Dota 2's next hero is Marci from the Dota: Dragon's Blood anime

Dota 2 is getting a new hero this autumn. It's Marci, the mute bodyguard from Netflix's Dota anime, Dota: Dragon's Blood. She'll join the game in an update "coming soon."

Here's the character reveal trailer, which was shown today on the penultimate day of The International, Dota 2's major tournament.

I originally read that Marci was coming "this fall" and thought, ah, right, six or so months away. But no, it's October, it's almost Christmas, what is going on.

Valve didn't offer much extra detail about Marci in an accompanying blog post. In the anime, she is the bodyguard Princess Mirana and skilled in hand-to-hand combat. That's all I know because I didn't actually watch the anime - it looked, from trailers, like it hadn't retained the weirdness of the actual game. But then I hear from others that it was good, so I dunno.

Earlier this year Valve added a skin for Dragon Knight to make him look like his (blandly heroic-looking) anime incarnation.

Dota: Dragon's Blood is getting a second season, though it doesn't currently have a release date.