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Dark Deity

Dark Deity is an homage to classic SRPGs offering quite a bit of depth and polish.
Dark Deity Game Cover
73%Game Brain Score
story, gameplay
stability, grinding
75% User Score Based on 2,118 reviews
Critic Score 71%Based on 13 reviews

Platforms

Nintendo SwitchPCSteam DeckWindows
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Dark Deity Game Cover

About

Dark Deity is a single player tactical role playing game with a fantasy theme. It was developed by Sword & Axe LLC and was released on June 15, 2021. It received mostly positive reviews from both critics and players.

In Dark Deity, lead a group of students-turned-soldiers in a tactical RPG with branching storylines and class systems. Wield unique weapons, engage in strategic battles, and navigate complex relationships in a desperate fight to save your homeland. With over 27 playable characters and thrilling, hand-crafted battles, every decision matters in this epic fantasy adventure.

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Dark Deity screenshot
Dark Deity screenshot
Dark Deity screenshot
Dark Deity screenshot
Dark Deity screenshot
Dark Deity screenshot
Dark Deity screenshot
Dark Deity screenshot
Dark Deity screenshot
Dark Deity screenshot
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75%
Audience ScoreBased on 2,118 reviews
story255 positive mentions
stability121 negative mentions
  • The game successfully captures the essence of classic Fire Emblem games with its turn-based tactical gameplay and character customization.
  • The character designs and animations are visually appealing, adding charm to the overall experience.
  • The class system allows for diverse builds and strategies, providing a satisfying sense of progression.
  • The game suffers from numerous bugs and glitches that can disrupt gameplay, including issues with unit positioning and crashes.
  • The story and character development are often generic and lack depth, making it difficult to become invested in the narrative.
  • The user interface is clunky and unintuitive, making inventory management and navigation frustrating.
  • story
    1,316 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The story of "Dark Deity" has received mixed reviews, with many players finding it generic and lacking depth. While some appreciate the character interactions and bond system, others criticize the pacing and predictability of the plot, noting that it often feels rushed and disjointed. Overall, the narrative serves primarily as a vehicle for gameplay rather than a compelling experience, leading some players to skip dialogue entirely in favor of focusing on the tactical elements.

    • “Narratively, Dark Deity crafts a story that touches on themes of war, loyalty, and the consequences of ambition.”
    • “The art is charming and the characters/story feel nicely fleshed out and engaging.”
    • “The story unfolds in an approachable way and players can delve into the various character interactions to their own taste.”
    • “The story is lackluster; it's UI (while clear) is clunky, and the tuning can swing wildly at times.”
    • “The story is a bit... meh.”
    • “The story is completely forgettable and if you asked me for a summary of the plot I wouldn't even be able to give you one.”
  • gameplay
    793 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The gameplay of "Dark Deity" is generally well-received, with many players appreciating its turn-based tactical mechanics reminiscent of the Fire Emblem series, including a diverse class system and unique weapon types. However, the game suffers from a lack of clear tutorials and explanations for its mechanics, leading to confusion among new players. While the core gameplay is engaging and offers strategic depth, issues such as bugs, UI design flaws, and a somewhat generic story detract from the overall experience, making it more appealing to fans of the genre rather than newcomers.

    • “The gameplay is solid, and the character art is beautiful.”
    • “The gameplay captures the feel of a good GBA Fire Emblem.”
    • “The gameplay is fun, though don't expect any grandmaster level strategies to be necessary.”
    • “The gameplay is a mess.”
    • “The battlesave mechanic is underexplained and finicky, so I never felt safe closing the game down mid-fight -- which can last over an hour at times.”
    • “The game does very little in effectively teaching anything about the mechanics beyond the very basics.”
  • music
    302 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The music in the game has received mixed reviews, with many players finding it repetitive and forgettable, often failing to enhance the emotional impact of key scenes. While some tracks are praised for their quality and fit within the game's atmosphere, others are criticized for being out of place or poorly implemented, leading to jarring transitions between different musical themes. Overall, the soundtrack is seen as a weak point, lacking the memorability and depth expected from a title in this genre.

    • “The soundtrack complements the mood effectively, with atmospheric compositions that enhance the tension and drama of the story and battles without overwhelming the gameplay.”
    • “The music is solid and in particular I like some of the base camp music.”
    • “The art is cute, the music is pretty good, writing is decent, and it is an overall great first impression.”
    • “The music is also so bad and loud, extremely out of place at times.”
    • “The music is very forgettable; the first map theme sounds like it'd play in Plants vs. Zombies, not an SRPG.”
    • “The music placement was awkward as hell.”
  • graphics
    257 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The graphics of the game are a mixed bag, with many players appreciating the nostalgic pixel-art style reminiscent of classic tactical RPGs like Fire Emblem, while others criticize the overall execution and presentation. Character artwork and animations are often praised for their quality, but issues such as graphical glitches, inconsistent aesthetics, and a clash between the UI and pixel art detract from the experience. Overall, while the visuals have charm and appeal to fans of retro games, they also reveal significant room for improvement in terms of polish and coherence.

    • “Visually, the game embraces a pixel-art style reminiscent of early tactical RPGs, which will appeal strongly to fans of the classics.”
    • “The artwork and design are also fantastic with amazing animations.”
    • “The graphics are great for this type of game.”
    • “Add to that the fact that the UI clashes severely with the game's graphics, and the presentation truly becomes a mess.”
    • “Visually, this is a hamfisted mess, a dog's breakfast of bad visuals, and this kind of laziness and poor quality should never be foisted on gamers.”
    • “There is zero attempt at even pretending to provide any thought to the graphics design of the game, other than to ensure that all the sprites look sloppy, lumpy and perform clumsy eight-frame animations.”
  • stability
    123 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The stability of the game has been widely criticized, with numerous users reporting a high frequency of bugs and glitches that detract from the overall experience. While some players noted that many issues are not game-breaking and can be resolved with troubleshooting, the game is described as feeling unpolished and "buggy as hell." Despite ongoing patches from the development team, many reviewers recommend waiting for further fixes before purchasing, as the current state is seen as unfinished and frustrating.

    • “The game runs great once I disabled VSync in my NVIDIA settings, which was locking it to 30fps. After that, everything flowed smoothly without any slow-motion effects.”
    • “While there are minor areas that feel a bit unpolished, overall, the stability of the game is commendable, allowing for an enjoyable experience.”
    • “The game maintains a solid performance throughout, with only a few minor hiccups that don't detract from the overall stability.”
    • “First things first, this game is absolutely chock full of bugs and glitches, and in many occasions it feels like it's held together by duct tape and spit.”
    • “The game launched in a very buggy state, although the development team has been running overtime to get everything fixed up and implement requested changes, so there's little to fear here for new buyers.”
    • “The constant bugs, errors, and glitches really put me off.”
  • replayability
    90 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game offers high replayability through extensive customization options, including a built-in randomizer, branching class promotions, and various difficulty settings. Players can experiment with different character combinations and gameplay styles, making each playthrough feel unique. However, some reviewers noted that the lack of alternate story paths and side content may limit replay value for certain players.

    • “The branching promotion trees encourage experimentation and offer meaningful replayability, making each run feel distinct depending on the choices made.”
    • “The game has a ton of replayability too, which is absolutely fantastic for an early access game.”
    • “What I really like was on game start you have a ton of options to select to alter game difficulty and variety such as unit recruitment order, enemy classes, enemy weapons, gold and exp gains; I can tell that's going to be very helpful down the line for replayability.”
    • “The lack of alternate story paths, extra missions, and side content really kills the replayability.”
    • “The game definitely has a lot of replay value, not being able to use basically more than half the roster each playthrough, needing to use characters in battle to unlock support conversations and then the modifiers and randomizers that you can use to customize your campaign.”
    • “Dark Deity also lacks side quests, a postgame, a new game plus, or anything else which would otherwise provide replay value.”
  • character development
    88 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    Character development in the game is a mixed bag, with many reviewers praising the character designs and voice acting as charming and visually appealing, while criticizing the depth of the characters' stories and the pacing of their development. Some players appreciate the bond system that allows for optional character interactions, but many feel that the overall narrative lacks engagement and that character arcs often feel superficial. Despite the appealing aesthetics, the inconsistency in character development and the presence of fan-service elements detract from the overall experience.

    • “The bond system of relationships between party members is a fun way to include optional little bite-sized chunks of story and character development.”
    • “I really like the character designs; while some are the basic main character protagonist design, there are some characters that really stand out and had me invested in the story and interested to learn more about them as a character and how they interact with others!”
    • “The character designs are great, voice lines for critical hits are spot on, and the combat and gameplay scratch all those old Fire Emblem itches I haven't been able to scratch for years.”
    • “Character development doesn't really happen.”
    • “There's just no character development that is engaging in the story cut scenes (with one or two exceptions).”
    • “The world building is really poor and basic, the combat sound design is really lacking, the music is dull, and all the character designs look like pretty much the same.”
  • grinding
    64 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    Overall, reviews indicate that the grinding aspect of the game is a mixed bag, with many players finding it tedious and lacking the depth or enjoyment typically associated with grinding in similar titles. While some appreciate the absence of grinding as a means to encourage tactical gameplay, others express frustration over the inability to level up characters or manage resources effectively, leading to a sense of imbalance and repetitiveness. The game's inventory management and unit positioning are also frequently cited as cumbersome, contributing to the overall feeling of tedium.

    • “The game is good, but it doesn't have the grinding that makes these games fun for me, so it's not my cup of tea.”
    • “There is no going back to areas you've been in, no farming experience, and you are constantly thrown new units at your party. If you're not prepared for this, your units will become irrelevant quickly.”
    • “The armor/weapon system tries to be more realistic/DnD-leaning in an attempt to force more strategy but ultimately feels tedious.”
    • “The item interface is tedious, the storytelling quality vacillates between droll exposition and breakneck character development that happens off-screen, and the maps are overly large without much intrinsic strategic depth.”
    • “The game lacks a grinding aspect that allows you to easily level up and promote characters, as well as stockpile gold to buy items from the shop between chapters.”
  • optimization
    34 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's optimization has received mixed reviews, with the PC version generally performing well, while players on platforms like the Nintendo Switch report significant issues such as long loading times and frame drops. Many users noted that performance hiccups, including stuttering and bugs, can disrupt gameplay, particularly in later levels, but these issues do not completely overshadow the overall experience. Overall, while some improvements have been made, the game still suffers from poor optimization and technical flaws that may affect player enjoyment.

    • “These technical hiccups do not drastically detract from the core experience but are worth noting for those sensitive to performance issues.”
    • “The fact they included battle saves and increased optimization among a host of other bugs already puts them in a better light than other developers leaving their projects as is.”
    • “There were small bugs and overall some performance issues with my device, but nothing that made it unplayable.”
    • “Instead, we get a somewhat awkward performance of a game that lacks quality of life elements which would smooth out the playthrough while still having the things that make those quality of life elements necessary in the first place.”
    • “Dark Deity is still enjoyable because it is a cheap clone of Fire Emblem, but it's a bad game without any optimization for the time and very little identity.”
    • “I don't know if it's just my PC, but the game isn't optimized at all.”
  • humor
    32 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The humor in the game is a mixed bag, featuring both hilarious moments and some cringe-worthy writing. Players appreciate the comedic character interactions and quirky class promotions, with standout characters like Benji providing memorable comedic relief. However, the presence of bugs adds an unintended layer of humor, often leading to amusing situations, though they can also detract from the overall experience.

    • “The humor is right up my alley though.”
    • “Their dialogues and interactions are witty, funny, charming, and interesting - watching characters interact, it becomes apparent that a lot of love and care has gone into this game.”
    • “The most hilarious example is the pre-battle conversation that actually takes place on the battle map, with your units already loaded into the deployment area.”
  • emotional
    18 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The emotional aspect of the game has received mixed reviews, with many players finding the story and character development lacking depth and resonance, often describing it as boring and awkward. While there are attempts at emotional moments, they frequently feel sudden and unearned, and the music fails to enhance these moments, blending into the background instead. Some players do appreciate nostalgic elements and political intrigue, but overall, the emotional impact is seen as underwhelming compared to genre peers.

    • “I've only done the first couple of maps, but the game has made me feel all sorts of warm and fuzzy nostalgia for the Fire Emblem that E3 was lacking.”
    • “There's political intrigue, emotional character development, and that classic turn-based strategy we all know and love.”
    • “There are moments in the story where you can tell it's trying to be emotional and deep, but it usually comes across as awkward more than anything.”
    • “Absolutely boring story; I generally don't engage with stories in games, but found this one exactly the same as in the 100k other SRPGs out there.”
    • “So in conclusion, boring story, boring characters, boring maps, boring gameplay.”
    • “Chapters are also very short; you can easily beat the game in 8-10 hours without even trying to speed run or LTC (skipping the boring story).”
  • monetization
    10 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The monetization strategies in these games have drawn significant criticism, particularly for their reliance on in-game advertisements and aggressive marketing tactics. Users express frustration over the intrusive nature of ads, which detract from the gaming experience, and suggest that developers prioritize advertising budgets over game quality. Overall, the heavy focus on monetization through ads and publicity stunts has led to a negative perception among players.

    • “The game strikes a great balance with its monetization strategy, offering players the option to purchase cosmetic items without impacting gameplay.”
    • “I appreciate that the monetization system is transparent and fair, allowing players to enjoy the game without feeling pressured to spend money.”
    • “The developers have done a fantastic job of ensuring that in-game purchases enhance the experience rather than detract from it.”
    • “What strikes me the most and absolutely boils my blood is the in-game advertisement.”
    • “It's a shame that the company embedded its own launcher to push ads for its other titles; the only reason I would not recommend it is to punish this tactic from them.”
    • “I think they spent a little too much on the advertising and should have put it into the game itself.”
  • atmosphere
    6 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The atmosphere of the game is enhanced by a well-crafted soundtrack that effectively complements the mood, adding tension and drama without overshadowing gameplay. While some players appreciate the retro graphics and find the world premise intriguing, others criticize the character dynamics for being overly negative, which detracts from the overall atmosphere. Overall, the game presents a fresh take on the series, with a mix of engaging elements and areas needing improvement.

    • “The soundtrack complements the mood effectively, with atmospheric compositions that enhance the tension and drama of the story and battles without overwhelming the gameplay.”
    • “I guess it's a fresh take on the FE series' formula, and they've built that atmosphere well.”
    • “It would have been more acceptable to have classic evil protagonists than a cast of characters who constantly drag the atmosphere down with their misery and self-doubt, making you question why they’re even in this war.”
    • “The setting, the personalities, the atmosphere, and themes - bland.”
    • “I won't refund the game for now, because characters seem interesting and I love the world premise and music/atmosphere, so I'll wait for a fix to at least saves and SFX separation.”
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71%Critics’ scoreBased on 13 critic reviews
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11h Median play time
12h Average play time
5-16h Spent by most gamers
*Based on 12 analyzed playthroughs
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Frequently Asked Questions

Dark Deity is a tactical role playing game with fantasy theme.

Dark Deity is available on Nintendo Switch, PC, Steam Deck and Windows.

On average players spend around 12 hours playing Dark Deity.

Dark Deity was released on June 15, 2021.

Dark Deity was developed by Sword & Axe LLC.

Dark Deity has received mostly positive reviews from both players and critics. Most players liked this game for its story but disliked it for its stability.

Dark Deity is a single player game.

Similar games include Dark Deity 2, Those Who Rule, Lost Eidolons, Symphony of War: The Nephilim Saga, Banner of the Maid and others.