Just a Cleric Reviews

Although this game can be fun, there are a lot of issues with the game that make it really frustrating. For one thing there are a few game ending glitches, which can get annoying because there's no auto save feature and there's some RNG elements in the game. Secondly, there's fall damage. Now I understand this could've been added to make the game harder, but the player should not get penalized for not wanting to go down a short ladder that takes time away. Thirdly, the weapons aren't that effective, I feel that no matter how much you level your character, some enemies are still difficult to attack. Other than these issues, the mission system is really good and the dialouge is really witty and clever. Also the music is really funny. I wouldn't not reccomend this game to someone, but I also wouldn't reccomend it at the same time. Price is very cheap though :)

The game is hard, it's Nintendo hard. It's not unfair but it is challenging for those retro gamers out there. Even if it gets frustrating at time. There are tons of secrets throughout and multiple ways to play the game as you can choose different character classes at the start of the game. The controls never feel stiff and move perfectly with a keyboard or gamepad. Although with this type of game I strongly recommend playing with a gamepad instead. The music is fun and hilarious. Instead of some retro bit music or synth soundtrack you are treated to an actual rock band doing the music and lyrics. In a way the soundtrack sort of reminds me that of Home Movies if anybody recalled that show. The game's pricing is really not that much even at full price it's an enjoyable experience. My only complaint about the game is that there is no Steam Cloud. It isn't need but it would be nice. 7.5/10

Just a Cleric is a simple but fun indie game about a Cleric who finally gets his chance in the spotlight after his team is slain by a dragon! The structure of the game is pretty simple and is split into two halves. In town you can walk around and talk to the eccentric npcs to buy/upgrade your equipment, and then when you're ready you can take on various quests like watering plants, stealing eggs or protecting cats from zombies! The writing/humour in these quests is fantastic and definitely the best part of the game (even the soundtrack is both hilarious and catchy). The controls are pretty standard (move, attack, jump and spell) and the combat works fine (although the hitboxes are a little wonky). The game also has four different stats you can level depending on your playstyle. Personally I prefer Faith since you can spam healing/defensive spells more often if you level that. Now that DOES lead to a balancing problem since you can always just hide and heal up if you're low on a quest, but I won't complain since some of the levels can be pretty tough. My only major problem is that you can't grind between quests so if you're ever stuck there's not much you can do besides tough it out. This shouldn't be an issue once you've learned the game (or abuse the healing trick) but it would be nice if you could get some extra money and materials between quests. Overall Just a Cleric is a fun (but simple) indie game that's definitely worth the price. Thumbs up to the dev who's very involved in the community and always listens to player feedback. Keep it up! [b]EDIT: My video on Just a Cleric.[/b] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJ7aFcF6xVE

EDIT: After 51.2 hours on record I can say that this is a "piece of art" starting from pixel art to soundtrack. This game is FANTASTIC! if you like pixel games then I really RECOMMEND this game, main advantages: 1- Nice pixel design. 2- Numerous number (really lots) of weapons along with the game. 3- It has a lot of levels. 4- No bugs even while it's indie game. 5- A lot of unexpected and funny things happen. 6- Very Nice and lovely Soundtrack. The only "small negative thing" about this game is that you can't turn it to full screen from in-game settings, but you can easily do it using free software called "Borderless Gaming" so it's not a problem at all.

This is a fun goofy game. It's challenging, but not unfair. You play as a healer out for revenge after his party is killed by a dragon. It has a unique soundtrack. I like it, but I've always liked weird indy music and weird indy games. Unlike many indy games, a controller works very well. I haven't even tried the keyboard controls. The hitboxes are perfect. The game itself is simple but challenging. Most of the time your objective is to reach a certain spot on the map, collect a certain item, destroy a certain item, find a certain NPC or protect a certain NPC Once you get past the difficulty curve, the game is a joy to play.

Just a Cleric is an adorable, humble, and devastatingly silly indie effort that punches above its weight class, even if it is in the lowest class. The Steam community has rightfully commented on some clunk factor with graphics and combat. I had good fun for an hour but didn't feel like completing it. I was able to pick this game up on sale for $0.59 and would recommend goofing with it at that price.

As a Cleric out to kill a dragon in revenge for his fallen allies, you start out in a small hub where you can buy and upgrade equipment before leaving to perform certain tasks on a series of missions. Some levels are small and require you to beat the nearby enemies in some way, while others are more maze-like and feature optional paths and secrets. There's also a New Game+ mode that has incentives such as stronger enemies, hidden powerups and some different items to obtain. The controls are simple enough, with your character being able to equip a variety of weapon types and to learn a series of spells. You can choose what stats to increase when levelling up and even reset them for a small price if needed. I've found that increasing Faith is quite useful so you can recharge MP quickly and use the healing spell any time you find yourself in trouble. Some missions are rather difficult, but it shouldn't take long for any action game fan to get the hang of it. Get good, will ya? Most of the time you can turtle out of battles, even some bosses, to heal yourself and there's a rather cheesy fire shield spell that trivializes several areas. As a wise man once said: "Ninjas can't catch you if you're on fire". The low-res pixel art gives a cute cartoony feel to it, not unlike Environmental Station Alpha. Plus, it has a silly soundtrack with corny lyrics. All in all, the game feels like an improvement to one of the dev's more well known games, Hasslevania. Frankly, the ongoing Hasslevania 2 project, as I remember it from the betas, would feel more unrefined and slow-paced than this one. Just A Cleric is good fun, lasts for a couple of hours and is well worth the small asking price.

Just a brief rundown of Just a Cleric as I need to sink more time in. First impressions, though, are good! The game has a lot of heart and an endearing sense of humour; there's a definite self-awareness to the proceedings and nothing here takes itself too seriously. The pixel art is decidedly a bit crude yet thoroughly charming and consistent. Clearly the work of one artist, which contributes a great deal to Just a Cleric's world feeling cohesive. While the game is built for a diminutive resolution (160x112), it means you won't find any unevenly scaled pixels knocking against each other as tends to happen, for instance, when a game aims to merely [i]approximate[/i] a low-res presentation. For me, the only real drawback to the pint-sized resolution is the readability of the game's sprite font in lower case, something I gather to be a common gripe. This is an extra shame as the dialogue and description text is generally pretty hilarious. Mechanically, Just a Cleric isn't the most polished action platformer on the planet but it plays more than competently enough. The RPG elements are well executed and there's real fun to be had taking on quests one-by-one from the rotating cast of snarky characters populating the pub. These bite-sized missions present a wide variety of locales to blunder through and the soundtrack is equally diverse, offering an eclectic mix of self-produced Primus-flavoured tunes with lyrics that often break the 4th wall. On the technical side, there are some rough edges to Just a Cleric but nothing I'd call dealbreaking. Controller support is a little iffy (an Xbox 360 gamepad wasn't detected at all on a Windows 7 machine but no issues under XP), the instant drop to desktop upon hitting escape is a touch rude and the complete lack of configurability is certainly not ideal, but the [i]game[/i] is good. For those seeking a lo-fi platformer with RPG accoutrements and a whack of personality, Just a Cleric fits the bill. Based on my experiences thus far, definitely recommended :)

I´ve had the possibility to talk to the Developer a lot and I´ve been keeping an eye on this game since it was put on Greenlight. So far, this game has been one of the best Indie-Releases I´ve played to date, but let me start from the beginning. The Developer is a great guy who already developed a few other games, JAC being the first one who was put on Steam Greenlight. I don´t know where I met him anymore (I think it was somewhere in the Off-Topic-Hell here in the Steam-Community), but he told me about JAC and after I saw the Greenlight Trailer I immediately knew that this game had potential. After two or three weeks he uploaded a Demo for everyone to try. This Demo was the moment I was really convinced to buy this game. The humor in this game is so awesome, almost every NPC is admireable and throws out one gag after another. Situational Humor, funny Tooltips... The Demo alone already entertained me more than most games in terms of humor. Gameplay-wise this game reminds me of the old Castlevania Games, mixed with a weird blend of different games. The Cleric Class from the Old-School-RPG´s (take Baldur´s Gate from BioWare as an example), the deadly traps you know from Dungeon Crawlers and Side-Scrollers (like Castlevania), a lovely Pixel-Art-Graphicstyle (which only adds to the charme of the game, I couldn´t imagine this game being 3D or whatever), everything in this game kinda matches. AND the soundtrack was selfmade. It´s so god damn awesome, I´d recommend this game solely for the soundtrack already, but that´s not the point here. You start off as a Cleric who never gets to do something (yes, you´ve read it correct, you never get to do something). His Party-Members are so strong, he just stands somewhere in the back, drinking Milk, while his Party Members have been bringing wrecking carnage upon the enemies. One day though, he has to take a piss after a fight (because he drank too much Milk) and while he is gone, his friends are being attacked by a Dragon. Once the Cleric returns, all of his friends are dead. The Cleric swears to take revenge for his fallen comrades and pillages the dead bodies for loot. (Oh yes, that is macabre, isn´t it?). Actually, this is the first important step in the game. You are able to get the entire Gear during the game anyways, but this choice will influence your early game. You better not fuck this up. Choose wisely. The game itself is simple but challenging. Don´t expect a game that will change the entire RPG-Genre. Most of the time your objective is to reach a certain spot of the map, collect a certain item, destroy a certain item, find a certain NPC or protect a certain NPC. Every few missions though, a mighty boss appears and you have to figure out how to beat him. Memorize the attack patterns and exploit the weak spots. The game itself really is challenging sometimes, you will definetly find yourself repeating some stages over and over again, but the Developer really listens to Feedback, he even decreased the challenge in the first playthrough, so that the game doesn´t get too tough. Once you´ve beat it for the first time, you´re going to find yourself in the New Game +, where the enemies have been reworked completely, delivering a harder challenge now, spitting at the poor Cleric with lots of debuffs, new attack patterns etc. Especially the Bosses are a REAL challenge now. And as if this wasn´t enough, there´s even a [b]Super Boss [/b] to beat. (But I haven´t reached him yet, so I can´t really say much about him). Summa Summarum: If you´re searching for a game that is able to entertain you, this game will definetly be able to fit your needs. Challenging Gameplay, the best Humor in a game I´ve seen for a long time and the charming Pixel-Graphic make this game what it is. The Developer is really listening to the Feedback, looking for opinions and ideas on how to improve his game. Hardly I´ve seen a Dev that has been so passionate (might have something to do with the fact that he´s been working on this game in his free time during the last two years. You can see the Heartblood he pumped into this title). I´ve spent 4€ on it, and that´s far less than what I´ve spent on some "AAA-Games" who have been disappointing, to say the least. If you´re even slightly interested in such games, consider to pick this up. You won´t regret it. [u]EDIT:[/u] The Developer added an expansion. A noteable thing among many others is the "grind" level that allows you to increase your cleric´s powers in order to make the whole game a tad easier. It´s still challenging. The whole expansion turned out awesome, so... if you have some spare money and search for great entertainment, consider to grab this game. I also recommend looking at his other work released on Steam as they both get frequently updated.

First off let me start off by saying the Developer is a really nice guy and is there to help in any way possible. He's very vocal with the community and has fixed some things that really irked me when I first made this review. My review was initially negative, but the developer fixed the issues as fast as you can say, "Just a Cleric." So don't be afraid to contact him or post issues on the forum. I will leave my original review intact, but my new review is as follows... PROS -Great and hilarious original soundtrack filled with crunchy bass lines and HILARIOUS lyrics. -New game plus feature that introduces cool new features that I don't want to spoil for you. HINT: Jump around EVERYWHERE when in new game plus. Trust me, you won't regret it. -Cool, but very basic leveling/upgrade system. This is both a con and a positive. I'll explain the cons of this in the con section below. You can upgrade your gear to plus 4 and after that you can get your items blessed for even more power, which is a very cool feature. - Once you get past the difficulty curve, the game is a joy to play. I ended up playing for a few hours last night and didn't realize the time flew by so fast. -NPCs are hilarious as well and blend in with the cutesy atmosphere. CONS -No place where you can farm for money or gear between missions. The gear can be pretty expensive. -The font is pretty atrocious, but hang in there and you'll adapt to it -Sometimes the Cleric has a hard time listening to your button commands.Only seems to be this way when you're under attack. The overall feel of the controls is avergae at best. -Lacks a skill upgrade system. The stats DO affect your powers, but I would have found leveling more enjoyable with something else to invest points in, like maybe passive skills that increase run speed, Attack speed etc, but the leveling system is still solid. -Sometimes difficulty can seem more artifical than fair. That's when you gotta outwit the opponent by using the ladders to destroy them. Trust me, it's a godsend, especially against the Dragon. If you end up buying this game I HIGHLY recommend focusing on mostly the Faith stat because you're gonna get annoyed by sitting there for at least a minute or two to heal your magic points in order to heal your hp, only to go fight a Boss that drains your HP like you're wearing a styrafoam armor set. I'm not saying ignore all the other stats, but make sure you have a healthy amount of faith. Also, the SPEAR type weapons are the absolute best weapons to use. After all my frustrations with the first few hours of playtime, I finally got the hang of it and now I'm having a blast with it. I'm actually destroying New Game plus at the moment with no issues. I recommend this game if you're into Metroidvania style games and also want a good laugh in the process due to the amazing music. Give it a shot! It's cheap! :) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ORIGINAL NEGATIVE REVIEW Pros: -Great music, very funny lyrics and that bass line is crunchy -Decent character upgrade/leveling system. (there are cons for this I'll explain later) -The townsfolk are funny, The humor in this game is top notch. Cons: -Lack of farming/grinding for levels or items. This is a problem because of..... -Expensive Gear. This wouldn't be a problem if we were able to farm to buy said gear and upgrade the gear more frequently. -Steep learning curve. I'm just going to say. I HATE the Werewolves and the Dragon. Never ending infuriation. It seems that the enemies tend to hit you first if you dont have a spear. -No checkpoint system. Dying over and over and over again would be acceptable if we didn't have to go through the same stage over and over and over and over and over again, wasting valuable time. Checkpoints NEED to be implemented to lessen the frustration. I would be able to deal with it if the game had such a system. -Difficulty seems more artifical than fair. Trust me, I LOVE difficult games if it's implemented correctly. Here it just seems artifically difficult, If you end up buying this game I HIGHLY recomend focusing on mostly the Faith stat because you're gonna get annoyed by sitting there for at least a minute or two to heal your magic points in order to heal your hp, only to go fight a Boss that drains your HP like you're wearing a styrafoam armor set. This game has ALOT of potential and the developer immediately responds to issues and fixes bugs promptly. At best, this game feels alot like an early access title. As much as I like the developer, I can't recommend this game.