Aniimo “Paws Up” Second Closed Beta Preview: New Creatures, Regions, Systems, And How It Stacks Up To Pokémon And Palworld

Aniimo’s creature collecting adventure is about to get a lot bigger. Pawprint Studio and Kingsglory are kicking off the global “Paws Up” second closed beta on January 23, 2026, opening the doors to a new batch of Aniimo, fresh regions in the world of Idyll, and a more fully featured spin on its social and base-building systems.

This preview guide breaks down what is new in the second beta, how the game’s core loop compares to Pokémon and Palworld, and what progress you can expect to carry forward to later tests or full launch.

What is Aniimo?

Aniimo is a free-to-play, open world creature-collecting RPG for Xbox Series X|S, PC, and mobile. You play as a Pathfinder exploring the whimsical world of Idyll, tracking down Aniimo, befriending them, and using their unique traits to solve puzzles, battle bosses, and shape the environment.

Structurally it sits somewhere between classic Pokémon and Palworld. Like Pokémon, the focus is on bonding with individual creatures and learning their movesets and habitats. Like Palworld, Aniimo leans on a shared world with co-op, large scale activities, and a strong emphasis on using your creatures to power facilities, mini farms, and social spaces.

New Aniimo And Bosses In The Second Closed Beta

The “Paws Up” test is the first time Aniimo really flexes its roster. Pawprint Studio is dropping dozens of new creatures and new evolutions for returning favorites, and the beta’s focus is as much on ecology as it is on combat.

Headline newcomers include Fentuft and Nimbi, two Aniimo whose moods visibly influence the world around them. Where a Pokémon game might keep weather and field effects mostly battle bound, Aniimo is experimenting with creatures whose emotional states bleed into the overworld. Clouds, lighting, and ambient effects shift as you travel with them, so the team will be watching how readable and satisfying those changes feel in day to day exploration.

Eko is another standout, a sound driven Aniimo created directly in response to community feedback from earlier testing. Eko leans into positional audio and detection based mechanics, highlighting hidden objects or secrets based on audio cues. In design terms it fills the niche of a utility partner in your party rather than a raw damage dealer, closer to how Pokémon uses field skills like Surf or Cut, but integrated more seamlessly into exploration.

On the high end of the roster, the second beta introduces new Boss Aniimo, including flashy iridescent variants, and the first Legendary Aniimo, Irelia. Rather than saving a legendary for late game post credits content, Pawprint is using the beta to test how a full legendary story arc feels across an accelerated slice of progression. Expect multi phase encounters and story beats that weave Irelia into the broader lore of Idyll instead of treating it as a one off raid.

This creature slate is important for the developers because it lets them test three different things at once: how players naturally build teams when utility Aniimo like Eko are available; how emotionally reactive Aniimo like Fentuft and Nimbi read in minute to minute play; and whether boss and legendary pacing feels fair in a free to play structure.

New Regions: Driftwise Meadow, Sandcastle Hill, And Rosetower Wood

Idyll itself is getting significantly larger during this test. The beta adds several new regions with more deliberate interlocking behaviors between native Aniimo.

Driftwise Meadow is pitched as an emotion driven space where mood shifting Aniimo are common. The region doubles down on the game’s reactive environment idea, with calmer routes, stormy patches, and hidden paths that open up depending on which Aniimo accompany you and what state they are in. It is the closest Aniimo comes to turning your party composition into a puzzle key for the overworld.

Sandcastle Hill is a fiery, more hazardous zone, home to heat leaning Aniimo and tougher encounters. Where Pokémon might section off its lava routes until you get a specific HM, Aniimo instead uses these zones to test how far your current roster and gear can push into risky territory, more akin to a soft gate that rewards experimentation and co-op.

Rosetower Wood is the lush forest region, designed to show off the latest visual upgrades. Dense foliage, layered lighting, and more animated NPCs and creatures make it a showcase for the team’s environment art passes. It also has new native Aniimo that tie into gathering and harvesting, which matters for the beta’s expanded Homeland system.

Meanwhile, previously available areas from the first closed beta are seeing expansions and new native Aniimo spawns. This helps test whether players naturally loop back through older regions when new collection opportunities appear, or if progression incentives need to be more explicit.

Homeland: Your Customizable Aniimo Powered Hub

One of the most important features being tested in the second closed beta is Homeland, Aniimo’s customizable home base. Accessible from the RV Campsite hub, Homeland is where your collection, progression, and social tools all collide.

At its core, Homeland is a player owned space that you decorate with attractions and facilities, then power using your Aniimo. Instead of passively storing creatures in a box like Pokémon or locking them into rigid work assignments like some Palworld bases, Aniimo presents Homeland as a playful fairground. You can set up mini farms and harvesting plots where Aniimo help grow resources, build whimsical structures for them to interact with, and gradually turn your homestead into both a functional resource engine and a personal diorama.

For Pawprint, this system is a litmus test for how much players enjoy using their extra Aniimo outside of battle. Pokémon has spent decades answering the question of what you do with hundreds of boxed monsters through features like Pokémon Camp and the Ranch. Palworld goes in the other direction and leans into automation and factory style production. Aniimo’s Homeland tries to land in a middle ground where those supporting creatures feel like active participants in a cozy space rather than either idle storage or pure labor.

Feedback here is critical during the Paws Up test. The developers will be looking at how often players visit their Homeland versus just pushing main story, which kinds of facilities see the most use, and whether cosmetic customization carries enough weight to justify long term investment.

Operation: Egg Heist On The Lost Isles

To complement Homeland’s chill pacing, the second closed beta also introduces a large scale multiplayer activity in the form of Operation: Egg Heist, set on the Lost Isles.

Teams of three Pathfinders set out across segmented zones and maze like dungeons in search of treasure and rare Aniimo Eggs. While the bulk of the gameplay is cooperative PvE, every team on the server is competing for control of a special Aniimo Egg. The mode borrows a little from battle royale pacing and MMO public events, asking you to weigh how aggressively you chase other teams versus how safely you secure your haul.

This is where Aniimo steps more firmly into Palworld territory. Instead of just battling AI trainers like in Pokémon, your squad of Aniimo becomes a flexible toolkit for dealing with shifting objectives, enemy teams, and dungeon mechanics in a shared space. It is a stress test for the servers and for the combat readability when multiple parties are throwing out flashy abilities at once.

The developers have also layered in traversal and puzzle hooks, so utility Aniimo like Eko or region specific companions from Driftwise Meadow can shine. Expect the team to pay attention to which Aniimo spike in usage statistics during Egg Heist, since those will signal whether the roster design supports distinct multiplayer roles.

Social Tools In The Second Beta

To support both Homeland and Operation: Egg Heist, the second closed beta significantly expands Aniimo’s social feature set.

The Horn lets you broadcast a call for help to nearby players, turning overworld encounters or tricky puzzles into quick co-op opportunities. The Flute allows you to invite players to your location, useful for showing off a rare Aniimo spawn or guiding friends to your Homeland. The Come to Me command is a direct summon for allies, streamlining the process of grouping up for Lost Isles runs or community events.

Beyond that, the Follow system lets you travel side by side with friends, while the Gift system allows you to trade or gift Aniimo directly. It is a softer take on trading compared to Pokémon’s more transactional system, and in the beta phase it doubles as an economic testbed. The team can study which Aniimo become de facto social currency and whether gifting meaningfully affects how rare creatures circulate through the playerbase.

Taken together, these tools nudge Aniimo toward a more modern, friction light multiplayer structure. Instead of lobby centric grouping, most interactions can happen organically in the world or directly from your social list.

How Aniimo’s Collecting Loop Compares To Pokémon And Palworld

Aniimo’s second closed beta is also a clearer look at where the game fits within the broader monster collecting landscape.

Against Pokémon, Aniimo is more open and social from the outset. There is still a focus on catching, raising, and evolving creatures, but progression is framed around building a web of relationships with Aniimo, other Pathfinders, and your Homeland. Where Pokémon’s main loop is built around gym badges and regional Pokédex completion, Aniimo leans on exploring interdependent ecosystems, unlocking story arcs like Irelia’s, and expanding your Aniimo powered home.

Combat appears closer to action RPG territory than strictly turn based battles, which changes how team composition works. Utility Aniimo that affect sound, lighting, or traversal matter in real time, so the devs can fold environmental problem solving into the minute to minute loop, not just scripted field move checks.

Compared to Palworld, Aniimo is gentler and more whimsical. Both games share a focus on using creatures to power structures and co-op activities, but Palworld skews toward survival crafting and industrial scale automation, while Aniimo aims for cozy base building and fairground vibes. The Homeland system is less about optimizing production lines and more about giving your unused Aniimo meaningful roles.

Operation: Egg Heist is where Aniimo borrows Palworld’s love of big, chaotic multiplayer scenarios. Yet even there, the tone is closer to a competitive treasure hunt event than a harsh survival challenge. Expect the beta to reveal whether that lighter approach keeps players engaged long term or if the team will need to dial in higher stakes modes later.

What Progression Will Carry Over?

Pawprint and Kingsglory are framing the Paws Up second closed beta as a true test environment rather than soft launch. That means all systems, numbers, and even some content flows are still subject to change before release.

The studio has not committed to full progression carryover into launch and is instead suggesting that player data will primarily inform tuning, balance, and feature priorities. You should go into the beta assuming that your account, Aniimo collection, and Homeland layout are temporary and might be partially or fully wiped before the next test or the final release.

What is more likely to persist is meta progress at the account level such as unlock flags tied to participation milestones, closed beta exclusive cosmetics, or titles and badges that recognize early testers. Those are the kinds of rewards many free to play multiplayer games preserve across test cycles to thank early adopters, and Aniimo is well positioned to do the same.

In practical terms, treat this second closed beta as a chance to learn systems, experiment with team compositions, and offer feedback on Homeland and Operation: Egg Heist rather than a head start on launch. The knowledge you gain about regions, Aniimo synergies, and social tools will translate forward even if your actual save data does not.

How To Approach The Second Closed Beta

If you are jumping into Aniimo for the first time during Paws Up, it makes sense to split your time between three pillars: exploring the new regions to get a feel for Aniimo ecology and mood based environment shifts, investing in your Homeland early to see how deep the customization goes, and queuing for Operation: Egg Heist to stress test team play and social tools.

Compared to Pokémon, think less about optimal stat builds and more about how your party interacts with Idyll itself. Compared to Palworld, focus less on extracting resources and more on curating a cast of Aniimo that feel fun to live alongside. This second closed beta is designed to answer a simple question for Pawprint Studio: can Aniimo stand apart as its own flavor of creature collecting in a crowded field?

January’s test, with its new creatures, regions, and expanded systems, is the best look yet at the answer.