Ten Ton Hammer - Taking MMO Gamers to the Next Level!

Dream of Mirror Online (DOMO) inserts players into the midst of Chinese mythology. The Kunlun Mirror, an ancient artifact designed to record the events of the human world, no longer reflects our reality accurately. Calamities in real life become horrible monsters in the world inside the mirror, and some of the Mirror Kings who guard that realm are missing. Each player is a human called into the mirror world in an attempt to solve the mystery of the disappearing Mirror Kings and to prevent the destruction of the mirror itself because the real world dies if something destroys the Kunlun Mirror.

DOMO is commendable for a number of reasons. It offers a plot that takes gamers off of the beaten path, features a nice multi-class system, and delivers a lot of gameplay elements at good quality without costing players a penny.

Pretty Good

DOMO offers the choice of four races at character creation: balanced humans, dragon-descended Shura, self-absorbed Sylph, and energetic Sprites. Customization options include the usual handful of faces, hair styles, and skin tones in addition to gender. Less typical modifications affect height, weight, breast size, and zodiac sign.

All players start as commoners because the classes come at level ten, a common design among Eastern MMOGs. In the case of DOMO, it works well because of the multi-class system and the number of possible skill combinations that arise from the ability to access primary and secondary skills from up to two other classes. The twelve jobs differ slightly from the norm but cover the basic archetypes. Each falls into a category of melee damage, ranged damage, healing and support, or tank.

Melee damage classes include martial artist, blademaster, and thief. Martial artists use their training for barehanded fighting. Blademasters do big damage with blades at the expense of defense and evasion. Thieves are the standard slippery brigands who sneak in for quick strikes at opportune moments.

Ranged damage jobs are the hunter, merchant, wizard, and shaman. Hunters track animals and use bow attacks. Merchants gain access to special item-making abilities and can throw money to hurt enemies. Wizards command powerful AoE spells that require consumable foci. Shaman call upon nature to deliver magical damage in small doses quickly.

Healing and support classes consist of the doctor, fencer, musician, and dancer. Doctors handle the healing. Fencers attack with precision to disable enemy attacks and spells. Musicians use songs and music to buff the party. Dancers debuff the enemy with capers and fan attacks.

The only tank is the mercenary. Mercenaries employ “Formation” skills to maximize party effectiveness while keeping foes’ aggression.

DOMO features all of the customary MMOG features: harvesting, crafting, auctioning, combat, and spell craft. The quests are above average in that they extend to unusual topics, such as investigating a murder in the city or having to build something. DOMO also mixes in cut scenes to engage the player. The major failing is the lackluster combat system. Because each class levels independently of all of your other jobs, expect to spend a lot of time in combat, grinding the same mobs repeatedly. Don’t look for many frills; DOMO tries to incorporate a combo system that is a little too unreliable and requires a good bit of luck.

Good

DOMO presents the world inside the Kunlun Mirror through beautiful cel-shading. The decision to use cel-shading establishes a sense of identity among competitors, allows the game to run smoothly on lower end computers, and ensures DOMO will continue to look just as nice two years from now. Spell and combat skills dazzle gamers with flashes of light and particles flying all about the screen.

My only complaint about the graphics in DOMO is that the cel-shading basically turns the game into a cartoon, which can turn off adult gamers. It may seem unfair to praise the developers for their gorgeous graphics and slam them for it all at once, but I can’t help but feel the community trends toward the young and immature side partly because of the art design.

Okay

Music and sound effects in DOMO are suitable in most cases. Western gamers may delight early on at scores that make use of Eastern string and wind instruments. Despite distinct background themes, nobody will be dying to download the soundtrack. It’s just different for a while until you get used to it. It is worth noting that cut scenes successfully add drama or humor with the music and sounds.

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