Retro Gaming Magazine April 2014 | Page 28

JESUS: KYOFU NO BIO MONSTER NES/FAMICOM Not the Bible Jesus, this one is sci-fi Words: Carl Williams This is one of those games that is a an obvious “duh” no wonder this didn’t come out in North America. From the name of the game to the graphics, it is pretty easy to see why Enix, now Square-Enix, didn’t bother bringing this one over. Gameplay-wise, Jesus is pretty linear. You are not likely to die of anything in the game, kind of a bummer considering the situations that you will be facing. Now, the other characters, they are kind of left out in the void of space as far as their safety goes. The question is, how will they meet their demise? There are some weird staff choices for the crew of Jesus, one in particular is a keyboardist of all things who is trying to write new songs and the like. Not sure how this would help on a space ship but well, she is on your crew in this game. She even wears a leotard during off hours. Get ready for your encounter with the alien creatures, remember they carry a predisposition to be evil and deadly. Some of these things look like a cross between Hordak from She-Ra and a four legged spider while others are directly out of your worst nightmares. Translated the name means Jesus: Dreadful Bio-Monster, nothing all that bad there. The title is indeed intended to refer to the Biblical Jesus, could be a stickler for a Nintendo game. The space ship is shaped like a double bladed sword which is meant to infer thoughts of the Book of Revelation. Another problem that could have stopped a localization effort. None of that is a deal stopper though, Enix could have gotten around all of it if they wanted to. Graphically, everything has the nice 80’s Anime look to it but there is very little animation to speak of. Colors are bright and contrast well getting the point across without too much trouble. One thing that bothered me with Jesus was the abbreviation work on the commands when there was obviously room for an expanded command box. It couldn’t have been space restraints because many of the commands appear in the text of the game. The story for Jesus is somewhat original, which is why it is so interesting to play. Set in 2061, Halley’s