Utilities
Stranger Than Heaven Tools
Not every Stranger Than Heaven question wants an essay. Some want a grid. This desk holds three launch-week tools: an edition comparer for the $70 / $90 / $130 ladder, an era timeline for the fifty-year jump cuts, and a combat cheatsheet for the bumper map. Each tool page still carries a full explainer and FAQs so search engines and humans both get a real article. Use the essays on editions, cities, and combat when you want prose. Use these when you want a screen you can leave open on a second monitor.
Edition compare — for the cart
The edition compare tool lines up Standard, Deluxe, and Collector’s on price, format, digital extras, physical extras, and preorder steel. It exists because store pages mix SEGA bullets with retailer posters and hope you panic. Toggle the rows, then read the preorder advice if you are still sweating Game Pass. The tool will not take your card. It will take your excuse that you “couldn’t tell what was included.”
Era timeline — for the decades
The era timeline is five stations: Kokura 1915, Kure 1929, Osaka 1943, Atami 1951, Shinjuku 1965. Each station lists the city’s job, the people who arrive, and the play verbs that matter. It is a companion to the cities hub, not a spoiler dump of 1965. Use it while a trailer montage tries to convince you neon and steam are the same night.
Combat cheatsheet — for your thumbs
The combat cheatsheet is LB, LT, RB, RT, charge, tackle, mount, block-and-counter, in a layout you can screenshot. It reprints controls without the sermon. Keep it open while you watch the official overview on combat basics. Boredom is fluency. Fluency is how you survive 1943.
What we will not build before launch
No fake damage calculator. No invented drop table. No trophy checklist harvested from a datamine that does not exist. After January 15 the desk can grow a substory tracker and a real weapon sheet. Until then, three tools is the honest set. If a site shows you a “build planner” today, they are role-playing. Come back here for objects that match public facts, then go read how to play so the tools have a life to sit inside.
Frequently asked questions
Frequently asked questions
Do the tools work on a phone?
Yes. Compare and cheatsheet stack on small screens. Timeline scrolls sideways on purpose — decades are horizontal.
Are prices localized?
The compare tool prints the widely reported US dollar ladder and notes Japanese yen on the editions pages. Always check your storefront.
Will you add a PC spec checker?
When Steam replaces TBD. Until then the platforms page is the spec article, and it is honest about the blank.
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