Digimon Story Time Stranger
Digimon Story Time Stranger
Game
Game2017
Children of Zodiarcs
Developer Cardboard Utopia
A story-driven, tactical RPG set in the fantasy realm of Lumus; a world divided by affluence and poverty. Take control of Nahmi and her fellow outcasts, utilising a brand new deck and dice based combat system to strike a blow to the noble Lords’ and Ladies’ unquenchable thirst for profit. From the Steam store page
202 reactions from 2 sources (Steam reviews, Bluesky) · newest Aug 23, 2026 · last updated Oct 8, 2026 · How this works
Audience score
63
Fresh
123 positive · 71 negative
95% range 56–70%
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steam reviews | 123 | 71 | 0 |
| Bluesky * | 0 | 0 | 0 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
8 newer reactions are still waiting for a label.
Steam's own rating
Mostly Positive
376 of 533 reviews positive (all languages, per Valve)
What people are saying
Summary pending — the reactions are listed below.
Reactions
60 of 202 · most liked firstI knew Children of Zodiarcs had a mixed reception on launch. It was in the early Kickstarter wave of spiritual successors, and I vaguely remember word of mouth that it ended up not so spiritually successful. Now, a few years and several patches later, how does Zodiarcs do from a fresh perspective? Not swell, but for fairly interesting reasons. My (admittedly obvious) theory about the early negative reaction is that the Kickstarter for Children of Zodiarcs drew a lot of outside comparisons to…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game is broken on a technical level. I'm unable to continue the game, as a bug causes the game to get stuck on character level up. As this is an rpg that is very frequent. Which is very disappointing, I actually thought mechanically this game was good. But given that I am unable to play the game, I must recommend against buying this.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →IMPORTANT: IF YOU DECIDE TO BUY THIS GAME, SKIP THE CUTSCENES. You'll thank me later. Children of Zodiarcs seems like a generic story with a bland card-and-dice system. In my opinion, that is false; that is also not always a good thing. Each of the seven playable characters has their own playstyle and corresponding power set, and how you set up their equipment and ability deck determines how you want to utilize them. For instance, you can utilize ability equipment to increase the probability…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →📌 New pinned post 📌 November games: Pathfinder WotR Final Fantasy XIII Children of Zodiarcs Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands Baldur’s Gate 1 Romancing SaGa 2 (coming soon! 😆) I got a lot on my game plate…I know 🙂
unlabelledView post →I wish this game had any sensible difficulty. Normal is by far too easy and hard is not difficult in the way it should be. Hard is essentially praying to RNGesus for high rolls, but why is this a thing in an srpg? Now, don't get me wrong, there has always been an element of RNG in srpgs (Final Fantasy Tactics, Fire Emblem, just to name a few), but it's never overdone. In this game, it's completely overdone. Almost every fight in hard mode can be attributed to high rolling enemies since you…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The systems are good. The fights are tactical and use space; the abilities are card-based AND add dice on top of that, tweaking the outcome of each turn. The 2D art is good, and the story is actually intriguing — it's an interesting, surprisingly grimdark idea to play as a motley band of kids in an unfriendly world. ...But the execution is worse that mediocre, unfortunately. The 3D models that you'll use in actual fights are ugly; worse, their animations are slow and clunky, and the game loves…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I didn't enjoy that much this game, everytime i played a new scenario i was expecting to find out any kind of mechanical or narrative twist or innovation that would led me to something more than a barebones tactics games. Simply put, the story went by as i battled time and time again the same meaningless enemies that had barely any distinction to them in the same brown and grey battlefields that each chapter pits you in. Survive this many rounds, kill this enemy, kill all the enemies. Is not…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →4 games that defined my 2025 Children of Zodiarcs was really a surprise for me, loved that game that was floating on my wishlist for a while. Hades 2, was impressive, challenging, inspiring, making the first one formula even better somehow.
unlabelledView post →After at some point of the game, you get a USELESS robot that does literally no damage, takes tons of damage and doesnt even have anything to compare with the other character you lost. Characters are boring. Story is boring. Combat is boring. You just throw dice all the time and hope for good rng. Since enemy level scales with yours, you cant even go back and farm some levels
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →In short? A must have for any Turn Based Tactical RPG fans! After playing the game for a while I understand why Square Enix decided to publish it. The card and dice system is an interesting combination and I love it. I wish more games could use this system. The customization of the decks and of the dice adds some nice variation to it without being cumbersome. I've found in some games that this can seem more of a chore than a feature, but here you can put as much time into customization as you…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Didn't find the game great, and would not recommend it. The good: - The art is good, characters look great, and thats a highlight for the game. - There is also a system that levels enemies down to keep them closer to your level so you don't need to grind as much. For example, with it on my level 13-15 team was fighting level 15 enemies with it on, without it on the same stage I was fighting level 17 enemies. Its honestly a good system, and I would prefer this way of leveling enemies down to…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The game lacks ergonomy, which made it unfun to play for me. The camera is hard to place correctly (and is rarely placed well to begin with), which makes it hard to see where the enemies are (especially some whose color blends a bit with the background). Speeding up the animations is unpractical because you it can make you mess up your placement at the end of the turn. When you combine this with the RNG inherent to the dices and the card draw, I found myself often frustrated and bored. The…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It was fun for like a few hours, but the game isn't balanced enough and the enemy AI is predictable, so the dominant strategy is found quickly. Kept playing in hopes it gets better, but it never did.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is essentially not a bad game for what it is, but it might not be what you expect. It is not an RPG. You make no decisions. There is almost no story and 'characters' are infantile caricatures seemingly written by someone who grew up reading reddit/twitter instead of literature. Let me illustrate it with an example of actual conversation that takes place in this game: "... ... - I farted. ... - I know. ... ..." Basically it is an causual game of cards/dice with some rudimentary RPG/tactic…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A bunch of interesting ideas, but it's not FFT TL;DR: Get it on sale and/or if you're a fan of turn-based strategy RPGs looking for something new to bite Children of Zodiarcs once mentioned being inspired by the classic Final Fantasy Tactics for the PS1. Although there are some elements of it here, it's definitely not the same thing. What is similar is Tactical RPG played in a grid Turn-based combat Some mechanics (orientation of your units matters, most victories are achieved through…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Good idea, limited deck building options, strange level up mechanics (akin to Fire Emblem where attacks, kills, and heals reward experience so the best way to farm and level up is to do little damage and let them take more hits), ugly character designs (with even uglier and unappealing personalities), and the kind of writing that wouldn't even be cute if it was ironic (it isn't) leaves this promising concept of a game attached to some very undesirable additives. Animations are also slow and…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Really disappointed by this game. I loved the gameplay at the start but the story totally ruined things for me. There's no main character growth and a bunch of contradictions. It seems like they were going for "there are no good guys" but failed miserably at making it compelling. I took a super long break before I was able to finish the game because I was so disgusted with the story that the gameplay was no longer fun. :/ Would be happier if I'd never picked this one up.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I saw this game, and thought it would be like Final Fantasy Tactics, with some added deck building & dice mechanics. The gameplay is very slow and some of the components are just really clunky, like the accelerate button is the same button as confirm, so if you hold the accelerate button to get through the boring wait time and aren't fast enough, it will auto-confirm the next choice which you may have wanted to change. Overall, found this game unplayable.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I wanted to like this game, but it requires too much luck apparently. Technically farming too, however I just watched my character that was 7 levels above the enemy get gang-banged and killed, so maybe not as important stat wise. I can't imagine how bad hard would be. I could probably try it again and do it, but I think I am a little over half done and I am kinda board. The game is slow. I see what that negative review meant about you are reading a visual novel with combat, I got interrupted by…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Is this game fun? I guess. Does it do anything new and exciting that other RPGs haven't? No. - The story is a plain one that you have heard before. Poor bottom-dwellers try to rise up against the rich nobles of the city. - The combat is a card based system that times annoyed me more than excited me. - The story isn't very long. Only about 10+ hours to beat the game. Maybe 20 hours if you are a completionist. Overall 6/10. It's ok. Nothing exciting. Just good enough to keep me playing.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →If there was a "Sideways Thumb" option or "Buy if on sale" I would choose that instead of recommended. Gameplay wise, the game has a really unique and intriguing combat system. However, if you're looking for a good story and characters to love, this might not be the RPG to look for. Honestly, I found the entire main cast (except someone who joins midway through) to be unlikeable. Thus, the side content and side stories actually ended up being more appealing when they were available. Gameplay…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →yes with some caveats. The core game is very fun but after 20 missions the game gets very repetitive. You end up facing the same 3 factions over and over again and while the maps are fun, overall the enemies just move too damn fast for any real worry about positioning.. By the end all the enemies are moving faster then you, have a wide variety of melee and ranged attacks and are stacking so many bonuses I just stopped caring about what they were doing and sped through their turns. The…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Tactical RPG with deck building. +Well-written story and world +Deckbuilding and dice customization offer a variety of ways to build your characters -Animation is slow so you're constantly holding down the "speed up" button and that can often lead you to end a turn facing a character the wrong way, leaving them vulnerable to critical hits -Grinding necessary in the back half of the game
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game has cool ideas for gameplay, but I believe there were some blind spots in the design. I liked the concept. The dice are cool, the cards for abilities are cool. I really liked being able to craft my own dice too. I felt like I had to rely too heavily on RNG elements (specifically Nahmi taking X extra actions in a turn) and too little on tactical elements, which made me enjoy the game much less. I believe the aspects I disliked about the gameplay could have been remedied by the…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →To be blunt, Children of Zodiarcs is clearly a passion project from an inexperienced group of Canadian developers, but the final product is ill-conceived, poorly polished, and generally suffers from a host of interesting, but extremely poorly executed mechanics that would never had made it past the most basic QA team. Models and artwork are ugly and generally unreadable, basic mechanics like mimicking throwing dice with your mouse / controller or manually changing the values/faces of each of…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I almost didn't buy this game because of the mixed reviews, but I'm glad I did. I only read a handful of the negative reviews, but it seems as though people had a really high bar for this game. For example, I saw multiple references to Final Fantasy Tactics, which is one of the greatest games ever made IMO... no wonder they were disappointed. If you're expecting greatness from this game, then you will probably be disappointed too, but if you're just looking for a short and fun game to play,…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Game feels too much like a visual novel interrupted by unique combat sequences. The dice, card and tactical options are great but sadly there will come times when you have to grind and level in order to tackle what's thrown at you and proceed but there are no clever or entertaining ways to do so.. (such as taking on extra RnG missions between story segments or random battle during free exploration).. Instead, because you're on a static and strictly linear dot-to-dot map moving from one spot…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →You would think this game is like FFTactics, but it lacks the depth of strategy and build. Fight outcomes seem arbitrary, and the controls are flawed, making hurrying the animations a gameplay risk in a game that is poorly balanced to the point where one mistake may take away a win that wasn't guaranteed in the first place.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game doesn't have enough deck building to make it interesting mechanically and with no cool items or upgrades to find i was bored very quickly with the repetitive combat. The story isn't engaging and the characters are completely forgettable. I would pass on this title as even with buying it on sale I don't feel I got my money's worth out of this game.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's worth it if you get it on a sale for like 5€ or the equivalent of that. Full price I'd steer clear of it. The whole game is so bare bones that it quickly becomes a chore to play. The gameplay itself has great concepts, but hardly any depth. The game is also short, even with the level grinding. I played it on normal and it felt too easy except for some of the skirmishes which deviated from easy to downright feeling like the AI's cheating. Story-wise I can't tell you much as I skipped the…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I really don't recommend this game, it has some problems I wish I would have known before redeeming the key, since > [url=https://steamcommunity.com/id/Canideh/recommended/436290/]this review < explains the problems really well, I won't repeat what it said, just add my own experience. I played a little over an hour and only managed to get to the 3rd fight and I already had enough of it, both because of the slowness of the fights (2 characters to fight 8 and can't one shot, can't reach them…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Similar gameplay and concept as Final Fantasy Tactics. Pros: Great artwork Cons: Extremely poor and nonsensical storyline Combat in a nutshell is everyone trying to backstab each other Dice mechanic adds RNG to combat Camera angles can be rough
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I'm a bit late to the party, but I saw this game in my followed list a couple days ago and since it was 50% off, I decided to buy it and give it a go. About 15h later, I've finished the main story and the optional questline (but not xin's arena). I have mixed feelings about this game, and I'm still unsure I should have clicked the "yes" button. It's relatively cheap so of course I can't expect much, and there are interesting ideas so I don't regret buying it. Yet I fell like there are a lot of…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Recommended on sale for fans of card/dice-based and tactics RPGs. It is a fun adventure even if it has some room for improvement. +Art style, music +Dice and card systems +New cards and card abilities on level up +Unique characters +Variety of cards/abilities +Customizable dice +Optional battles for leveling/dice -No voice -Few enemy types -A bit short, ~8-10 hours -Linear, no meaningful choices -Mediocre story -Some balance issues, grinding needed -Cannot replay story missions for…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Last things first: too much output randomness, insufficient UI for the tactical battles and too many different tactical customization features crammed in. Reasonably challenging, but the output randomness results in too much frustration rather than gameplay variance. Longer version: I will review this game as a tactics game with some strategy elements through bag building and dice crafting mechanisms. Even though the story was interesting enough, the RPG part of the game is much less…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I think this one is an undervalued gem. I found the combination cards and dice approach to be a very compelling mechanic. The store page doesn't make this clear but the system is that each turn you move and then play one card, the card's effects are resolved by throwing some dice. The symbols on the dice can add to the cards damage, activate special abilities on the card, heal you, negate enemy counter attacks, let you draw cards, give you another turn and a bunch of other things. Your dice…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →If you like turn based tactic games with dices and decks, this is the one for you to try out, however on sale only, as the game lacks polishing and ai overall.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's a nice lil turn based strategy game. I recomment that you play it on hard, because otherwise it's too easy. The game itself is missing some good indicator of when you can upgrade different things (like add an extra dice to your rolls). So it pays off to check that every few missions so you don't find out later that you were playing gimped (yep, talking from experience).
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Fun nostalgic mechanics overshadowed by an obvious white, rich man bad narrative. There is not really any character development or background to the characters and the only likable character has a short story line. I get everyone has an message they believe whether it is true or not, but if you want to cater to a larger audience instead of sitting in an echo chamber then it might be good to consider and research what your audience wants, not what message you want to push down their throat…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Ugh, these characters. I wanted them all to catch Smallpox by the time I was done with this game (never finished it). Character development as shallow as spilled milk. Boring story you don't care about because you're too busy hating the characters in your party. Did I mention the characters are annoying?
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Very hard to decide if thumbs up or down. I was looking for an enjoyable TBS with a soft but interesting story. The game mechanics are simple, but multiple mechanics are in place, making the game rather interesting. Sadly as other people said, you just go on with what you got, they are all scripted battles, and you have to do the way the devs decided or you will succumb. Initially was OK the RNG and to say "oh crap" I made a mistake and loose a battle. But in the next battles, it gets only…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Game has some of the best Mediums in TBS-RPG genre. For >10€ is a must have for any genre fans. +26 / +100
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game has a very rich world building. It is charming in it's size and scope. By the time I got to the end I felt like there could be so much more but was not dissapointed with the resolution. There is a suprising amount of re-playability with arena area and the leveling system which allows the characters to grow far beyond the enemy levels. Hard mode presents a more challenging replay and there are some difficulty curve issues that require multiple replays of a level. I took my time…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Video game character for Black History Month Day 6! Nahmi from Children of Zodiarcs!
unlabelledView post →This is a story about a girl seeking freedom. It does not delve into the nature of the Zodiarc weaponry. The battle mechanics is innovative and I delight in having a new concept to consider. There are pretty strong boundaries to the kind of sandboxing I usually like, though. Having the choice to listen to the story as you progress is really nice, though.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Well, to sum it up: the game was fun until it wasn't. I'll get more into that later though. While I like turn based strategy, this game blends the whole "move + action" of that genre with card game and dice rolling mechanics. These all go hand in hand very well! The cards range from magic/ranged attacks, melee attack and healing. There are 4 main characters you alternate as and all have different strategy to how you play them. The dice you roll depict how much damage, defense, healing, etc. you…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Graphic: As a game published on 2018, it is below the level. Story: The turning of the story is too stiff, Nahmi killed Brice suddenly when she still had other options, which is not reasonable. Enemy type: only ten if i am not wrong, it is a little bit few, but still all right. Game mechanism: it is very unique, rolling dices to determine the damage and effect. Totally it is fine at a discount, but for full price it is not worth.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Creative mechanics, but a bit grindy. Story is meh. The difficulty of the hard is due to a combination of the RNG of the customizable dice and the fact that enemies are just higher levels. You technically can grind dice to mitigate the effect of over-leveling.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Battles are a bit slow, but if you're looking for a turn-based tactics game with deck and dice mechanics, don't miss this game.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I got this game looking for something in the style of Fire Emblem or Final Fantasy Tactics, but that was a mistake. I'm about half way through the game and there has been maybe 20 minutes of story that really hasn't been very interesting. Many people are poor, some are rich, you're poor and a thief. Steal from those rich people, especially ancient artifacts. Also, your main characters are "we can do anything" girl, "This is dangerous/scarry" boy, "I'm rebellious and stuborn" girl, and a while…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I love tactics games and it was interesting at first with the mix of cards but it's just too bland and it's not as fun as it looks. I tried to like it but it's far from what I wanted.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A Diamond in the Rough Children of Zodiarcs is a turn-based, tactics-RPG card game with dice rolling mechanics. The cards represent your abilities and you'll roll dice to see how effective your abilities will be. The deck and dice mechanics set Children of Zodiarcs apart from other TRPG's, but they also add unnecessary RNG which can be frustrating especially on the Hard Difficulty when you can potentially lose an entire battle over a bad couple of rolls. Worth a try if you're a fan of TRPGs
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I want to recommend this game because I want more games like this to be made, but made better. Unfortunately I can't really recommend it because it's just not good enough. My main problem is the hard mode setting, where you rapidly get outstatted by enemy mobs to the point where you'll get one shot in story missions if you don't grind outside of the main game. Looking at a similar set of games (the Fire Emblem series), in those games if you were grinding it was optional and to make up for a…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →the gameplay is decent ! there is plenty of RNG, but so is RNG prevalent in games like XCOM. at least this time, you can see the dices actually roll. and you can change and craft your dices (tho i never fully understood the mechanics...) the weakest part imo, is the writing. the dialogues between characters were cringy and uninteresting, awful at times actual dialogue ''....'' ''....'' ''....'' ''... i farted... ''.…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Really good blend of dice & cards mixed into a turn based RPG, incredibly well balanced, the enemies you fight really use alot in their wheelhouse and don't just charge stupidly at you. This game deserves way more praise and attention, would love if characters were voiced but if you like turn based RPGs this game is 100% worth your time
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →SRPG + Cards + Dice Building = insanely fun and deep combat system. I don't understand why there is no sequel or spiritual successor. This formula needs to be recreated in a new game
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Story 3/10 Difficulty 4/10 (Even playing in hard, completing the achievement of no one dying) Music 5/10 (Average) Animations 2/10 (Had to mention them as they are lackluster, all attacks have almost the same animations, dying chars also have rag-doll have a dull dying animation)
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →There was an outline of an incredible game in here somewhere. The concept of deckbuilding, dice, and RPG tactical elements all hit my buttons, and it felt like in the beginning they would be able to work together harmoniously. But the unrootable characters and the thin plot became a drag quickly, and the level of depth for those strategic elements became quite lacking. While it wasn't a grindfest, I was still disappointed with how monotonous things became.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →My 2 cents: - Difficulty is too steep (which lead to the second point) - The game become grindy out of the blue - Boring gameplay - Story and characters are forgettable Not worth the money and time imho
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Children of Zodiarchs is like if you smashed Fire Emblem and cards and dice together. the balance of the gameplay is extremely broken but in a fun way. You only have 3 units when the game has 20 so they just let you spam infinite turns and deal 50+ HP damage to units as a status effect at the start of every turn. It gives you a crazy endorphin bloodrush. The story is absolutely awful, I would skip it. every character is so annoying. the game isn't too punishingly hard. I beat the game on hard…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →
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