There aren’t many more ambitious ideas than a musical video game for any studio, let alone for a studio’s debut title, but here we are with Stray Gods from Australian studio Summerfall Games. While it may be the studio’s first game, there is no dearth of experience involved in the project with David Gaider, formerly the lead writer on BioWare’s Dragon Age series and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, writing the game and the score by Austin Wintory, known for his work on Journey, flOw, and Assassin’s Creed Syndicate. That’s before mentioning the star-studded cast featuring Laura Bailey, Ashley Johnson, Troy Baker, Mary Elizabeth McGlynn, Anthony Rapp, Rahul Kohli, Felicia Day and more.
Players of this musical visual novel will take up the role of Grace who finds herself accused of the murder of the last muse of Greek Mythology and must use her newly gifted musical abilities to clear her name.
The Koalaty Critics are split on Stray Gods with most giving the game a 6 while a few fell under the game’s musical spell. While all loved the game’s visual style and appreciated its ambition, views differ on the quality of the music in the game and its cohesion with the gameplay elements. Those who loved the game praised the performances while others were not as kind.
Stray Gods is available now on PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch and PC.
Here’s what Australian critics are saying about the game.
KOALATY CRITICS – AUSTRALIAN CRITICS
Checkpoint Gaming – 9/10 (David McNamara)
Despite a star-studded creative team and a slick marketing campaign, Stray Gods remains charmingly indie and personal in its tone. Each character is lovingly designed and gets moments of light and shade throughout their dialogue, while the songs elevate the intensity of the drama in ways only a musical could achieve.
GamesHub – 5/5 (Christie McQualter)
The crown jewel of Stray Gods is its rich narrative. Even if I hated every song in the game – which I didn’t, I was pleasantly surprised by the hybridisation of the more traditional musical sound with contemporary genres like hip hop or rock – I would have endured them for this story. Beyond my affinity for mysteries and problem-solving or my anticipation at seeing how the artists would depict familiar characters like the Minotaur or Gorgon, I found myself thinking about the game even when I wasn’t playing it for an unexpected reason.
Kotaku AU – No Score (David Smith)
It tries its best, but there is a clash at the heart of its musical production that is holding it back. The score, by famed video game composer Austin Wintory, is just that — a score, and a good one, because that’s Wintory’s major area of expertise. The problem is that it feels like Wintory has written a video game score rather than arrangements for a musical.
Player2 – B (Stephen del Prado & Jess Zammit)
I truly love what they’ve tried to do here, and can appreciate that it must have been a mammoth task to get something like this released at all, but some choices that they’ve made with the direction of the game have me wondering if maybe this marriage of forms and genres is achievable in quite the way they’ve imagined. There’s a lot of power in the narrative, and there are elements of the story and its characters that I appreciate, but it just doesn’t quite… hit the way that musicals usually do? – Jess Zammit
Press Start – 6.5/10 (Brodie Gibbons)
I can’t help but feel that the songwriters might have been spread a bit thin considering every permutation, however. Except for a select few, the songs in Stray Gods don’t get their hooks in and are fast forgotten as you advance the plot. I do think the songs they choose to reprise and use as motifs throughout are well-picked, particularly Grace’s first solo which features prominently throughout.
SIFTER – No Score (Adam Christou)
These are the moments where Stray Gods truly springs to life – I found myself grinning with joy as I nudged story moments in unexpected directions through song. Tonally, some of these moments can be quirky and comedic, others can be deep, personal moments about life, death and trauma where the stakes feel incredibly high. It’s all helped by the incredibly high production values that Stray Gods has.
Stevivor – 6/10 (Steve Wright)
While performances in both Buffy and the recent Strange New Worlds outing aren’t perfect, they’re anchored by likeable, complex characters that convey real emotion; as such, you’re invested all throughout. With Stray Gods, something’s just missing and the end result feels hollow.
WellPlayed – 6/10 (James Wood)
The promise of Stray Gods’ roleplaying musical is predicated on how organic it makes controlling the flow of a song feel to the player. Musicals encompass an impossibly wide array of genres but, broadly, the core tenets of a successful one remain the same – rhythm, emotion, and lyricism. There’s maybe a world in which choosing the next line of a song doesn’t dramatically alter this chemistry, but Stray Gods rarely finds it.
Aggregator Score
