Cloud Song: Saga of Skywalkers, the free-to-play mobile Massively Multiplayer Role-Playing Game (MMORPG), has gone on both the App Store and Google Play Store’s top charts for free apps, and still has a spot on the charts now, a week after its launch.

In fact, on Sept 9, 2021, just one day after the game’s launch in the Southeast Asia (SEA) region (Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand, Philippines, and Indonesia), Cloud Song hit the No. 1 spot in both stores under the Role-Playing and Adventure games categories.

This speaks to the game’s instant appeal of its adorable yet still action-packed visuals, and its popularity. Upon its launch, the publisher, VNG Corporation, had to open nearly 20 servers to keep up with the influx of players!

Taking the multicultural and diverse nature of the SEA region into consideration, Cloud Song boasts an in-game auto-translation feature, where with just a single tap, players can have foreign languages that other players are typing in translated into their native tongue.

This is an MMORPG after all, and the developers have ensured that players will be able to experience a borderless adventure, interacting with players from other countries without language barriers being an issue.

Players have been reacting in an overwhelmingly positive manner, with the game having a 4.8 out of 5 rating on the App Store, and a 4.0 out of 5 rating on the Google Play Store across over 3,000 reviews. Guardians of Cloudia, the global version of the game, averages a 4.2 and 4.4 out of 5 rating across over 75,000 reviews. This is a game that players are enamoured with.

And who can blame them? With an action RPG gameplay that has players dodging out of attacks to survive, and timing their skills to deal maximum damage at the same time, this is a tried-and-true loop that gamers are familiar with and can’t get enough of!

Cloud Song’s unique angle to the formula here is the pet system. The game features a 9-pet array for players to deck themselves out with a smorgasbord of fantastical creatures that will bring a tear to a zoologist’s eye.

Three pets go on the major array, and can be switched back and forth in battle to best handle the enemy with their variety of skills and combos. 9 pets go on the support array, and the player’s stats will be boosted by these pets.

This opens up a lot of room for customisation and tweaking. With the pets being umbrellaed under four different elements – wind, fire, earth, and fairy, finding the best synergies and tweaking the way each pet works with the player character’s class will be great fun for the min-maxers among us.

The rarity of the pets that can be pulled from the game’s gacha system ranges from R, to SR, to SSR. Beyond that, there is even an Angel pet of an even higher rarity, UR, that can be obtained by obtaining enough angel feathers for it.

And not only is there a robust Player vs Environment (PvE) system where players fight monsters around the maps, and enter instances where tougher challenges await, there is also a cross-world real-time 60 vs 60 Player vs Player (PvP) mode.

This fully takes advantage of the MMO aspect of the game, letting players fight in thrilling brawls with and against other players. The mix of a plethora of PvE events that players can participate in with different bosses to tackle, and an exciting PvP system means that there will be something for everyone here.

The game isn’t just about the combat too, because there are minigames that can be played with the NPCs, such as a jigsaw challenge to turn the cogs in players’ heads, and chicken racing.

All this is complemented by the social features such as the guild system, and the marriage system to make Cloud Song more than just a game. Like other MMORPGs, it can feel like a virtual home, or a virtual hang out spot with friends too.

Cloud Song: Saga of Skywalkers is free-to-play, with a low barrier to entry, and very easy to pick up. So, what are you waiting for?

This article was first published in Geek Culture.