King of Kings: The Early Years on NES is holy crap

destructoid.com:

I may be one of the few people in the world who can be upsold on Kusoge (crap game). I was minding my own business, spending all my money at the local game store. The clerk there, perfectly aware of my infamous lack of taste, pulled out a boxed copy of King of Kings: The Early Years. Usually, I don’t collect boxed NES titles, but the price was right, and he made a convincing argument. I did need another subject for my column. I also could probably use more Jesus in my life.

Perhaps this was God speaking through my friendly neighborhood game dispenser. He led me to the promised kusoge, and it was my sacred duty to play it. I lasted about an hour because, while God may provide, He has no guarantees on quality.

King of Kings: The Early Years was part of Wisdom Tree’s infamous run of games based on the Bible. Back in the ‘80s and early ‘90s, Nintendo had a lot of (very illegal and anti-competitive) rules that it placed on retailers and publishers. If you wanted to sell Nintendo games, you couldn’t also sell unlicensed cartridges. Color Dreams figured out a way around it: Jesus. They rebranded to a Christian-themed company and began developing games based on the Bible.

Christian bookstores didn’t have to worry about Nintendo for a few reasons. First, they didn’t typically carry video games, so they didn’t need to worry about Nintendo withholding anything from them. Secondly, both they and Wisdom Tree didn’t need to worry about getting sued, because Nintendo wouldn’t want to be known as the company that brought the hammer down on Jesus. Also, if they did, Jesus has great lawyers.

King of Kings released in 1991, the same years as Bible Adventures and Exodus: Journey to the Promised Land hit consecrated shelves. It shares the