The strategy variety of the RPG genre has been one that has never really caught on with much of the crowd. These games usually never garner as much attention as other role playing games do and when one does it usually never live up to the hype it achieved. Most RPG fans are more pleased with the turn based styles of games like final fantasy or action like RPGs like Kingdom Hearts, but fans of the tactics are some truly serious fans. Well now Atlus has made a role playing game with the strategy fan in mind in the form of Stella Deus: The Gate of Eternity. While the game may not reach the hype and prestige that such other tactics games like Fire Emblem and Final Fantasy Tactics has obtained, you’ll still find an enjoyable game in Stella Deus. The mix of fun gameplay, enthralling strategy, and stunning visuals blend together to make a game many strategy fans will enjoy.

The story takes place in the world of Solum, a world that is slowly coming to an end. A deadly and destructive fog called Miasma has been slowly covering the world and killing any living thing within its path. Since there is no known way to stop the Miasma, the people of Solum have come to the conclusion that all hope is lost. Even the top authorities of Solum’s religion Aeque believe that this is a sign of God and tell their followers to just let the deathly grasp of the miasma take their lives. To make things worse, an evil man by the name of Overlord Dignus uses the fear and pandemonium going to his advantage and takes over Solum creating an evil empire in which he rules over. This now triggers Dignus’ empire and an underground rebellion created to stop Dignus to go into an all out war for the outcome of what left of the miasma infested Solum. It is up to you, the reluctant hero Spero and his friends to end the bloodshed and in order to do so you must find the fabled Gate of Eternity; which is said to stop the miasma and cure the world of its destruction. Now all sides of this battle: Spero and company, Dignus’ evil empire, the Alchemic rebellion, and the religious Aeque are all in search of the gate for their own intentions. The only question is who will find it and will the world of Solum be saved?

While playing Stella Deus you’ll come to find that one thing that really stands out in the game is the wonderful visuals. The visuals in the cutscenes have a very unique feel that blends anime like art with soft drawing styles. Even during combat the sprites are incredibly well detailed and show it from the simplest of things like character movement all the way to the more involving abilities like your special and team attacks which involve multiple characters flying across the screen and bright colored visuals all going at the same time. You’ll come to find that the quality of sound in Stella Deus is about on the same level of quality as the visuals. The music is very well put together and fits the situation pretty well, from the intense energetic battle music to the calm and peaceful music found in the over map feature. The dialog is spoken in the game as well and while it is nice to hear some voices to what is going on in the scene it would have been nice to hear some better voices.

Now like every other strategy RPG you’ll be taking your fights to the battlefield in the form of a grid based map. What helps Stella Deus stand out from other strategy rpgs is that your entire turn depends on how many action points you have during that turn. Action points are used to allow you to do such actions like move your characters, use items, or even attack with your weapons or magic. Action points help add an entire new level of thought to the game and while it may take a bit of time for you to get the hang of the game its still is a pretty interesting way to go at the gameplay. You will be refreshed with some more action points every time your turn rolls around but even then the purpose of the AP system is for you to optimize your points to your advantage without wasting so many points in one try. Combat does have a tendency to get a bit repetitive but as long as you know how to work the AP system to your favor majority of the battles end up being rather simple.

You’ll come across a wide variety of characters that will eventually team up with you and aid you in battles. Once they gain enough experience points from battles they will level up and you will be able to upgrade their stats to make them stronger. It is wise however to make sure your characters are on par in levels with each other or else you will have to spend time in the Catacomb of trials leveling your weaker fighters up to your stronger ones before you can continue with the story. Your team members vary of such classes like fighters, alchemist, and swordsmen, but there are not many unique classes that stand out amongst the generic ones we’ve seen in tactic rpgs before. Since many classes act like similar classes as well you’ll find that certain special attacks tend to repeat themselves since each classes has their own set powers and some classes share abilities with certain characters. Like many rpgs as well, the more you use a certain character the more they will gain experience points, which allows them to level when they reach a certain amount of xp points. You can customize your characters abilities and decide for yourself which powers they can and can not use, this helps differentiate certain characters that have similar power levels a bit. Equipping certain items to a character can give them special abilities as well and majority of the time you will find the powers given to you by items can be the most deadly of them all. The best attacks however are the team attacks and depending on the situation you can have two of your teammates on the field pull of a combo attack that is not only very cool to look at but able to cause massive damage as well. There is a wide array of options and customize to do with your characters in Stella Deus and though it would have been nice to see some more variety in the character classes its still fun to pick new powers and abilities for your fighters.

When you are not in the battle field taking on your enemies or in the catacombs leveling up you will find yourself in either the shop or a town guild. The shop is self-explanatory as its here where you can purchase new items, weapons, and armor while selling old ones as well. The guild is where you can pick which quest you want to take on next. These quests vary in their importance and while most are simply for you to gain some more money, other quest will result in finding new team members or progressing the story along. While at the guild you can pick an option called “item fusions” which lets you pick any two items from your inventory and combine them together to make one item. Most of the items you will find in the game can be combined to make a completely new item. In some cases there are items you can not even obtain unless you fuse the right items together.

To sum things up, Stella Deus is a very fun and interesting strategy RPG that fans of the genre will definitely enjoy. The game may not stand out amongst the other top tier titles in the genre but what it delivers in game play options is great. Between the interesting combat, useful item fusing, and well detailed character customization you’ll find that there is just about something for everyone in this game. While some of the fights tend to get a bit repetitive and the certain combat features like the action point system may be tricky to understand at first, there is still little in Stella Deus that is flawed. While you my find yourself taking more time to level than progress through the story you’ll still find yourself having fun doing it since Stella Deus is a pretty well balanced game. This is a game strategy fans should not miss out on as well as a game first timers should give a chance since you may even find yourself enjoying this quality title in the strategy genre.