The New Caravan Stories MMORPG Looks Pretty Damn Good

At a time when we thought all was lost.. a genre was dying.. cute Anime waifus were losing their once dedicated husbandos.. comes an MMORPG attempting to save us from the curse of perpetual, sub-par Anime MMO releases.
Caravan Stories, a crisp, beautiful new cel-shaded Anime MMORPG releasing July 23rd.. on PS4. PS4, damnit! Why not PC? Most of us in the genre play on our computers still! That’s why I spent $5,000 on my PC after all!
In Japan Caravan Stories is cross-platform, having players play on both their PC and mobile devices, but instead of releasing cross-platform in the West they opted to release the game exclusively on PS4.
Which if I’m being honest here is still a good choice. Granted, sure, I’m a little salty that I’ll have to download it on my PS4 as opposed to playing it on PC but realistically it isn’t a big deal.
The PS4 has shown that it’s capable of supporting MMOs and if the game does well on console then they might port over the PC version at a later date as well.

Caravan Stories is a popular Japanese cel-shaded Anime MMORPG with over 2 million players currently in Japan alone.
The game utilizes a very interesting combat style for an MMO- if you guys have ever played an older JRPG like any Final Fantasy game before Final Fantasy XV, a Tales of game or.. any game for that matter that gives you the freedom to openly traverse fields with combat triggering upon connection with an enemy- combat in specific taking place in instanced environments.
You’ll level up and fight alongside characters and pets you obtain throughout the game meaning monster-taming is imperative to progression, akin to how you would progress through a Pokemon game.
Monsters are captured, leveled up and are capable of evolving at different stages- changing their overall appearance completely and gaining access to additional abilities.

Caravan Stories has 6 playable races: Human, Elf, Dwarf, Orc, Gessy (which are like.. little.. animal dudes,) and Lizardmen. Not all players will be able to see or play with one another, at least at the beginning of your journey.
The area you begin in will be solely dependent on which race you choose, with each race having their own unique starter areas and stories to tell.
This provides additional replayability – getting to experience different aspects of the story and seeing how each race interacts with one another from their side.

The plot is fairly simple but there’s a lot of it: Evil forces are traveling to our world through a gate known as an Enigma. It’s up to us to defend the world from destruction.
There are two forms of parties in Caravan Stories. Player-controlled parties which have up to 6 characters total, and group parties where you party with other players.
You can group with a total of 2 other players, totaling 18 units in battle at maximum.
The game has a strong emphasis on group play and open-world content. Raids are open- you don’t party up with a large group of people and tackle an instance.
Instead, bosses spawn out in the open world and you do battle with them right there. This is an interesting way to tackle raiding and honestly I don’t know if I’ll like it but they’re trying something different and I’m all for that.
I mean I won’t know if it sucks unless I get to experience it personally. Dungeons are still instanced off, however, meaning there is still instanced group-content.

Players also gain access to their very own mobile caravan that they will be able to upgrade as they continue to explore what the game has to offer.
I’m not 100% certain of its purpose as I never played the Japanese version and English translated sites are very vague on its uses so if anyone that has actually played the game could clarify for me that’d be great.

If PvP is more your thing then Caravan Stories features a Coliseum for you to engage other players in. You have a 10 man team and defend your caravan from your opponent.
The closest reference you could make is that it functions similarly to a tower defense game. You equip your caravan with various weapons and items and attempt to survive.
The matches in specific are 1v1 and you both field a group of 10 of your own pets and heroes. I’m not certain exactly how group PvP works or, heck, if it even exists, but from what I could gather.. it does not. Yet, anyway.

I spoke about Eternal Magic a couple days ago and honestly, that game looked like trash.
Caravan Stories on the other hand looks like it could be something cute that you could waste some time in.
It’s an Anime MMORPG – something we have in very limited supply right now. I mean let’s take a moment and see what Anime MMOs have even released in the last 2 years.
Closers? Soul Worker? They’re both instanced hub-based Anime MMOs. KurtzPel? That’s marketed as an MMO Action RPG and never has more than 2 people on-screen at once.
So seeing a game that looks this good – this unique become available is a nice change. Especially with all the re-release crap and cash-grab Korean ports over the last few years.

I know that the game seems a little mobile-esque, but regardless, I’m still excited. It could potentially be a very fun game to burn time in on my PS4. The PS4 could always use more MMOs.
What do you guys think? Are you excited for the release, even if it’s a PS4 exclusive?