The War in Heaven

Strangely enough, this actually does look like what I pictured Hell to be. Well, except for that glowing Christmas tree thing.The game's installation went surprisingly smooth, as the programmers were intelligent enough to get an automatic install wizard working just fine (which is better than some other major game companies). After 220 megs of holy crap was moved to my harddrive, I booted up the game and prepared to worship Jesus by changing my key binds.

When getting to the options / configuration screen, I was shocked to actually discover that all major action keys could be remapped! Things were definitely looking good, as I find it much easier to hit things with swords when I'm using my "ASDF" keyboard configuration. I adjusted all the options and jumped into the game, ready to save my soul from the eternal fires of Hell!

Then the game started, and I realized that I would have to sit through Hell in order to get out of Hell. How ironic.

The purpose of "The War In Heaven" is supposed to provide "Bible-based entertainment to Christians while at the same time introducing nonbelievers to the eternal truths of the Word of God." Yeah, right, and "Space Bunnies Must Die" was created to "intellectually stimulate the most savvy of MENSA members across the globe." You can choose to play as either an Angel or a Daemon, the main difference being that the Angel starts with a sword, and the Daemon has some kind of double-pronged backscratcher. If you're the Angel, you kill things in Heaven; if you're the Daemon, you kill things in "Hell" (notice the use of quotes around "Hell". I will explain this later). 

At the start of every episode, you're treated to a Bible parable or some incredible words of wisdom that some dead person who hung around Jesus might've muttered at one point in time. They don't really tie in to the game at all, so you can basically ignore it. Well, you could if the game DIDN'T FORCE YOU TO SIT THROUGH THE WHOLE THING BEFORE YOU CAN START THE DAMN LEVEL. This Bible Parable screen does serve a purpose though, as it informs you of what terribly malformed object you're supposed to find before you can end the map. You must search for inane crap like the "Helmet of Salvation" and the "Boots of Peace" (I'm not making these up). You can tell when you've found the object you're looking for because it's invariably some rotating lump of blocks that are colored green and / or red. This stands out from the rest of the map, where everything else is blue and grey (or, if you're playing in Hell, really really really red). If you try to be a smartass and complete the level without finding the magical "Tubesock of Truth", the screen will turn solid black and inform you in giant letters that you have in fact "FAILED". Then you get to start over from the beginning again! HOORAY FOR JESUS!

Enemies don't feel pressured to fully appear on the screen. They're pretty laid back.

In order to impede your progress and generally frustrate you, the designers have placed enemies in the game. These bad guys range from walking frogs to Ken Dolls with swords. They are equipped with deadly weapons (sticks) and advanced artificial intelligence so complex that they are capable of either walking towards you OR walking away. Sometimes the enemies choose to run in place or get stuck in doorways, but this is probably just part of God's master plan (I assume). Occasionally enemies will disappear too, which is definitely an added bonus that kept me "on my toes." The game designers also opted to throw in more "difficult" versions of the same enemy. The difference between a normal badguy and its more difficult brother is their skin hue, and the fact that it takes three minutes of holding down the "attack" key to kill the difficult guy, as opposed to the normal two. After playing this game for many hours, I have discovered the optimal attack plan, which you should follow when encountering any kind of enemy in this game:

1) Approach opponent by walking towards it in a straight line. They will do the same.
2) Hold down the "attack" key.*
3) Wait until enemy dies or game crashes.
4) Repeat instructions until everything on map is dead.