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Overview
“A
fist person-Shooter of biblical proportions. You’re Malachi, a chosen
angel, who descends into Earth to stop hell’s legions from destroying
mankind”
Reading
the box sent a shiver down my spine and made me want to devour the
box right there and then. This is too good to be true I thought
to myself, a FPS that has a Christian theme to it. Unfortunately
it seems I was correct..about the "too good" thing.
Released
April 1st 1999, the game boasted about having some great things,
some of which proved to be true. The angel Michael is, indeed, sent
to earth to protect Creation from his fallen brethren. Set in what
I’m guessing is a post-raptured earth you find that Lilith (an evil
demon lady) has the earth in her clutches. Your task is to liberate
the people and banish Lilith to Hell.
Christian
Sense (CS)
At
first this game gave me a real buzz using my angelic lightning and
other such heavenly arsenal. I felt the game was very imaginative,
but alas this was short lived. My first problem that I came across
was the nudity, female nude torso’s. In hell the various demon vixens
and Lilith herself openly display there chests. Even though they
are deformed and mangled, I couldn’t help but be put off by this
bit. Next Is the language. I wouldn’t mind so much if the bad guys
swore or cursed Gods name as the bible often tells us this will
happen in the end days, but when your character uses Jesus’ name
as a cuss word, I felt disgusted.
Next
was the enemy. Now at first I was having a blast banishing the hell
spawn back to where it belongs, but then my enemy was humans possessed
by demons, there was only one choice...kill kill kill. And the methods
of killing a human are often imaginatively gory (blood boil for
example)
There
was however some nice little gems hidden in there. The intro was
a real up lifter as well as the end. A few enemies were well done
such as the cyberfiends who looked to be inspired from the biblical
creature in Revelation with the woman's face, the lions teeth, and
the scorpions tail. Also, some of the angelic power brought a smile
to my face: exorcist, pentecost, banish, heal, heal others and resurrect.
The last little thing I liked (and it really was little) is a sign
in the hospital suggesting prayer as a cure for illness, oh if only
if only.
I
truly wanted this game to deserve at last a 3 but there are just
too many faults. If only there was less of them, but they are so
much a part of the game. What a shame. The bottom line is that the
game takes Christian values and really mishandles them. This wasn't
a game written with Christians in mind. It was using biblical themes
as a thin wrapper for a violent, graphic and often offensive game.
Gameplay
(GP)
On
a lighter note, the gameplay typically is fairly good for this genre.
The main bummer was thatthis game was released a year after Half-life
and was totally overshadowed by its massive success. Amazingly there
is more depth to this game than Half-life, though not as well executed.
In terms of tasks to do in the game, it’s the fairly basic "find
a button to push it" and so on. There are some nice little
puzzles to solve, though they can be a little frustrating at times.
The
interface was easy to understand and didn’t clutter up the screen
too much. Controls took a little getting used as there were just
so many added options. Fortunately, these controls can be changed
to suit your personal preferences.
There
is nothing really spectacular to say for the game it’s all rather
average, has its fun moments, a nice storyline and a fairly good
ending. Unfortunately the multiplayer has no support that I have
seen on Mplayer or Game Spy. Basically it offers average game play
with nothing to say OOOH or AAAH about.
Game
Engine (GE)
The
E.A.T engine was purposely built for this game and it actually is
quite nice, the maps are often really nice and good to look at.
I had no problems crashing bar one point loading up a level but
I fixed that. No in-game lag due to multiple enemies and believe
you can get quite a few at one time. Character design is quite good
it does give off that post rapture feel to everything. The poly
count is low on most objects. Everything moves smoothly just as
the engine intended to. There is some good examples of well thought
out A.I, enemies hiding from you jumping up boxes to get to you
as apposed to the normal route and so on. The textures are a bit
blocky at times and it’s a shame coz at times it’s really noticeable.
In short for its age its good, a little dated now, but still beats
some games and yes it may pain some people but the engine is noticeably
superior to Catechumen’s Genesis engine.
Next is the sound, and again is nicely handled. Some good if not
a bit cheesy voice acting at times, good sound effects but not enough
adrenaline pumping music I’m afraid to say.
I
do have a few problems though. This game could look excellent in
3dfx but it doesn’t seem to work with 3dfx cards. I’m still looking
into this one. Hopefully it's a fault with my installation. With
no multiplayer support anywhere this is a big let down for some
people as team matches seem quite good, the chosen versus the fallen.
And finally is the lack of 32bit support, ok the games old, but
not that old, its still newer than Half-life and therefore has no
excuse! Nice use of a good engine. Unfortunately with the success
of the Half-life engine, the mistakes here are just too obvious
now to go un-noticed.
Ian
Buchanan
Final
Score
Highlights: The
thought of playing an Angel is cool.
Lowlights:
Christian Sense rating says it all.
Hints:
Recommendation:
This
isn't a good game for Christians and should be panned.
Age Appropriateness:
Mature
Teens +
Christian
Sense (CS): 2
- Fumbles badly with Christian themes. This one could have been
so much better.
Game Engine
(GE): 3.8
- Better than the Catechumen engine but not as good as the Half
Life engine.
Game Play
(GP): 3.4
- Fun, not terribly gripping and nothing new.
Overall:
3.1
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