Playing Stranger Than Heaven at Summer Game Fest 2026, TechRadar Gaming Editor Dashiell Wood found himself reminiscing about a disastrous hands-on with The Callisto Protocol years earlier. In both cases, a novel combat idea turned into a frustrating experience. Stranger Than Heaven’s directional system forces players to alternate between left and right attacks, but in practice, the slow pace and punishing enemy damage make brawling feel like wading through soup.
Directional Combat: A Simple Concept with Clumsy Execution
The core mechanic is straightforward: the left side of the controller maps to the left side of the character’s body, and the right side to the right. Tap the right bumper to throw a right fist; pull the left trigger for a left kick. According to Wood, players must alternate sides to prevent enemies from blocking. "It sounds simple enough," he wrote, but the execution is far from engaging. Swings are slow, and encounters, especially against groups, play out at a snail’s pace. Aggression is punished harshly—players who mash buttons are quickly knocked down and beaten.
"I don’t think its mechanics are quite that rough—but even when I fully understood its many idiosyncrasies, I wasn’t exactly having fun." — Dashiell Wood, TechRadar
High Stakes and Slow Pacing
Enemies deal Dark Souls-level damage, and a single grab can drain most of the health bar in moments. Escaping a grab requires identifying which side the enemy is holding and attacking from the opposite side—a counterintuitive mechanic that "feels clumsy," Wood noted. Health items are equally frustrating: the protagonist takes an excruciatingly long animation to eat a single rice ball, and the action cannot be interrupted. This leaves the player vulnerable to special attacks like a katana cleave.
Melee Weapons and Glitches
Wood tested three melee weapons, favoring the knife for its hilariously unbalanced behavior. Sprinting and frantically mashing attack caused enemies to freeze and take hits before fighting back. In one encounter, a powerful boss enemy became stuck on a doorway, allowing Wood to defeat it easily. However, moments of polish were undermined by sloppiness: fists sometimes passed through enemies with no visible reaction, a problem Wood attributes to the early build.
Release Date and Platforms
Stranger Than Heaven is scheduled for release on January 15, 2027 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and Series S, and PC. The game promises an epic story spanning five eras, but Wood was unable to sample narrative content or non-combat activities during his hands-on. Whether the full experience can compensate for the combat's current shortcomings remains to be seen.
