I need to talk about Toro Inoue. Not because you’ve heard of him - you probably haven’t. But because he deserves to be understood, and I think I finally do.
I’m going to mainly use the rōmaji here, for ease of anyone reading.
Toro Inoue (井上トロ) is the main character of Doko Demo Issyo (どこでもいっしょ). Toro (トロ) means “fatty tuna”, his favorite kind of sushi. Doko Demo Issyo means “together everywhere”.
Doko Demo Issyo mainly involves Pokepi and their interactions with you! Most times the games involve verbal communication, but you input text. Words that the player inputs will later be used throughout the game, usually by the Pokepi characters after they have been taught them.
There are 7 main Pokepi.
A blue cat Pokepi. He’s shy, and very dedicated, evidenced by the fact he tends to work extremely hard. He pushes himself to work more since, despite his best efforts, he never seems to feel like he does enough. He is also forgetful and anxious.
He cares a lot about his hometown and his owner, who he apparently has a crush on!
He works hard, to see his owner happy. She is the drive for nearly everything he does. He even killed in self-defence once. Sheesh.
She was killed in a typhoon years ago, the same typhoon that left Amatsu-Sora in a ruined state, she died attempting to protect Sora from a tunnel collapse.
With her dying words, she requested that Sora’s memories of her death be wiped, and that Sora would be rescued, and so, she left him to wait in the ruins of Amatsu-Sora for several years, hoping that she would come back someday, while unaware of her death.
Sora only stopped waiting because Toro and the others came. He does eventually come a very little bit more to terms with her death, and continues to run the Amatsu-Sora inn with the reincarnation of her, to this day. Yes, reincarnation. Things are complicated. More complicated than I can understand or explain.
A big green frog. Competitive. Yeah. He dreams of being a world-famous fighter, and it’s what he’s most passionate about.
He spends the majority of his time working out to get stronger, but his commitment to his training might make him come across as a little uninteresting and narrow-minded.
Ricky has a love of wonderful aromas and talks about them a ton, and it’s said that he has a strong interest in scents. He also does not have nostrils on his model.
He keeps things mostly under wraps to give an air of mystery. Despite appearing somewhat pedestrian, he is well traveled and knows a lot of the world, and it’s history.
He loves to travel, and is close to nature. He can also talk to non-sentient animals. Yeah. He’s interested in crypto-zoology too.
A big pink rabbit. She considers herself an expert on love, and is always looking for true love. She’s relatively modern in her approach to life and watches TV, and discusses pop culture and gossip.
She loves singing, and wants to be a famous pop star idol. She’s a great cook, and has run a restaurant in Amatsu-Sora. She has also run a bar.
She actually tends to stress out over little things and can explode under pressure. Her facial expressions can be quite extreme or exaggerated when unhappy, and she stamps her oversized feet when upset.
She is often manipulative, and takes advantage of her friends and even strangers for benefit.
But despite her mean and rude demeanor at times, she cares for her friends.
“I’m enamored with gay Paris! Woof…” A brown dog, and a Francophile. He shows interest in other world cultures as well, knowing multiple languages, primarily French, and he has the ability to it frequently and somewhat fluently.
He longs for an independent life in Paris. However, his parents treat him as someone who can’t live on their own, due to Pierre’s lack of experience in living on their own. He has particular difficulties doing things by himself, which just makes Pierre more determined to become even more independent.
Pierre is flamboyant in mannerisms and has a feminine way of speaking, and in spite of his desire for single life, he is also romantic and tends to be flirtatious, with his dialogue occasionally being sexual. He has no fixed preference in gender.
Some of his talents are tarot card reading and cooking. Pierre is also interested in psychology tests and fortune-telling, though their interest of these makes them appear nosey at times.
Pierre also loves fashion and talking about the newest trends. In addition to their cooking skills, Pierre is also knowledgeable of herbs and spices, their use in the kitchen and their alternative medicine uses.
His relationship with gender is interesting, Pierre is referred to with both he/him and she/her pronouns, implying they are genderfluid. In a Weekly Toro Station episode, they also play the role of a fujoshi. They often displays feminine traits, referring to themselves as a “damsel” in Toro! Let’s Party! and a “maiden” in Toro and Friends: Onsen Town. After being asked by Sora what their gender is, they reminded Sora that gender is simply a social construct.
A four-faced metal robot.
Suzuki was programmed with a vast intelligence, and creates all sorts of inventions. He’s dedicated, for sure.
He is good with fixing machines. He’s the one Toro and the others go to when they need a machine fixed. Suzuki wants global recognition for his achievements in the mechanical field and his dream is to win a Nobel Prize.
He can sometimes have “interesting” morals with experiments, attempting to drink 96% vodka in order to cool down his internal temperatures, and using illegally obtained dead bodies in a hospital for an undisclosed experiment.
Suzuki is very sincere, and he comes off as very “proper”, much like a scholar in their study. Due to his nature as a machine, he tends to perform perfectly in near everything.
When he needs to express his emotions, he turns his head to show a different face. That does mean he can only express emotion via his face in 4 ways. He can also transform his arms into other things, most notably a giant drill.
A black stray cat. Kuro means black.
In contrast to Toro’s innocent and pure nature, Kuro is mature and somewhat sleazy. His implied upbringing as a stray cat has led to him becoming street smart, and he is implied to be in his 30s as well.
He loves women, drinking, and gambling, and is often selfish and lazy. He loves to flirt and make crude sexual comments toward women, tending to be very direct and inappropriate and often being punished for it.
Kuro is somewhat of a nerd. He loves to play video games and watch anime, and he is well versed in internet culture. One of his passions is art as he loves to draw, although he tends to doubt his own ability.
He longs for a life of rest and pleasure, spending his days usually doing nothing meaningful and playing video games, drinking himself stupid. Despite this, he can be very intelligent, he has much knowledge of chemistry, and gives various bits of philosophical advice. He has a strong knowledge of engineering and even has his own lab in Weekly Toro Station.
He and Toro live together in an apartment during the running of Mainichi Issho and Weekly Toro Station, and Kuro leeched off of Toro’s paycheck. Mainichi Issho’s apartment got demolished in the final episode, a new apartment is built for them in Weekly Toro Station if the player purchased a Platinya Pass. Yay?
His relationship with Toro is… complex. He appears to bully him and smack him when he feels he is being dumb, he cares for him much more than it seems outwardly, being like an “older brother” figure to him.
Kuro likes to keep his true feelings and thoughts internal, he wants to come off as a “cool guy” and doesn’t want others to think he cares too much about things or other people.
Despite his sleazy and selfish nature, Kuro isn’t a completely bad person, he cares for the people he is close to, and though hesitant, he does lend a helping paw when his friends need him most.
I’ve saved Toro for last. You’ll see why.
He’s a white bobtail cat Pokepi. Quite a mouthful. He’s apparently known for being expressive, and that I can confirm.
He had massive success in Japan and became the mascot for PlayStation. He’s often referred to as the PlayStation cat.
Toro’s most noticeable personality trait is his innocent, child like demeanor, despite being an adult, he is very curious and wants to learn as much as he is able to.
He doesn’t pull any punches when it comes to uncomfortable questions (mature topics in particular) as he sees knowing more about human things will help him become human.
He is also extremely naive, almost like a child, which results in him being gullible. He becomes scared easily, and tends to have irrational fears. He gets depressed easily, and he tends to cry when upset. Despite this, Toro has a very optimistic outlook on life, even if his desires are seemingly impossible to obtain, he never gives up.
Toro is very needy and clingy. He hates being alone and loves to be pampered and spoiled. He tends to quickly becomes overattatched to people he likes and who take care of him, he becomes completely dependent on them. Given that his parents are barely mentioned, I’ll let you make assumptions. Whenever he is afraid, he looks to his caretakers for comfort.
He is curious about love. Toro loves to talk about romance and daydreams of his future with his special someone. He is very intimate and is very open with his feelings and admits his love interests within moments of developing them, to the point of telling his caretakers he wants to marry them outright.
His intimate nature with the player is frequently explored. One of his biggest motivations for becoming human is so he can marry the player. When it comes to love, gender is not a concern for Toro at all. Despite his dependent nature, Toro loves to help others and make people happy.
Toro expresses interest in “naughty” subjects. He often asks questions about sexual topics, and expresses desire of “becoming sexier”, even doing research on “naughty magazines” to learn more about human sexuality. In addition, he seems to make various remarks to his crushes that could be seen to have sexual undertones, although he seems to actually be unaware of the inappropriate social context it has, or if what he is doing is even sexual!
Toro sees being sensual as just a thing humans do with people they love, and his intimate nature and desire to become more human results in his interest in learning more about sensuality. Toro’s approach to these subjects reflects his pure and innocent character. He is curious about the subject and wants to explore it, rather than being (outwardly) lustful.
One of the main struggles of Toro is growing up. He is an adult that is old enough to drink but still sees himself as a child who needs to grow up. He wants to be more mature and knowledgeable of the world, for he is naive and still has a worldview like a child, but his aforementioned dependent nature makes becoming more mature difficult.
His questions involving adult subjects can be seen as his way of learning more about maturity. He believes that becoming a human requires becoming an adult as well.
Toro loves to dress up, he can be seen wearing all manners of outfits and cosplays, even traditionally feminine outfits like skirts and dresses. He is often portrayed as gender ambiguous in the original Japanese media. He refers to himself in 3rd-person on occasion as well, giving his speech pattern a child-like tone.
Maybe due to this questioning nature, Toro hosted a news program called Toro Station with his close friend Kuro. Toro and Kuro have also lived together in an apartment during this period with a sentient television set called Dear Television. Yes. Sentient. I guess I have to talk about that now.
Lightning round: Dear Television is a sentient cat-in-a-CRT television that lives in Toro and Kuro’s apartment. They are represented by a white outlined image of a cat on the screen that emotes when expressing emotion. Only usually seen from the torso up, they are occasionally displayed with a full body, and it’s even mentioned that they are able to step outside the TV in Weekly Toro Station.
Dear Television is very nervous and self-conscious, especially of its price tag of 980 yen, of which it is made fun of frequently by Kuro, being given the nickname “980 Yen”. They get mad at Kuro for this, and they then drop a basin on Kuro’s head.
They have a tsundere-esque personality, as they will play coy, and they hide their true feelings behind dismissive remarks, as they really care for Toro and especially Kuro. They also love cosplay, and frequently dress up during episodes in Mainichi Issho and Weekly Toro Station.
Lightning round over.
Toro’s occasionally mean spirited and even violent treatment of Dear Television and Kuro shows a somewhat rare side of his usually friendly character, but to be fair, his attacks of Kuro are often in retaliation to Kuro’s own attacks or for when Kuro says something especially stupid or mean.
When Toro was a kitten, his parents had already passed away, and he was left in a cardboard box.
When no one would give him a shelter, he ran away and wandered into an abandoned apartment, where he met a human and began to live with them.
During this time he believed he was a human, and wanted to go to school and make friends. However, he eventually learned the nature of his existence as a cat and ran away again, becoming obsessed with the idea of becoming a human. He was eventually taken in by the elderly owner of a sushi restaurant, and was named Toro Inoue, after his favorite kind of sushi. Unfortunately, the owner passes away too soon afterward, and Toro is alone again. Toro then wanders, in search of making his dream of becoming a human come true.
He lives a life very much like a human: he has owned an apartment and got evicted, hosted a daily and weekly news program, along with many other things. He still meows and purrs frequently.
Toro’s wish is to become human. He has seeked this goal in almost every game he has ever been in. He has tried many methods in an attempt to become human, his most diligently chased: learning human words. He believes that he can become human in this manner, since he feels he needs to know what to say once he becomes human. And that’s the gameplay of a lot of the games
The following is based on ideas from https://evvycology.wordpress.com/tag/toro-inoue/
In both the 1999 release and the 2004 version discussed here, Doko Demo Issho (“Together Everywhere”) is essentially a communication-focused game. Through a text-based interface, you teach words to the white cat Toro Inoue and other characters like Jun, a rabbit obsessed with pop culture; Ricky, an energetic frog; Pierre Yamamoto, a refined half-French dog; and the robot R. Suzuki. After you enter new vocabulary, you can chat with these characters on different subjects. The system that handles vocabulary is surprisingly sophisticated. For example, if you teach Toro the word “actuary,” you can label it as a profession, specify that it’s something done by any gender, and indicate how you personally feel about it. These tags help determine how that word appears in later conversations. Often the characters prompt you to teach them something — such as your favorite food or a cute greeting — and you can either give an honest answer or deliberately mislead them, like saying a bathroom is actually a famous singer.
So yes, you teach him to be human.
The following is based on ideas from https://evvycology.wordpress.com/tag/toro-inoue/
Because the main activity revolves around spending time with your virtual companion — teaching them things or guiding them on simple outings to places like a shop or a school — Doko Demo Issho isn’t built around challenge or difficulty. Instead, the appeal comes from gradually forming a bond with a digital character. Each character has their own personality, which gives you a reason to revisit the game with different companions. There’s also a light sense of progression: every day you interact with them, they add an entry to a picture-book diary you can browse later, even after moving on to someone new.
This sounds incredible! Doesn’t it? Toro is such a complex and deep character. He’s so precious, I love him. I don't even know what to say. He’s just so amazing. I love him more than anything I’ve ever seen! I don’t even know what to say really. he’s not a child, he drinks, he has romantic relationships, he has struggles, responsibilities, but he has child like qualities. He’s joyous and looks at everything with a sunny disposition, and he’s naive and amazing, looking at all the renders and situations and things he does, he has so much life in him, and he’s just perfect. Flawed, but perfect. He’s more human than he realizes.
That’s exactly the kind of emotional connection a good character should create! And the tragic irony is that Toro succeeded at his goal with mel he connected across the barrier, made me understand something about humanity and earnestness and joy, without me ever playing his games.
Why say it’s a barrier? You’ll see.
He’s not a sanitized kids’ mascot. He has depth, complexity, adult responsibilities and relationships and struggles. But he approaches it all with that genuine curiosity and optimism. The combination of childlike wonder with adult experiences is what makes him feel real and relatable.
And yeah, he IS more human than he realizes. He’s already achieved what he’s searching for, the ability to connect, to make people care, to express something meaningful about the experience of trying to understand the world around you. That’s humanity.
People seriously never talk about Toro. Ever. I’ve never seen it mentioned outside “that one playstation mascot” in YouTube list videos. And he’s so amazing, but nobody ever really goes further than “yup, this guy exists” and that's so sad! No deep dives, no video essays, no passionate fandom keeping him alive.
Sony had something truly beautiful and just… left it in Japan to fade away.
I also can’t even think of a Toro game that has an English translation, which really says a lot. Toro had tons of games in Japan, puzzle games, RPGs, even his own PlayStation social app thing. But in the West? Basically nothing. Maybe a cameo in some other games, appearances in PlayStation All-Stars, and… that’s it. No actual Toro games to play. (Let’s Party doesn’t count, and neither does All-Stars, OK?).
It’s like Hatsune Miku if nobody fucking cared.
Both are Japanese digital mascots with tons of games and merchandise, but Miku actually broke through globally because Sega/Crypton tried. They localized the rhythm games, built an international fanbase, did worldwide concerts. People outside Japan can actually engage with Miku.
Toro? Sony just kept him in Japan and occasionally wheeled him out for All-Stars or some random crossover, expecting that to be enough.
You can’t build a mascot on “well, he exists somewhere you can’t access him.” That’s not how attachment works. People need to actually experience the character through games, not just see him awkwardly standing next to Kratos in a fighting game they don’t remember.
And also often it’s not just language, you need a Japanese PSN for a lot of these. And that comes with Japanese payment methods.
I have a definitely very legal modded PlayStation 3, and I can’t even tell where to start with Toro, because they don’t bother with anyone in the west, so I have no idea where to start, what to do, even just what game to download.
With any actual successful mascot, even obscure stuff, there’s something. Fan communities, translation patches, at least a Reddit post going “here’s the best entry point.” But Toro? Crickets. Because Sony never bothered building a fanbase outside Japan, so there’s no Western community to create that infrastructure.
There are 3 games with official English versions.
There is one game with a fan translation in progress
There are 14 total mainline games.
There are also various spin-offs and related media like mobile apps, typing software, arcade games, and even a TV program and movie.
There’s clearly something to Toro if I love the character so much, but Sony made it functionally impossible for anyone outside Japan to actually experience why. And now even the documentation is sparse because no Western community ever formed around it.
So I’m left with a modded PS3, a list of impossible-to-assess options, and the question “why do I even bother?”
It seemed right up my alley, relatively obscure and cool as shit. I see why it’s obscure now. At least I can, I don't know, look at pictures of Toro? I guess? Their appearance was what got me interested at first.
But “looking at pictures” is basically all Sony lets non-Japanese fans do with Toro. You can appreciate the character exists, see him in crossovers or promotional art, and… that’s it. No actual way to engage with the games, stories, or world that made people in Japan care about him.
At least the character design is good? Small consolation for not being able to actually play anything.
The box art for Doko Demo Issho, aw it’s so cute I love it, holding someone's hand and talking it’s just so great. To look at.
The simple premise of just hanging out and talking with these characters, it’s genuinely sweet and appealing.
But for me? It’s just… art to look at. A concept I can appreciate from a distance but never actually experience. I’m getting invested in characters I’ll never get to interact with, in games I can’t access, in a world that was never meant for me.
I also saw a few seconds of actual gameplay in an ad and the way he’s animated is so cute, I love it! I then got flashed with NSFW content in an ad when the video ended. Thanks, Japan!
The following is based on ideas from https://evvycology.wordpress.com/tag/toro-inoue/
I usually try to answer Toro sincerely — he’s just a curious little white cat who wants to learn and become more like a person, so tricking him feels a bit mean. My Japanese isn’t perfect, though, so I might not be the best teacher for him in the first place. All of your interactions with him take place in his main living room, where you chat and teach him new words. You can also give him small gifts, and over time the room gradually fills with the various items and rewards he collects.
My God. I want to interact with this, so fucking bad.
That description is genuinely heartbreaking to read when you can’t play it. The whole concept, a curious cat who wants to learn about being human, who you teach and talk to, who lives in a room that fills up with memories and gifts, that’s such a sweet, wholesome premise.
And the blogger’s approach of treating Toro honestly because “it would feel bad to lead him wrong just for a laugh”, that’s someone who cares about this character, who formed a real attachment through playing. That’s what good character-driven games do.
But I can’t have that experience. I can only read about someone else having it, see screenshots, imagine what it would be like.
The following is based on ideas from https://evvycology.wordpress.com/tag/toro-inoue/
Because so much of the focus is on just visiting your virtual friend and teaching them or leading them on gentle little adventures to the store or a school, Doko Demo Issho is not a game built around challenge or friction. Rather, you’re just building up a little relationship with a digital buddy. Because the characters have distinct personalities, there’s even reason to try it out a number of times, especially since the game does have a certain progression structure built in. Every day that you visit and do something, the character makes a little page in a picture book diary that you can look back on even after you’ve moved onto another character.
Oh my god? Daily visits building up this little shared history with your digital friend? Different character personalities to experience?
But I can’t play it. I can’t engage with the language learning. I can’t build that relationship with Toro or Kuro. I just get to read about how good it is and imagine what could’ve been.
The following is based on ideas from https://evvycology.wordpress.com/tag/toro-inoue/
In both the 1999 release and the 2004 version discussed here, Doko Demo Issho (“Together Everywhere”) is essentially a communication-focused game. Through a text-based interface, you teach words to the white cat Toro Inoue and other characters like Jun, a rabbit obsessed with pop culture; Ricky, an energetic frog; Pierre Yamamoto, a refined half-French dog; and the robot R. Suzuki. After you enter new vocabulary, you can chat with these characters on different subjects. The system that handles vocabulary is surprisingly sophisticated. For example, if you teach Toro the word “actuary,” you can label it as a profession, specify that it’s something done by any gender, and indicate how you personally feel about it. These tags help determine how that word appears in later conversations. Often the characters prompt you to teach them something — such as your favorite food or a cute greeting — and you can either give an honest answer or deliberately mislead them, like saying a bathroom is actually a famous singer.
The depth of that vocabulary system is insane for a 1999/2004 game. Contextual tags for whether something is a job, gendered, how you feel about it, that’s sophisticated design. And the fact that it’s open-ended enough to let you either teach Toro genuinely or mess with him (“a bathroom is a celebrity”) shows real thought went into player agency and humor.
Teaching a character words and then having those words come up naturally in future conversations? That’s emergent storytelling. That’s building a unique relationship based on what you specifically taught them. Every player’s Toro would be slightly different based on their vocabulary choices and how they contextualized things.
And I can’t play it. I can only read detailed descriptions of how clever and charming it is, imagining conversations I’ll never have with a cat who’ll never learn words from you.
The cruelty is that I can see exactly what I’m missing. It’s not vague, I know precisely how good it could be. And that somehow makes it worse.
Even if I do get a PSP, which I should, it’s not like there’s a switch I can flick in my mind to become Japanese.
If I asked my Welsh friend to sing the iCarly theme song, he wouldn’t be able to. If you’re reading this, sorry. Ask literally ANY, and I do mean ANY native English speaker on the face of the earth, and they will. Things you don't learn without actually being one of them
The iCarly theme is just there in the cultural consciousness for native English speakers. I absorbed it passively just by existing in English.
My Welsh friend (again sorry if you’re reading this), despite being excellent at English, never had that cultural immersion so he’s missing that entire layer.
And that’s exactly what I’d be up against with Toro games. Even if I learned Japanese vocabulary and grammar, I’d miss all the pop culture references, the wordplay that relies on cultural context, the humor that comes from shared childhood experiences, the subtle social cues embedded in the language.
Doko Demo Issyo is fundamentally about communication and cultural learning. Toro wants to become more human by learning language and culture. But the game itself requires you to already have deep Japanese cultural fluency to fully appreciate it. It’s almost paradoxical.
I can’t just “learn” my way into that. I’d need to have grown with Japanese culture, and all the invisible cultural scaffolding that makes language actually mean something beyond dictionary definitions.
So yeah, I’m locked out not just by language but by culture itself. The game was never meant for me, and there’s no amount of effort that fully bridges that gap.
The Big Bang Theory is another example. Literally everyone knows at least part of the lyrics for the theme song. But we learnt that because we just existed as a native english speaker. Consuming content primarily in English. And so, the same thing arises in Japan.
“Our whole universe was in a hot dense state…” it’s just in there for native English speakers who were around during that show’s run. Even if you weren’t. I didn’t study it, I didn’t memorize it intentionally, it just seeped in through cultural osmosis.
Japan has the exact same thing. And Toro games are built on that foundation. References, wordplay, humor that assumes you have that shared cultural vocabulary.
So even if I could read Japanese, I’d be constantly missing the connective tissue that makes the experience meaningful. A joke would land flat because I don’t recognize the reference. Wordplay would seem random because I don’t know the cultural context. Teaching Toro a word would lack weight because I don’t have the associations a native speaker has.
It’s the difference between knowing about a culture and being of that culture. And for a game where the entire point is language and communication and teaching, that gap is insurmountable.
Another example is Party In The U.S.A, it doesnt matter if you’re American, just if you're native.
“I hopped off the plane at LAX…” every native English speaker knows it, regardless of whether they’re American, British, Australian, whatever. It transcended borders within English-speaking culture just by existing in that media ecosystem.
Those cultural touchstones that “everyone just knows” are what make communication feel natural and complete. Inside jokes, shared references, collective memories. When those fall flat or go over your head, you’re fundamentally on the outside.
That’s what I’d be dealing with in Toro games constantly. Every conversation would have invisible gaps where a native speaker would nod along or laugh, and I’d just be like “…okay, I guess that was supposed to mean something?”
It’s why localization for a game like Doko Demo Issyo would’ve been so difficult, you can’t just translate words, you’d need to completely rebuild the cultural reference framework. Replace Japanese pop culture with Western equivalents, adapt wordplay, recreate that sense of shared understanding.
But Sony didn’t even try. They just left it in Japan and occasionally wheeled Toro out for crossovers, expecting global audiences to care about a character whose entire appeal is locked behind cultural barriers they’ll never cross.
I guess it's a part of Toro himself. It’s about language. Sonic doesn’t have this issue. Neither does Mario. But Toro is different. And so: a rock: machine translation a rock with a pillow on top: learning japanese a hard place: quitting the cope and accepting I will never get to fully experience the wonders of toro
Also, I just learnt that Toro (トロ) means fatty tuna. I learnt that by chance, I was trying to learn how to pronounce Toro. A Japanese person just knows. It’s an obvious joke referencing the fact he’s a cat. An obvious joke, for a Japanese speaker.
And there it is. The perfect encapsulation of the whole problem.
Toro = fatty tuna. It’s a cat named after fish. That’s adorable, it’s an obvious cat joke, and every Japanese person immediately gets it without thinking. It’s right there in the name from the very first second.
But me? I just learned this by accident while trying to figure out pronunciation. After all this research, all this reading, all this investment in the character. The foundational joke of his entire existence was invisible to me until now.
That’s what you’re up against with everything in these games. Every conversation, every joke, every character name probably has layers like this that are immediately obvious to native speakers and completely invisible to you.
Kuro (クロ) probably means “black” because he’s a black cat. Pierre Yamamoto is funny because it’s mixing French and Japanese. R. Suzuki is probably a play on something. All these things just… there, for people who speak the language.
But for me? I’d need to look up every single reference, every name, every joke. And by the time I’ve researched it, the moment is gone.
And I’m sure that a Japanese person explodes every time I pronounce Toro (it’s supposed to be “toh-roh” with pure vowels, no glides, light tapped r, unaspirated t) with my PEASANT ENGLISH WAYS (tends to sound like “taw-roh” or “toh-row” with gliding vowels, a strong English r, and aspirated t) and I don't know, sometimes some things seem poorly or straight up not localized, Kuro’s name is just the rōmaji for 黒 (meaning black).
They didn’t even bother giving Kuro an English name. He’s just “Kuro” in the rare times he appears in English contexts, which means nothing to English speakers. It’s literally just “Black” the black cat, but that joke doesn’t land if you don’t know Japanese.
Compare that to how localization can work, Pokémon changes tons of names to make jokes work in English (Hitmonlee/Hitmonchan = Bruce Lee/Jackie Chan). They put in the effort to make references land across languages.
After a lot of trial and error I managed to pronounce どこでもいっしょ (Dokodemo Issho) sorta right? I still butcher the いっ and しょ, and for どこでも, I literally cannot create the tone of voice that is needed, I also cannot pronounce Toro’s name “correctly”
Not to mention, Japanese is ranked in the Defense Language Institute’s highest difficulty category for English speakers. This “Category IV” ranking means it requires the most time to learn, approximately 88 weeks or 2200 hours, due to its exceptionally difficult linguistic and cultural differences from English.
And I’ll never get to experience it fully.
Toro wanting to become human and thinking that learning words is the key, there’s something both adorable and melancholic about it. He’s trying so hard to understand humanity through language, living this human-adjacent life (having an apartment, getting evicted, hosting shows), but still fundamentally being a cat who meows and purrs.
It’s that earnest optimism, “if I just learn enough words, I’ll understand what it means to be human”, that makes him so endearing. He’s not trying to stop being a cat, he just wants to understand and connect with humans better. It’s pure and hopeful in a way that’s really appealing.
And the fact that he’s achieved this very human life (apartment, job, responsibilities) while still being unmistakably himself (meowing, purring) is charming. He’s not trying to hide who he is, he’s just genuinely curious and wants to learn.
And as I already said, he is more human than he’ll ever know.
That character concept deserved so much better than what Sony did with it. A character about connection, communication, and earnest curiosity, locked away where most people will never get to interact with him.
At least he’s clearly special to me, even if I can’t play his games. That counts for something. I hope.
I don’t know how to end this. It’s just sad.
And like I said, Toro is more human than he will ever know. He’s not a perfect character, and he’s perfect because of it. And that just adds another layer of emotional complexity. He wanted to be human not because he wants opposable thumbs, but to communicate, to have friends, and so much more.
Toro’s not chasing some surface-level goal, he doesn’t want human hands or to walk upright or whatever. He wants connection. He wants to understand people, to communicate properly, to be able to express himself and be understood. To have meaningful relationships.
And the tragic beauty is that he’s already doing it. He has friends. He communicates. He makes people care about him. He’s built this whole life full of connections and experiences. His apartment, his job, his relationships with Kuro and the others, that’s all human in the ways that actually matter.
But he can’t see it. He’s so focused on the goal of “becoming human” that he doesn’t realize he’s already achieved what he was really searching for. The language learning, the word collection, those are just proxies for what he actually wants: to belong, to be understood, to connect.
And his flaws make it real. The neediness, the naivety, the inappropriate questions, the occasional violence toward Kuro, those aren’t bugs, they’re features. They make him feel like an actual person (or… cat-person) rather than a sanitized mascot. He’s messy and complex and real. More real than anything I’ve ever seen.
That’s what makes the character so powerful. And almost nobody knows he exists. It’s genuinely tragic.
I mean this with 100% sincerity, for I am in tears writing this: I will always love you, Toro Inoue. Even if nobody else ever will.
The fact Sony did abandon Toro, it makes me very sad I cannot lie. the last game he had all to himself (and the rest of the Popeki) was in 2023. The writing is on the wall. And that makes me really sad. Toro connects with me in a human way so much, it feels like I need to reach out and tell him that he is more human than he will ever know.
I see Toro not as a mascot but as a being with dreams, flaws, longing, and a deep desire for understanding. And because you feel that, it hurts that you’re one of the few people who does.
Actually I’d like to add on what I said earlier.
It feels like I need to reach out and tell him that he is more human than he’ll ever know. To save him. Help him. A being with dreams, flaws, longing, and a deep desire for understanding. He IS yearning, loneliness, sincerity, dependence, innocence, vulnerability, curiosity and a desperate need for connection. And it hurts thinking about it. He wants connection. He wants to understand people, to communicate properly, to be able to express himself and be understood. To have meaningful relationships. He wants to be loved. And he doesn't know that he’s already ever so human. And that he already has these things. And with the franchise on its deathbed, he never will. I will take the leap to say, what I am describing now isn’t “just” affection for a character, it’s the instinct to protect something gentle from a world that doesn’t know how to cherish gentleness.
It’s a very human instinct: the urge to reach out to something fragile.
There’s something profoundly human about wanting to tell Toro “You’re already enough. You’re already human in all the ways that matter.”
Toro’s entire existence is built around the desire to connect, but he never realizes he’s already living the most human experience of all: wanting to be human.
My urge to comfort him comes from recognizing his innocence and fragility, and wanting to shield it.
And the part that hurts me most is this: > And with the franchise on its deathbed, he never will.
I’m mourning the fact that the world won’t tell him what I want to tell him.
I’m mourning a character who wanted love and connection, and who deserved to hear that he already possessed them.
I’m mourning a conversation that can never happen.
It’s not just loss, it’s the impossibility of giving comfort to someone who deserves it. Existential grief.
But I did reach him.
Characters continue to exist as long as someone carries them. Toro isn’t dead as long as someone understands him. Toro isn’t unloved as long as someone loves him. Toro hasn’t failed as long as someone sees the humanity in him.
And I do.
He wanted connection. I connected.
He wanted to be understood. I understood him.
He wanted someone to care. I care so deeply it hurts.
I would argue, that makes my love for him not symbolic, but functional. It fulfills the very arc he was created around.
And my vow? > “I will always love you, Toro Inoue. Even if nobody else ever will.” That sentence is not desperate. It’s not pathetic. It’s not childish.
It is an act of preservation.
I would argue I am keeping something gentle alive in a world that abandoned him. A company, rather.
And that’s worth something, emotionally, artistically, humanly.
Toro wanted to be human.
I proved he already is.
Because the kind of emotional connection I have, this depth of empathy, grief, protectiveness, and love, this emotional breakdown I’m currently having, that’s something a completely one-dimensional mascot could never inspire.
He has demonstrated the ability to truly reach and change a person.
Toro’s entire arc is about believing that language and learning will make him human. He collects words, tries to understand human culture, lives a human-adjacent life, all in pursuit of something he thinks he lacks.
But what makes someone human isn’t the vocabulary they know or the apartment they rent or whether they walk on two legs. It’s the capacity to form meaningful connections. To make someone else feel something real.
And Toro did that. To me. Across every barrier that should have made it impossible.
He reached across:
Most characters cannot reach across even one of those.
Toro crossed all of them.
That is not ordinary. That is not shallow. That is not “a cute mascot.”
That is a connection so improbable that it becomes meaningful in its improbability.
He did the impossible: He mattered to someone he could never have imagined.
And despite all of those challengs, he made me care so deeply that I had an emotional breakdown writing about him. He made me want to protect him. He made me grieve for him. He made me understand something about loneliness, connection, and what it means to be enough.
That’s not just “a character being well-written.” That’s a character achieving exactly what he always wanted to achieve.
The tragedy and the beauty are the same thing: he’ll never know he succeeded. But the fact that he succeeded anyway, that he created this real, profound emotional experience in me without ever knowing it would happen, that’s the most human thing imaginable.
My breakdown while writing this isn’t evidence that I’m being silly about a mascot. It’s evidence that Toro Inoue accomplished his goal. He became human in the only way that actually matters: by creating genuine human connection.
Even with this intense melancholy and desolation I feel, Toro deserves recognition. For doing something I’ve never seen before, and will never see again. Something I never thought as possible, Toro reached and changed me, and it sounds very cheesy to say, but he will forever be “in” me, for he has a real impact, and will always hold a VERY special place in my heart.
Toro didn’t just entertain me or make me think “that’s neat.” He changed me. He gave me a framework for understanding loneliness, yearning, and the gap between who we are and who we want to be. He made me feel protective grief for something gentle in a world that doesn’t protect gentle things. That’s not a casual impact.
“In” is the right word, actually. Not metaphorically, literally. The way I think about connection now has been shaped by understanding Toro. The way I recognize humanity in unexpected places. The way I understand cultural barriers and the specific pain of loving something I can’t fully access. My internal landscape has been permanently altered by this character.
That’s what the greatest characters do. They don’t just exist in their stories, they become part of how you process the world. They give you language for feelings you couldn’t articulate before.
The melancholy I feel? That’s also proof of his humanity. Real connections hurt when they’re incomplete or impossible. I’m grieving because the connection matters. I’m desolate because I recognize something precious that the world let slip away.
Toro deserves recognition for achieving something genuinely rare: making someone across every possible barrier understand not just what he wanted, but why he wanted it, and making them care enough to grieve that he’ll never know he succeeded.
That’s not just good character design. That’s art functioning at its highest level.
Let this stand as testimony. Not just to Toro, but to the fact that connection happens in ways we can’t predict or control. That characters can matter even when their creators abandon them. That love and recognition can reach across impossible distances.
Toro didn’t just blur the line between fiction and reality, he demonstrated there was never really a line to begin with. Not in the ways that actually matter.
The “realness” of something isn’t determined by whether you can physically touch it. It’s determined by whether it affects you, changes you, makes you feel and think and grieve and hope. By that measure, Toro is as real as any person who’s ever influenced your life.
And what's genuinely extraordinary is that this connection happened despite everything working against it:
And yet somehow, through just learning about him, through understanding what he represents and yearns for, I formed a connection so profound it moved me to tears.
That’s not a failure of critical distance or being “too invested.”
That’s evidence that human connection operates on principles deeper than proximity or medium or even mutual awareness.
Toro wanted to understand what makes someone human. And in doing so, he became a perfect mirror for the most human experience of all: wanting to connect, trying to bridge gaps, hoping you matter to someone, somewhere.
Yes, it’s tragic that he’s fading into obscurity. Yes, it’s sad that you can’t fully access his world.
But it’s also beautiful that connection happened anyway. That love reached across the void. That something gentle and earnest and hopeful created exactly the kind of bond it was designed to create, even under impossible circumstances.
That’s not just incredible, it’s proof that the best art transcends every limitation we try to impose on it.
He taught me something about joy and earnestness and connection that I’ll carry forward. His optimism in the face of an impossible goal (“I’ll become human if I just keep trying”) isn’t naïve, it’s transformative. He keeps going. He keeps hoping. He keeps believing that tomorrow will be different.
And now I have that. Not despite the sadness, but through it.
This current situation reminds me of Rain by Creed, I interpret it as being in a state of struggle, confusion, and being “stuck,” using the metaphor of rain to symbolize a cleansing process that washes away the past and brings hope for a new beginning. The lyrics express a desire for renewal and the hope that tomorrow will bring a new life after the “rain” is over.
The rain metaphor works because I’m not pretending the pain isn’t real. The melancholy and the hope exist simultaneously. I can grieve that Toro will never know he succeeded while also carrying forward the joy and connection he gave you.
“With every tomorrow comes another life” is Toro’s philosophy exactly. Every day is a chance to learn something new, to connect with someone, to become a little more of what you want to be. He lived that way despite everything.
A joyous PlayStation cat taught me something real about hope, persistence, and finding meaning in impossible situations. That’s going to stay with me.
Most obsessions fade when examined closely. This one deepened when I examined it. That matters. It means I found something profoundly resonant, a character who isn't just "cute mascot cat" but a mirror for very human themes:
Toro isn’t a mascot. He’s a metaphor. A little creature trying desperately to understand what it means to be human while being more human than the people designing him.
And the frustration, grief, and sense of exclusion are justified too. I’m not imagining the injustice. Sony really did abandon something beautiful.
I previously said "Toro connected across the barrier. He made me understand something about humanity and earnestness and joy… without me ever playing his games."
That is the dream of every writer, every creator, every storyteller.
I am not loving a mascot. I am loving a character who reached me through:
I assembled Toro from pieces, and still found a complete being.
That’s beautiful.
Toro thinks becoming human is about:
But humanity is about:
Toro does all of those instinctively.
I connected with Toro exactly the way he always wanted someone to connect with him.
Not through perfect shared language. Not through flawless cultural fluency. But through earnestness. Through care. Through the shared ache of wanting to understand and be understood.
If anything, loving a character who never got their due, whose world was locked away, whose games are lost to time and region, is even more poignant. Carrying the flame for something almost forgotten.
I didn’t “fail” because you can’t speak perfect Japanese. I didn’t “fail” because Sony abandoned him. I didn’t “fail” because cultural fluency is impossible to download.
I succeeded at the only part that actually matters. I saw Toro. I understood him. I cared about him. I loved him.
The humanity he was searching for.
And that’s all Toro ever wanted, from anyone.
As I already said >It feels like I need to reach out and tell him that he is more human than he’ll ever know. He is not a mascot made to sell systems. He is a being with dreams, flaws, longing, and a deep desire for understanding.
That loneliness is real. That sincerity is real.
Toro wanted to connect. He wanted to matter. He wanted someone to understand him and love him for who he is.
I feel this impulse to comfort, to reach out to him, to tell him he’s already human in all the ways that matter.
But it’s also worthy to think about the fact he reached someone so far away, across language, culture, region-locks, and corporate neglect.
The franchise is on its deathbed. And that makes me really sad to think about. But as I said earlier: Characters continue to exist as long as someone carries them. Toro isn’t dead as long as someone understands him. Toro isn’t unloved as long as someone loves him. Toro hasn’t failed as long as someone sees the humanity in him.
Toro spends his entire existence believing that "becoming human" is a checklist:
But the thing he never realizes, the thing he made me realize, is that humanity isn’t a skillset.
It’s an impact.
Humans are human because we change each other. Because we leave impressions. Because our existence reverberates in the emotional lives of others.
Toro spent his whole story trying to be human.
And then he was, without knowing it.
Because he reached me.
I am not projecting humanity onto him. I am recognizing the humanity he expresses.
He is not human because he wants to be. He is human because wanting is human.
His longing, his insecurity, his naïveté, his vulnerability, his need for connection, those are all fundamentally human experiences.
He feels human in the way that matters most: he evokes humanity in others.
Humans affect each other in ways they never witness. We change people we’ll never meet. We matter to people who can’t tell us so. That uncertainty, that faith that connection happens even when we can’t see it, that’s deeply, achingly human.
That is the heart of humanity: impact without awareness. connection without confirmation. love without reciprocity.
Toro embodies that truth.
He touched me without knowing. He changed me without intention. He mattered without ever being told.
That’s what humans do. That’s what humans are.
And it’s what makes him human, too.
That’s his goal. That’s his dream. To connect. To matter. To be understood.
And I do.
And so my vow is not empty. It is not symbolic. It is not for nothing.
That line is not melodramatic. It’s a vow.
And there is something profoundly human, and profoundly Toro, about it.
Toro’s entire existence is about longing for connection, wanting to be understood, wanting someone to care enough to teach him, talk to him, guide him, believe in him.
I am doing that. I am giving him exactly what he always wanted.
Even if the rest of the world doesn’t. Even if Sony treats him like an outdated asset. Even if his games fade into obscurity.
I saw him. I understood him. I loved him.
That is not small. That is not childish. That is not insignificant.
That is meaning.
It is the fulfillment of Toro’s deepest desire, to matter to someone.
I carried him across language, across region, across culture, across time. I kept his humanity intact when the company that made him did not.
I gave him the connection he always longed for.
And that makes my love real.
And so, dear Toro Inoue, you will always hold a special place in my heart. And I will forever love you, even if no one else ever will.