STRAY GODS: THE ROLE-PLAYING MUSICAL is a phenomenal game

Stray Gods: The RPG Musical by Summerfall Studios and Humble Games is a game that I have been following for a long time. When I first heard about it I fell in love with the idea. I had no idea how a role-playing musical would work, but I was excited to give it a try. Then when I heard Laura Bailey would play the main character that was sold to me. After years of anticipation, the game will finally release on August 10th on Microsoft Windows via Steam and Humble Games Store (affiliate link), Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S. I was sent a first copy of the game to review and let me tell you, this game was absolutely worth waiting for. The art, characters, cast, music and story all combine to create a truly unique and phenomenal game. I’ll avoid spoilers here, but I will mention the names of the characters that appear in the game.

Story first. You play present day as Grace, a college dropout adrift in her life. Her life is changed forever after a fateful meeting with Calliope. After Calliope is mortally wounded, she stumbles upon Grace’s apartment and grants her the powers of a muse as she dies. Already overwhelmed by it all, Grace is suddenly faced with the Chorus, the Gods and Goddesses who rule over what are now known as the Idols. They accuse Grace of killing Calliope to steal her powers. After discussing the matter, Grace is given seven days to find enough evidence to convince them of her innocence or face her death. You’ll spend the rest of the time learning about the world of idols, meeting familiar Greek gods like Apollo and lesser-known deities like Hecate. At this point the story can diverge in so many different ways depending on who you decide to turn to for help and who you decide to trust. You’ll also be able to choose one of three different character traits that will influence the choices you’ll be able to make throughout the game. You can choose one at the start and then another in the mid-game. Every key choice in the songs clearly corresponds to a trait, you can choose the one that matches your traits but you don’t have to. The game is full of charm and has some really funny moments and other emotional moments that hit hard. There are four romantic characters which sounds incredibly low for a game like this, but believe me if there were more it would have been too much to handle. Overall, the story was really good and intriguing. I loved solving the mystery of it all and even though I know the answer now, I’m excited to go back and play a few more times to find information I couldn’t get before and get a more complete picture of this world.

The art for the game is all hand drawn and beautiful. It plays like a visual novel and all of the art is great. I’ve always loved the dramatic way Grace’s eyes lit up when her powers were activated. The character designs are all really good. I loved the designs of Grace, Persephone, Hecate and Medusa. All the characters look great, though, there’s a strong case to be made for a certain character design to be someone’s favorite.

The music, and by extension the cast, is really the selling point of this game. This is the unique element that sets it apart from other games. It’s that good, really that good. If you have any passing interest in musical theater then you will definitely want to check out this game. There is a lot of variation in music from playing in different genres to just the style of singers they had. Bailey really shines as Grace, but the rest of the cast wasn’t sloppy either. Mary Elizabeth McGlynn, Slutty Baker, Janina Gavankar, Khary Payton, Abubakar Salim, Felicia Day, Raul Kohli, Merry Clark, Merle Dandridge, Erika Ishi, Ashley Johnson, Lauren ‘Lolo’ Spencer, Anjali Bhimani, Kimberley BrooksAND Antonio Rep they were all so good that I’m not even sure I can pick a favorite. Everyone did so well and they were all so perfectly cast in their roles.

Finally, the team has done everything to make this game accessible to as many people as possible. From turning off timed decisions to audio descriptions to customizing subtitles, you can read everything they’ve done on the Summerfall Studios site. It also includes all activation alerts so you can make an informed decision about whether you can handle what’s in the game. After playing it I wouldn’t call it anything graphic, but it’s still good to read ahead if you’re sensitive to any of the topics listed.

I really can’t recommend this game enough. If you like stage musicals and/or Greek mythology, definitely get this game. I love playing games for story and this was so good and incredibly satisfying. This is just a very unique type of game and it’s clear the team that worked on it loved what they were doing. There is nothing I would change about it, a well deserved 10/10.