Save Jesus

Shock value sells. Sacrilege sells. Counter-culture sells. Maybe you won’t be building a Scrooge McDuck-style money silo with your earnings from it, but in Indieland, being outlandish certainly helps you stand out in a crowded field. Even if the games that rely on gimmicky “yep, we went THERE” satire tend to suck. I’ve reviewed so many games dependent on a novelty shock concept that you would think I wouldn’t fall for it anymore.

Yet, here we are.

Generic Physics Puzzler: Jesus Edition.

Or Save Jesus.

Whatever.

The guy in the UFO thing is apparently someone going back in time to assassinate Jesus. Seems like it could be done easier. Just replace the wise man giving baby Jesus gold and instead give him a piece of enriched uranium. That seems like it would do the trick.

The idea is there’s a giant ball that you must somehow cause to bowl-over Romans while sparing Jesus, and sometimes his disciples. You can’t directly move anything. Rather, you use the mouse to clear out certain blocks that starts the chain reaction with the ball. The Jesus theme is completely unnecessary. You could plug any theme into this and it wouldn’t make a difference. But they chose Jesus because LOL blasphemy am I right? “It caught your attention, didn’t it?” said Brian. Well, yea. But I figure I’m going to hell anyway because.. well.. anyone that’s read this blog knows why. I might as well get a leg up on the type of stuff that I’ll be playing once there. Stuff like this.

I exaggerate the blasphemy part. Besides a colorful splash of blood, there’s nothing really all that M-rated about this title. This really compounds the “why even bother?” question. I played a truly horrible brawler called Fist of Jesus once upon a time. It was among the worst games that I ever played at IGC. But, damnit, it went all-in with its gimmick. This included implied homosexuality between Jesus and Judas. The type of stuff that will earn you a protest at your office and all the free publicity that comes with it. With Save Jesus, all you get is a cartoonish “squish” sound and a puddle of blood if you accidentally kill Jesus. Oh come on, the Romans could at least lap up his blood with their tongues, because it’s basically red wine when you think about it.

The biggest problem is the game is just so damn bland. Physics-puzzlers are one of the most over-saturated genres these days. You need more than a clever and/or offensive theme to stand out. You need solid, original gameplay. Save Jesus is just boring. The physics are a little wonky too. Sometimes stages would clear themselves before I even got the ball rolling, just by the Romans dropping into pits. Other stages required me to time detonating a dynamite crate to launch the ball up to a higher platform. But the physics are so unforgiving that it required several attempts before I timed it on the correct microsecond that would solve the stage. Stages like this don’t feel like you solved them based on any skill, since you know what you’re supposed to do and it just comes down to clicking the mouse at the right time. A puzzle in the same sense that waking up when your alarm clock tells you to is.

I clicked one block here and the stage beat itself. I didn’t get any stars for it, but really by this point I just wanted it to be over with.

I’m not religious, so I don’t really care if Save Jesus is designed with the shock-value of “it’s funny because it’s Jesus” in mind. Heck, I’d even be prepared to name such a game my favorite indie of all time if it was that good. But, no matter the gimmick, games have to stand on their own. The biggest sin Save Jesus commits is being boring. There’s nothing worse a game can do.

It did do some carpentry in my house though, so it has that going for it. And it fed an army with a fish. Cured my cataracts. Walked across my swimming pool. Resurrected my 108-year-old neighbor. Hardly seal-of-approval worthy stuff if you ask me.

Save Jesus was developed by Almighty Games
Point of Sale: Steam

$1.59 said “John 11:35 never felt more appropriate” in the making of this review.