Brighton-based indie studio Bytten Studio and Swedish publisher Raw Fury confirmed that Cassette Beasts 2002, the sequel to the BAFTA-nominated creature-collector RPG, will launch in March 2027 on six platforms — and Neil Newbon, the performance-capture artist behind Astarion in Baldur’s Gate 3, will voice the game’s central villain, an enigmatic occultist named Westerley. The studio unveiled a Voice Actor and Launch Window Reveal Trailer at the Xbox Gamescom Day showcase on August 27, 2026, giving fans of the series their clearest look yet at a game that promises more than 57,000 fully animated beast-fusion combinations across its turn-based battles.

Brighton and Stockholm are among the most productive addresses in indie publishing right now, and this announcement — a March 2027 launch confirmed with a partial voice cast and a trailer playable on the Gamescom floor — gives the creature-collector community a concrete decision horizon for one of the genre’s most anticipated sequels.

Nodnol: London Spelled Backward, Beast World Looking Forward

The sequel moves the action from the island of New Wirral to Nodnol — London spelled backward, and a shadow version of early-2000s London that exists hidden beneath our own. Players arrive as a newcomer in a quiet London neighborhood, only to slip through to Nodnol and find themselves entangled in an occultist’s scheme in Nodnol. The central dramatic question — who is Westerley, and what are they planning for both worlds — hangs over the entire game.

The setting is charming and uncanny in equal measure: retro in its pixel-art aesthetic and early-2000s cultural flavor, yet genuinely strange in its mythology. Unlike the original game’s island of New Wirral, Nodnol is a city mirror — the mundane and the monstrous layered on top of each other — which gives the sequel a different emotional register from its predecessor. Players who have already completed the first game can import character from first game directly.

What the Gamescom Trailer Shows

The Xbox @ Gamescom reveal confirmed a number of expanded systems for the sequel. The cassette-tape core battle system remains: players record wild beasts they encounter, then play those tapes back to transform into those creatures during turn-based battles. But the depth the sequel adds sits squarely in the fusion system.

With more than 250 beasts in the game — including full evolutionary lines — any two can be combined to produce a fused form. The official figure is 57,000-plus fully animated fusions. This is not a procedurally generated figure: every fusion is a distinct, fully animated result, meaning Bytten Studio built — or engineered a pipeline to build — tens of thousands of unique character animations. For a studio whose three full-time staff team consists of Jay Baylis, Tom Coxon, and Joel Baylis, that is a production commitment that would be substantial at any scale. The combinatorial math bears this out: with 250-plus beasts arranged in ordered pairs, the number of possible combinations exceeds 62,000 even before accounting for evolutionary variant constraints, so the 57,000 figure reflects deliberate curation as much as mathematical fact.

Battles also feature an alchemy layer: players can apply buffs and debuffs alongside their attacks, and can alter opponent’s elemental type mid-fight — adding a tactical dimension beyond raw type-matchup optimization. A Rogue Beast adaptive enemy system creates dynamic difficulty: certain enemies can observe the player’s combat techniques, adapt to them, and return later as harder challenges.

Companions, Voice Cast, and Multiplayer

The most prominent announcement from the Gamescom trailer is the partial voice cast reveal. Cassette Beasts 2002 features twelve recruitable companions — up from six in the original — with full English voice acting. Seven cast members announced at Gamescom:

• Colin Ryan as Oliver
• Samantha Béart as Prue
• Savy Des-Etages as Nell
• Nhi Do as Eden
• Rebecca Hanssen as Bella
• River Medway as L
• Neil Newbon as Westerley

Newbon is the marquee name here. British actor and performance-capture artist Neil Newbon spent more than 14 years working across games and television before his breakthrough as Astarion — the vampire elf companion — in Baldur’s Gate 3. His casting as Westerley, the game’s antagonist, carries meaningful credentialing weight for an indie: the Neil Newbon Astarion casting announcement signals both the budget and the ambition of the voice production.

Each companion has their own storylines, motivations, and quests. Deepening bonds with companions unlocks powerful companion fusion forms in battle, making relationship-building both narrative and mechanical.

Multiplayer returns in expanded form. Players can trade cassettes, join co-op during random encounters and story mode, compete in one-on-one battles with power scaling, and take on timed challenges for special rewards through the multiplayer co-op and PvP modes.

Who Made the Original — and What It Scored

Cassette Beasts 2002 is a sequel to the 2023 original of the same series, developed by Bytten Studio — a Brighton, UK indie outfit currently consisting of Jay Baylis (art director and co-founder), Tom Coxon (programmer and co-founder), and Joel Baylis (composer). Before founding Bytten, the co-founders worked at Chucklefish, the London indie developer and publisher, where they contributed to Stardew Valley — specifically, Tom Coxon’s Stardew multiplayer role was coding the game’s multiplayer functionality, acknowledged by Stardew Valley creator Eric Barone — along with Starbound and Wargroove.

The original Cassette Beasts earned a Metacritic score of 83 and an OpenCritic Mighty top seven percent rating — an average of 85, recommended by 86 percent of critics, placing it among the top 7 percent of all reviewed games. It received a 2024 BAFTA Games Award nomination. One critic at God is a Geek called it the finest monster-collecting game they had ever played in a God is a Geek review that scored it 100 out of 100.

Swedish indie publisher Raw Fury, based in Stockholm and whose catalog includes Blue Prince, Norco, and Sable, handles publishing duties.

Platforms and How to Wishlist

Cassette Beasts 2002 is targeting a March 2027 on six platforms — PC via Steam and Windows Store, Linux, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Nintendo Switch 2. The game supports English voice acting throughout, with subtitles in nine languages covering French, Italian, German, Spanish (Castilian and Latin American), Brazilian Portuguese, Japanese, Korean, and Simplified Chinese.

The game is available to wishlist now on Steam. A playable demo was available on the Gamescom 2026 floor during the show’s public days (August 27–30), marking the first time the game was publicly playable.

Frequently Asked Questions

When does Cassette Beasts 2002 come out?

Bytten Studio and Raw Fury have confirmed a March 2027 release window for all platforms. A specific day within March has not yet been announced. The game is currently available to wishlist on Steam.

What platforms will Cassette Beasts 2002 be on?

The game is confirmed for PC (Steam and Windows Store), Linux, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Nintendo Switch 2. All platforms are currently targeting the same March 2027 window.

Do I need to play the original Cassette Beasts first?

No. Bytten Studio has designed Cassette Beasts 2002 to serve as a self-contained entry point for newcomers. Players who have completed the first game can import their character, but the sequel’s story works independently. The original earned an 85 average on OpenCritic (“Mighty,” top 7% of games) and is widely available if you want the full context.

How do the 57,000-plus fusion combinations actually work?

The game features more than 250 beasts, including evolutionary lines. Any two of these beasts can be fused together — and because the order of fusion produces a distinct result, the number of possible combinations exceeds 57,000. Crucially, every single one of these fusions is fully animated, not procedurally generated. For a small indie studio, building that animation pipeline is one of the more ambitious technical commitments in the creature-collector genre.