Stella Deus, developed by Altus and company, released late April of 05, is a turn based strategy RPG that does by no me
Genre - Fantasy Turn Based Strategy
Maker - Altus
Release date - April 26th, 2005
1 player
Game length - Approximately 50 hours
Rating - 5.4
Stella Deus, developed by Altus and company, released late April of 05, is a turn based strategy RPG that does by no means re-define its genre. It does however succeed in creating the worst voice-over acting experience ever witnessed by gamers to date.
The truth is that I did not get through much of this game, and my review is somewhat a reflection of that. My opinion is based on the first 30 minutes I spent trying to struggle through the intro. I regretfully purchased Stella Deus after reading the Official Gamespot review and miscellaneous player reviews. The range of context I saw when attempting to base my decision for purchase was misleading to say the least. Although the score for SD was only a 7.5, rather unrealistic might I add, I decided to purchase the title, making the largest mistake I’ve ever made in the gaming industry.
When I look back on the reasons for my purchase I feel that one must never judge a book by its cover, and I am no less of a person because I didn’t. The fact is I feel that this game should have a warning on it, perhaps in large red letters stating CAUTION : purchase at own risk. Then in fine print beneath the warning, Altus and affiliates are in no way responsible for the destruction of your PS2.(The reason they would need that is because last night I felt that destroying the PS2 would be preferable to playing in game further.)
When arriving at my home that evening I sat down with my partner and popped in the disk, hoping to be pleasantly surprised by a traditional fantasy theme turn base strategy .
I have to be honest here, the first moment I heard the voice acting I was immediately turned off. It was worse than bad, it was all wrong for the characters they were representing. I decided that the voices were not something I could condemn a game for , so I struggled through the intro, which for the record was way too long and extremely anticlimactic.
The intro lasted in total for 20 minutes, stretching ominously forward with a dull, bleak outlook. In that first intro I learned that the main character had the body of a young boy, and the apathetic monotone voice of an older man with no personality whatsoever. The secondary character, an Alchemist, was a weak pacifist who would rather serve his enemy than stand up to them. After watching how these two jokers were acting, I was beginning to hope that the bad guys were much better characters than the main ones. Alas, my hopes were dashed when enters the disgusting cat woman and her sideways standing captain imbecile, who’s voice acting, if possible, was even worse.
About this point I turned the sound off, thinking that maybe the game is not that bad without the sound. Just when I thought the game could sink no lower, I saw for the first time the Cackling Idiot. He was well built, slightly tan with a white pony tail, for all of you who actually made it to this point, you know just how bad this character was. I flipped the sound back on just to see if he was as bad as I thought he would be. The answer was yes. Flick- Power off PS2. Thus ended my experience with Stella Deus.
Overall- Stella Deus’ graphics were not bad, but the background music seemed as if it was not properly paired with the climate of the scene. The voice acting was HORRIBLE end of story for that part. The characters might get better, but remember I played for thirty minutes. I wrote this review not to trash on those who liked the game, but to give warning to those who might not know what bad voice acting can do to an otherwise decent game.