adaptions followed which would each cover a particular route of the game. But there are also light novels and mangas which were made into anime adaptions so keep that in mind. If you're interested in the visual / light novels / manga then go ahead but this article focuses on the anime adaptions.

Before we have a look at all the different animes of the Fate-Series I'll just quickly explain what all the Fate part have in common. In the Fate universe there are Holy Grail Wars being held. In a Holy Grail War a number of participants summon each a Servant of a set of different classes. A Servant is a being whose identity originates from stories of our world. An example would be Arthur Pendragon of the Saber class. As the name suggests a Servant serves a Master which is a mage that participates in a Holy Grail War. The goal for every Master/Servant pair is to take out all the other servants and get one wish granted. Although this is usually what you will see in an Fate anime but there are exceptions we'll cover afterwards.

• The first anime to be released was Fate/stay night in January 2006. It adapts the Fate route with some elements of the Unlimited Blade Works and Heaven's Feel route. A lot of people didn't like how the story incorporated parts of other routes and how this let to an ending which feels kind of forced. Kind of like too much story within too few episodes. Since it has 24 episodes you can guess what the whole Fate-Series has to offer. Since this is the first part of the series so I suggest to give it a go but if you don't like it have a look at the watch order list below.
• In October 2011 Fate/Zero was released which is an adaption of the eponymous light novel. In contrast to Fate/stay night the protagonists are not in high school. This anime convinces with everything it has to offer. This one is one of my all-time favorites. There is a second season of this anime called Fate/Zero 2nd Season where the plot continues seamlessly.
• In December 2014 Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works was released. Since I explained the concept of routes you can probably guess what this anime is an adaption of. It adapts the Unlimited Blade Works route of the Fate/stay night visual novel. This anime is also split in two different seasons the later one being Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works 2nd Season.
• The next one is Fate/Apocrypha which finished airing only recently since it was released in July 2017. This is an adaption of the eponymous light novel.
• In October 2017 the first part of a 3-part movie called Fate/stay night Heaven's Feel: I. Presage flower was released which is adapting the Heaven's Feel route.

That concludes all anime released so far that focus on one Holy Grail War each.
Next we have a spin off series which features Illya as the protagonist. She appears in the other animes above as well but just so that you know how see looks heres a picture.

So we'll quickly cover the parts of this series.

• In July 2013 Fate/kaleid liner PRISMA☆ILLYA was released which adapts the eponymous manga. It is a sort-of magical girl anime. There is no Holy Grail War ongoing in this series but it will be discussed. Instead there are class cards which enables one to transform in that particular class.
• In July 2014 Fate/kaleid liner PRISMA☆ILLYA 2wei! was released which is a continuation of the series recognizable by the 2wei which refers to the german word zwei which means two.
• In July 2015 Fate/kaleid liner PRISMA☆ILLYA 2wei! Herz was released which adapts the rest of the 2wei manga.
• In July 2016 Fate/kaleid liner PRISMA☆ILLYA 3rei!! was released which adapts the third manga part of this series again the 3rei or drei in german means three.
• A movie which adapts a part of the 3rei manga was released in August 2017 and is called Fate/kaleid liner PRISMA☆ILLYA Oath of Snow.

That concludes the the kaleid liner series so far.

Before I'll list some some more of the smaller parts of the Fate franchise I'll be mentioning Fate/Extra Last Encore which started this season.

So here are the remaining parts Carnival Phantasm in August 2011, Fate/Prototype in December 2011, Fate/Grand Order -First Order- in December 2016, Fate/Grand Order x Himuro's Universe in December 2017, Fate/Grand Order -Moonlight/Lostroom- in December 2017 and Emiya-san Chi no Kyou no Gohan in February 2018.

Watch order

I recommend watching in release order and that would be:

• Fate/stay night
• Fate/Zero
• Fate/Zero 2nd Season
• Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works
• Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works 2nd Season
• Fate/Apocrypha
• Fate/stay night: Heaven's Feel (3-part movie)

But in case you'd like to skip Fate/stay night I would watch Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works and Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works 2nd Season first to the get an introduction to the series and then continue with Fate/Zero.

To watch the Fate/kaleid liner series I recommend to watch at least one part of the above to get an introduction first.
It's up to you when you watch the other spin-offs but one introduction part would be helpful.

Since the adaptions were made by different studios the art style differs so I'll include a few examples below.

Fate/stay night:
Fate/Zero:
Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works:
Fate/Apocrypha:
Fate/stay night: Heaven's Feel:

Since there are so many parts with very different core stories I'll leave it up to you to look up the description of parts that intrigue you.
Same goes for the studios and genres.

Have fun watching!

In the Daily Anime Pick-Series I present to you one anime each day that I think is worth watching so if you want more of this you know what to do.