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Those Who Rule on Steam - User reviews, Price & Information
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Join three fresh recruits caught in a web of betrayal as war looms over the land. Lead your band of heroes through tactical turn-based battles, master unique abilities, and forge powerful gear to turn the tide of battle. Will you unravel the conspiracy driving the conflict—or be consumed by it?
Those Who Rule is a tactical rpg, turn-based tactics and rpg game
developed and published by Eldin Turulja.
Released on January 27th 2025 is available in English only on Windows.
It has received 510 reviews of which 461 were positive and 49 were negative resulting in a rating of 8.4 out of 10. 😎
The game is currently priced at 8.74€ on Steam with a 50% discount.
The Steam community has classified Those Who Rule into these genres:
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System requirements
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Windows
- Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
- OS: Windows 10, 11
- Processor: i5
- Memory: 4 GB RAM
- Graphics: OpenGL 2.0 compatible video card with 2 GB VRAM
- Storage: 4 GB available space
Steam Price & Best Deals
User reviews & Ratings
Explore reviews from Steam users sharing their experiences and what they love about the game.
Just finished the game after about 60 hours. It took longer than expected because I'd completed it without any deaths to my crew. Simply put, this is a phenomenal indie game. While the game isn't flashy by any means, where it matters, it delivers. The combat system is done very well; there is plenty of nuance in how you can control and position your troops to maximize success. From beginning to end, the game engages the player. Lose focus and make one too many mistakes and you will be severely punished for it. Also, rather than random maps, all the maps are fixed. They are well curated and I get a sense that the game had gone through a lot of play testing and the maps thoroughly tweaked so that everything on it matters, from where the enemy soldiers are placed, to the positions of the various terrain (i.e. terrain such as bushes / rocks offer tactical advantages / disadvantages). The weapon and gear system is also well thought out. Weapon progression is gradual, with most weapons you find being sidegrades. Early game weapons can still remain relevant mid to late game which is good as coin is not easy to come by and the player is not punished for upgrading early game weapons. As for the story, while it's not ground breaking, it is fairly interesting with some political intrigue. Music is also decent. The only minor quibble I have with the game is the RNG of the character leveling system. While I understand the intent of the designer, it does feel bad when your character gets only one +1 stat upgrade when it levels up. On the flipside though, I do find myself fist pumping when the stars aligned and all the stats get upgraded, so there's that. The designer has included a fixed upgrade option for those who prefer a more predictable leveling system but I think the game still plays better with the default random option. All in all, if you are into tactical turn based games (think Fire Emblem, Final Fantasy Tactics), this is a must buy. The game is reasonably priced for the amount of play time you get out of it, and it is obviously a game done with a lot of passion. Designer, if you are reading, great job! Hopefully, a sequel in the works.
This an indie solo passion project that everyone who has enjoyed a Fire Emblem game should be throwing their money at. I'm coming at this as someone who hates Fire Emblem games because the fundamental gameplay loop feels tragically beholden to a 30 year old formula. But I'm also someone that has played and beaten just about every game in the series because I'm a starving, degenerate fiend for tactical RPGs and Fire Emblem has a junk food appeal to it. I didn't enjoy watching the later seasons of Game of Thrones, either, but dammit, I was committed and there was nothing else like it on television. Those Who Rule is genuinely novel in a lot of interesting ways. Yes, it follows a lot the same formula that Fire Emblem does, but the developer seems to actually understand enough about what makes those games tiresome to make impactful key changes. To name a few highlights: -- Hexes, Zone of Control, and the importance of character facing add a strategic nuance to the game that actually matters. -- Removal of critical hits gets rid of a layer of variance that makes turns more predictable and therefore more reliant on your choices. -- Swords, Lances, and Axes exist, but there is no weapon triangle. Nonetheless, each weapon has its own unique features that feel meaningfully different. Lances are accurate and let you attack before the enemy does even if they initiate combat; Swords get bonuses for flanking, backstabbing, and Avoid; Axes ignore a portion of defense. -- Shields (and three different variants of them!) give you a health pool that recharges at the beginning of every round and added importance around flanking. -- Two-handed weapons provide additional character options in lieu of shields. Axes ignore shields entirely; Lances and Swords both hit more than one target. -- Your characters get active abilities outside of attacking or healing based on their class and weapons. -- There are a handful of buffs and debuffs that can be applied in a handful of ways. -- Weapons can be forged, but also enchanted using scrolls that you buy or find. -- No cavalry; no fliers. No magic. -- Characters can equip up to 2 accessories that give them various special abilities or benefits. -- Endurance is a stat that increases the amount of equipment you can carry; each piece of gear or enchantment has a weight that contributes to the total held. And I haven't even hit on the bevy of things that Those Who Rule steals from Fire Emblem that it just does exceptionally well. It cuts a lot of bloat and adds a lot of quality of life. Non-generic weapons feel meaningfully unique. Characters promote automatically and can choose one of three different classes at each tier -- some of which overlap, which means there are a lot of interesting combinations to play with. Anybody can talk to recruitable characters, which removes some of the frustration and guesswork. Optional objectives are frequent throughout chapters, broadcast immediately, and add a lovely additional challenge to maps. The story is... actually good? The dialogue is... believably written? The characters are... typically pretty interesting? I really took this for granted until after I beat the game and looked at the landscape of other indie games in the genre that I couldn't drag myself through more than the first three chapters because I hated everything about the premise, the dialogue, and the characters. Look, if you actually hate Fire Emblem (and I don't mean "hnnggh, stupid sexy Dmitri ORKOing the battlefield..."), Those Who Rule probably isn't going to be the game for you. But, it might! This game falls into many of the same pitfalls as Fire Emblem. For instance: A majority of the strategy revolves around carefully exploiting the AI during enemy phase and things slowly fall apart into superpowered hilarity by the time you get your second promotion. But these issues didn't feel as... stark and cloying as they do with most Fire Emblem games? My one true gripe: I played the game predominantly on Steam Deck and the controller implementation is... rough in a lot of places. Menu navigation is oftentimes actively frustrating because the controls don't work intuitively. Using L and R to scroll through your units is weird, because when you exit out of the menu it goes back to the unit you originally selected. Around Chapter 8, my inventory got large enough that it permanently broke and started skipping around randomly (?) when I hit up and down instead of going in order. Tooltips too frequently disappear off screen. These issues were annoying, but not gamebreakingly bad. I was shocked by how enamored I was by this game; by how easily it gripped me in the first couple chapters and never let go. I was frustrated when I spent an hour in a chapter and lost a unit and my OCD demanded I restart, but I always knew it was my stupidity or impatience that was the cause. Those Who Rule always feels more than fair. And it's fun! It rewards mastery in a compelling way. This is such a good game, man. Stop reading my review and play it.
I was a little hesitant to jump into this one but I'm glad I did. This is certainly a spin on the fire emblem school of game design, but the personal touches (hex grids, shields as temp HP, readily accessible aoe damage, items that provide active skills) combine to give it a distinct flavor. Difficulty (on veteran) came in at a nice spot for me As to story, I'm constantly frustrated by games in this space devolving into uncomplicated fights against simple (magical) evils. Those Who Rule bucks this and squares you up against totally grounded human enemies. There's solid character work in the supports too, though unfortunately many of the later joining characters are barely present. The back third of the game particularly treads into narrative territory that pleasantly surprised me. Probably my biggest complaint is the graphics. I'm quite fond of the character art but the actual gameplay models are rough, and the combat animations are middling. But it's basically a solo dev with some support so I get it. Overall highly recommended to fans of the genre
A Fantastic Indie Title that Stands Tall Next to Fire Emblem Favorites and Classics. (Just for reference I finished the game on Brutal Difficulty, and am a longtime Fire Emblem / SRPG player. Take my review with that in consideration). For SRPG Fans: 9 / 10 (Could easily reach 10/10 status for SRPG fans with just a little bit balance tuning and an update to finish obviously missing content like side objectives, support conversations, and SS tier weapons in the final few chapters). For non SRPG Fans: 8 / 10 (A deep and fulfilling tactical experience with a fun, fast-paced story, and interesting challenges to test your strategic mettle on in every chapter. Might be a little bit daunting for a first timer especially if they jump into the harder difficulties with no prior experience with similar titles). Stuff I Liked / Things That Could be Expanded Upon in the Future : Weapon Variety and Balance: Every weapon type felt like it filled its specific niche and I never felt like having a balanced party capable of using all weapon types was wasteful or inefficient. Overall Character "Build" System: Starting with personal skills, then going to class skills, item skills, weapon types, weapon skills, weapon upgrades, weapon refinements; the ability for the player to make wholly unique and interesting/powerful builds for characters here is incredible. Rat Effigy, skirmisher boots hero Marcus who would heroic charge into a hoard of enemies, somehow survive, and then just run away after backstabbing was just too cool. Difficulty level: Brutal mode was BRUTAL but never in any way felt constraining on my options in terms of weapon usage and class promotion paths. I was able to find multiple strong builds using a variety of different class skills / items / weapons / weapon modifiers. Side objectives and the need for speed in early and mid-game chapters especially upped the difficulty and necessity for sound strategy at a dangerously fast pace. To put it succinctly, the first 75 percent of the game made turtling an ineffective strategy and pushes players to the limit without going overboard. Overall great difficulty balance on brutal. Art: Both the 2d sprite work and the 3d animation, character models, and background / map art was incredible. Very easy to tell apart different classes and characters, and the battle animations were simple but effective at translating what each weapon was doing. Music was also surprisingly consistently great throughout the game. Lots of chill normal medieval / Fire Emblem-esque tracks and lots of exhilerating rock/metal tracks as well. Uniqueness: Those Who Rule is a truly novel and interesting take on the classic SRPG formula. Obviously inspired by Fire Emblem and Berwick Saga, Those Who Rule takes the structure of the combat system of the former and the hex based map system of the latter to make a SRPG formula with layers upon layers of consideration for effects and how certain mechanics interact with one another. Between personal skills, class skills, weapon types, a weight system to constrain how many different weapon type any one unit can carry, and the removal of high mobility classes which can take care of all of the "chores" on a level; Those Who Rule creates probably one of the most insane fast-paced SRPGS I've ever played. There are no warp staves, cavaliers, or wyvern riders to cheese your way through side objectvies on the map. The player has to use each turn and every resource they have to its maximum capability to finish everything there is to do in each chapter on Brutal difficulty (except for the last 5 or so lolol). Story (little bit of good little bit of bad here): Story was fast paced and fun. Rorick and his awesome one liners after every chapter near the endgame were great. Super classic revolution / reform type story played straight and well. Obviously missing some details here and there, and we definitely could have gone more into the history / culture of fern that allowed indentured servitude to thrive, but I can also accept it for the necessary conflict it is as well. Crawford's character and plans, and how and why Zoltan agreed to them also got quite muddled near the end. If Crawford's plan was to instigate a war and to have Zoltan take the iroquan throne, why would he then want to continue the invasion afterwards and continue killing iroquans? Why would Zoltan agree to any of this in the first place knowing Crawford would stab him in the back later? If Zoltan did not know of Crawford's desire to destroy Iroqua, why would Crawford bother working with Zoltan in the first place. Unless I'm misunderstanding something here, either Crawford or Zoltan is a huge idiot and super overcomplicating their own goals by including the other in their plans. Stuff I Disliked / Things that Could be Improved Upon in the Future : Class / Class Skill Balance: The balance here wasn't terrible, in fact, for the first class and first promotion, I felt balance was beautifully handled. However, as we hit the second promotion, and the power level of our units became higher and higher with more and more modifiers, the class balance of the game definitely took a toll. Commandos, Warlords, Assassins, and enlightened being the biggest offenders here. Class skills that allow for extra turns, ALOT of extra movement, or ALOT of extra damage (whether indirect like the commando or direct like the assassin) obviously hurt the balance of the game when other classes like tier 3 sniper get 1 extra damage for every ten hit over a hundred. Probably quite obvious and doesn't have to be said but if the game were more difficult than it already is the class balance would be a big problem. For right now however, I finished the game with a large variety of classes on my team and never felt like I had no options for beating levels with the classes I had chosen. Only Two SS Tier Weapons: c'mon now Those Who Rule dev...... you know ur wrong for this one LMAO. I spent SO long grinding weapon tiers for all types just to hit chapter nineteen and see no SS weapons before the final chapter BRUH. No Side Objectives For Last Few Chapters: Basically same complaint as before. Pretty obvious last few chapters are unfinished compared to the first 75 percent of the game. Really hope dev goes back and finishes it, would love to play a second playthrough with the game fully complete. Overall : A supremely deep, unique, and FUN strategy game that allows for a multitude of playstyles and builds on units even on the hardest difficulty. Last quarter of the game is definitely unfinished and could use some work, but the story is complete and the levels are challenging enough to be playable. Absolutely worth your money and time, and I am excited to see where this dev goes next.
Those Who Rule rules over the indie PC SRPG genre Overview Those Who Rule is one hell of an impressive game. I will eventually play through it again and enjoy that – but at the moment really need to go through a massive backlog to give other games a fair chance. Make no mistake though, this game is probably the absolute best Steam alternative to Fire Emblem . I’m a huge fan of the genre and while I also really like Lost Eidolons and its spin-off, I think Those Who Rule reigns supreme with an inspiring and charming dev at its helm who masterfully blends an engaging story, a diverse cast of lovable characters, beautiful art, and challenging but fun game mechanics into a really damn good game. Most of all, while it’s a Fire Emblem like game, it does quite a lot of innovation to stand out as its own game while hitting all the right notes that make the genre so enjoyable. Story While the game has animated graphics, it is a far cry from the anime tropes of Fire Emblem (which is a good thing, I absolutely despise the entire cast of Fire Emblem Engage despite that game being mechanically good). It has a deep political low-fantasy story with conspiracies within conspiracies with pretty much no magic involvement. This is something I really enjoy as I kind of dislike when SRPGs devolve into fighting monsters. Human conflict is far more engaging and often more interesting gameplay-wise too when they too have class abilities to contend with. In the end this is very much a story of raw and gritty human struggle with a huge gray moral compass. There really is no clear good or evil and this makes the roleplaying aspect more engaging as it’s not so easy to roleplay the objectively good guy as it’s not always clear if you’re making the “right” choice. And that is by design because there really isn’t a right choice. That said, the consequences and choice do matter. Every choice you make including in the prologue/tutorial mission have a lasting impact in some way. Choices you make can lead to recruitment or bar you from recruitment. The final choice even impacts the final battle and what ending you get. I like this. Makes for a more diverse story without branching too wildly. It also feels fair, engaging and grounded in reality where you kinda just go “yeah should have expected that” when you’re slapped in the face with the consequences of your own actions. The story centers around a group called the Rangers. In the prologue, a few rangers uncover a conspiracy but it lands them in some trouble. You then get control of your main trio pictures on the title screen of the game and will follow for the rest of the game. They are a fun bunch and its nice to see them grow from recruits to leaders and trusted allies among the group as time goes on. I really liked the characters and my one request for improvement in future games would be to spend more time with the other characters who seem to fall off after 1 or 2 chapter and then don’t speak much again after that. Could even add bond events like the genre loves to do to help give the illusion that they’re more present. Presentation Graphics are great, love the art. At first I wasn’t sure about the sprites but they grew on me. While I prefer the usual 2D sprites for SRPGs the 3D models do help them stand out in the genre and go better with the map design and hexes. Gameplay Very fun and customizable to fit your preferences. Staples of the genre like perma-death and RNG growth are there for those who want it. But you can play without death or with fixed growths as preferred. There’s even the classic character with amazing growths but starts out incredibly weak and underpowered. He’s amazing and consistently performed as the MVP of every battle once properly invested. There’s also the throwing more characters at you than you know what to do with. I actually struggled with who to drop once I hit the max because I liked everyone that I tried for the most part. I ended up dropping some people I liked but just really weren’t performing well (due to feeding their kills to others or bad RNG, maybe both). Even the extra bodies you don’t use are useful though. Free equipment to steal off them! The game started out a bit simple, but mechanically solid. I really like the zone of control to highlight the importance of positioning and tanks. Flanking and backstabs are very fun and rewarding to pull off. I was a bit confused at first about the weight system and multiple weapons but there are enough tooltips and an extremely helpful (and active) developer on the forums happy to help answer questions. Weight is often associated with speed in these games. In this case, it’s just an inventory limit and does not impact speed at all. Speed is from agility and will determine if you double attack or not. Very easy to follow once you get it. As for weapons – early on you probably won’t make use of multiple weapons while limited by low weight. But eventually it becomes very handy to change weapon based on your needs. There is no weapon triangle in the usual sense of Spear > Sword > Axe for example. Instead, the weapons have their own advantages/disadvantage that may make them more useful against certain other classes or weapons. Spear for example is highly accurate and is great to use against dodge tanks. Axes are inaccurate but hit hard so are not a great idea to use against a dodge tank but great to use against an armored unit (it also penetrates armor) or if you know you have 100% chance to hit. Then you get into other weapons that mess with range. Great swords and polearms hitting multiple tiles, bows shooting from range, etc. it's really all about how you build characters. You might want to have someone just really hyper invest in one weapon type and that’s it (an archer not caring about melee weapons at all for example) while another character may want to jack of all trades multiple weapons for versatility or take advantage of a passive ability that grants them bonuses from weapon ranks. Or may just want to have a hammer ready for armor, a spear and shield for hard to hit targets or needing to tank and a great sword for cleave. The building is so satisfying and even more so once you hit the two class promotion changes (lvl 10 and 20). With each new class changes comes 2 new abilities and the final tier especially becomes broken when built optimally or paired with the right accessories. Summary Those Who Rule was a great time and I can’t wait to play it again when I can feel less guilty about not giving other games a chance. There is a strong replayability factor in story (choices), roster (impossible to field everyone), and just plain fun factor. Even if I used the same exact characters again I could try out different builds or RNG growth turn out differently, or play with perma death on. Hell, I could play with the exact same party and choices I did the first time (because lets be real I do that too often when I replay games), and it’s still be fun. The map design is just good and even the challenging ones I look forward to tackling again rather than dreading. I not only recommend this game but highly suggest to keep watch on this developer to see what he puts out next. He knows what he is cooking and his patience, passion and engagement with the steam community has been amazing to see.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Those Who Rule is currently priced at 8.74€ on Steam.
Yes, Those Who Rule is currently available at a 50% discount. You can purchase it for 8.74€ on Steam.
Yes, Those Who Rule received 461 positive votes out of a total of 510 achieving a rating of 8.42.
😎
Those Who Rule was developed and published by Eldin Turulja.
Yes, Those Who Rule is playable and fully supported on Windows.
No, Those Who Rule is not playable on MacOS.
No, Those Who Rule is not playable on Linux.
Those Who Rule is a single-player game.
No, Those Who Rule does not currently offer any DLC.
No, Those Who Rule does not support mods via Steam Workshop.
No, Those Who Rule does not support Steam Remote Play.
Yes, Those Who Rule is enabled for Steam Family Sharing. This means you can share the game with authorized users from your Steam Library, allowing them to play it on their own accounts. For more details on how the feature works, you can read the original Steam Family Sharing announcement or visit the Steam Family Sharing user guide and FAQ page.
You can find solutions or submit a support ticket by visiting the Steam Support page for Those Who Rule.
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Additionally, we incorporate data from the SteamSpy API, which offers insights into game sales and player statistics. This helps us present a comprehensive view of each game's popularity and performance within the gaming community.
Last Updates| Steam data | 21 July 2026 13:29 UTC |
|---|---|
| SteamSpy data | 24 July 2026 23:54 UTC |
| Steam price | 28 July 2026 18:22 UTC |
| Steam reviews | 26 July 2026 03:45 UTC |
If you'd like to dive deeper into the details about Those Who Rule, we invite you to check out a few dedicated websites that offer extensive information and insights. These platforms provide valuable data, analysis, and user-generated reports to enhance your understanding of the game and its performance.
- SteamDB - A comprehensive database of everything on Steam about Those Who Rule
- SteamCharts - Analysis of Those Who Rule concurrent players on Steam
- ProtonDB - Crowdsourced reports on Linux and Steam Deck Those Who Rule compatibility
Game modes
Features
Online players
27
Developer
Eldin Turulja
Publisher
Eldin Turulja
Release
27 Jan 2025
Platforms