Toram Online is free-to-play, 3D anime-themed MMORPG developed and published by Asobimo Inc., a well-known Japanese mobile game developer best known for their mobile MMORPGs, Avabel Online and IRUNA Online. Toram Online is the sequel to IRUNA Online and takes place in the same universe but with new characters, new maps, and a new story. Toram Online was recently released on iOS on May 14, 2015 and Android users can download the game from the official Toram Online website (not out on Google Play yet). Toram Online has been in active development over the past year and Asobimo Inc. has been translating the game from Japanese to English since late 2014. The game is still fairly unknown due to ongoing beta testing and lack of advertisement, but the game is definitely in a playable state at the moment and is worth trying out.
Character Creation:
Toram Online offers the most appearance customization choices that I have seen in any mobile MMORPG. Character Creation is divided into four steps due to its inability to fit everything into one screen. In the first step, players can choose their character’s gender, skin color (15 different options), and one of three heights (short, medium, and tall). In the second step, players can choose a face type, eye style, and eye color with many different variations. The third step features hair customization with more possibilities than I have seen in most PC MMORPGs. Players can customize different parts of their character’s hair including “Bangs,” “Back,” and “Tails,” each of which, have over 15 options, with “Bangs” and “Back” having over 30 options. There are so many different possibilities and the hair creation is extremely in-depth for a mobile game. There are also over 20 different unique hair colors with every shade of the rainbow. Male and Female characters have the same hair customization choices to choose from and each character in the game can look fairly different due to the appearance customization. Toram Online has, by far, the best appearance customization in any mobile game I have played. In the fourth step, players can choose their starting weapon.
A Non-Restricted Class System
Toram Online has no classes which gives players the freedom to build their character how they like. The game does, however, has four different weapon types with skill trees that somewhat define your class. The four weapons and their difficulties include Sword (Easy), Bow (Normal), Staff (Hard), and Knuckle (Easy). Although the game does not restrict players to one class and players can build hybrid characters if they like, in order to simplify things and explain different roles in battle, I will associate each weapon with a common class. The classes include Warrior, Archer, Mage, and Fighter respectively as named by the game’s community.
Warriors are high health, frontline fighters specialized in two-handed swords and one-handed swords with a shield. Their main attributes include Strength and Vitality and are easy to play due to their “tankiness” or attack power, depending on how players build their character. Archers are swift ranged snipers who can attack with bows and crossbows from a distance and dish out high amounts of damage before getting attacked. They depend on Dexterity for attack power. Mages are powerful spellcasters equipped with a staff and have the highest amounts of damage in the game but are fragile and the most difficult class to play. They are difficult due to how quickly they can drain their mana and getting attacked while casting a spell completely disrupts the spell and the mana is also lost. They rely on Intelligence for attack power and Dexterity for casting speed. Fighters are a unique melee class equipped with large gauntlet-type weapons known as “Knuckles.” They are an all-around class with average attack power and defense and rely on Agility for attack power. Each class has their pros and cons and a variety of different skills that can be unlocked and leveled with skill points gained from leveling up.
A Beautiful and Scenic World
The world of Toram Online is absolutely gorgeous. Only 2 years after Asobimo Inc. set the graphical MMORPG standard with their highly popular, Avabel Online, they release Toram Online which manages to top it in almost every way. Every new map, area, or boss battle begins with a cutscene panning the surroundings and it is mesmerizingly beautiful. Toram Online is, in my opinion, the best looking mobile MMORPG at the moment, although the anime graphics make it an unfair comparison to most other games, but it is definitely the best looking anime-themed game on mobile. The environments are bright, colorful, crisp, and very atmospheric. Each map looks very detailed and original, and one can tell Asobimo Inc. spent an enormous amount of time working on the backgrounds, scenery, and object placements in each map. The main town in the game is huge and has a very appealing medieval fantasy feel to it. Character and NPC models and weapons and armor are also all well-designed. The game also has amazing music that makes the already gorgeous world even more immersive and dazzling.
Combat and Gameplay
The combat in Toram Online is point-and-click in a very traditional sense. Because most gamers nowadays prefer action, hack and slash combat, Toram Online’s combat to some may feel like a step backwards, especially considering Asobimo Inc.’s Avabel Online featured action combat. Players can move their characters with a virtual joystick and target and auto-attack enemies with a button on the bottom right or by tapping on the enemies themselves. Although it is not action-oriented, the point-and-click combat works well and feels very polished. The animations are smooth, the effects are flashy, and the combat is simple enough for anyone to pick up. Although some players may find the combat boring, personally, I thought it was fine for this type of MMORPG. I believe Asobimo Inc. wanted to keep the combat similar to IRUNA Online (the prequel game) but with improvements, and the combat, although still point-and-click, is a lot better and more fluid than IRUNA Online’s stiff and lackluster combat.
Most quests (I will talk more about quests in the next section) involve defeating a boss monster which is where the grinding kicks in. Boss monsters are almost always higher level than your character and players will have to grind and level up in order to defeat bosses. Toram Online doesn’t have as much filler quests as other games so killing random monsters just to level up plays a large role in Toram Online. Leveling at lower levels doesn’t take too long but it gets more repetitive and time-consuming at higher levels. The story-based quests do make the grinding feel somewhat worth it in the end though.
A Story-based Questing Experience
Toram Online breaks out of the traditional unengaging, wall-of-text quest storylines and adds in dynamic cutscenes and realistic dialogues to its questing. Individual quests are part of larger story chapters and each quest begins with eye-pleasing cutscenes and multiple camera angles as players interact with NPCs or watch other NPCs interacting with each other. The quest dialogue is conversational, and combined with natural body movements and things happening in the background, the dialogue and story feel high quality and are something to look forward to. In addition to dialogue cutscenes, there are also many other cutscenes that involve action sequences, player movement, boss encounters, and more. Quests range from killing certain monsters to gathering items to defeating giant bosses. As mentioned before, Toram Online isn’t filled with hundreds of filler quests like most MMORPGs so players will generally be working on one quest (usually the boss killing quests) for many levels before moving on with the story. Overall, the cutscenes, story, dialogue, and questing are interesting and well-implemented in Toram Online, but I think Toram Online needs more to keep the player busy to avoid too much grinding.
Cash Shop/In-App Purchases (IAP)
In-App Purchases usually play a large part in freemium mobile games and MMORPGs by providing advantages and cosmetics for paying players. Some games have more reasonable In-App Purchases while other games are just pure pay-to-win. As of this review, Toram Online is still in Beta and Asobimo Inc. has yet to add In-App Purchases to the game. They did recently add an Orb shop with randomized treasure chests containing items such as Training Scrolls, Revive Droplets, Health Potions, and Mana Potions, each of which can also be bought with Orbs but the system is still under development and players cannot purchase Orbs yet. My guess is that the Cash Shop will be similar to Avabel Online’s which was mainly cosmetic items such as costumes, but also had randomized higher rank equipment, which gave advantages and reduced the time spent farming but was not game-breaking. None of Asobimo Inc.’s mobile MMORPGs have been pay-to-win so far so Toram Online’s In-App Purchases should be fairly reasonable.
Final Verdict – Great
Although Toram Online is already out on Apple Itunes, it is still a game largely in development but has huge potential when it finally launches. With top notch, anime graphics, a huge open world, beautiful scenery and music, and an engaging story and questing system, the traditional point-and-click combat and grinding can be overlooked by many. Toram Online is currently one of the highest quality mobile MMORPGs I have played and a game everyone should try out.
