User:SnowyCinema/Santa Claus Saves the Earth

Santa Claus Saves the Earth is an 2-dimensional action-platform video game that was released in late 2002 for both the PlayStation and the Game Boy Advance. It was developed by Ivolgamus (now known as Nordcurrent) and published by Telegames. The game was only released in Europe, despite plans to expand the game to North America. Because of the game's titular main character, the legendary Christmas figure Santa Claus, sales of the game are most prominent during the Christmas season. The game received mostly negative reviews from critics.

Gameplay and plot
The only playable character in the game is the titular Santa Claus. In the game's plot, a wicked fairy named Nilam, who can see the entire world through a "magic copper," sees Santa packing presents for children. This makes her extremely angry, so she traps Santa in her "magic lands," in hopes that that would stop Santa from doing more good. It is Santa's job to progress through the lands, in order to defeat Nilam, escape, and save the Christmas holiday.

There are a total of fifteen stages in the game. The focus of most levels is to find certain objects, such as switches and keys, that allow access to the level's end goal, and then to progress to the end goal. There are three boss stages in the game, however, that do not follow this formula.

The player has four methods of attack. The first method is the default attack mode which can be done at any time in the game; swinging Santa's pack, which is only useful for close-range combat. Santa can also throw snowballs, shoot tomatoes, or shoot candy pieces, but only if the ammunition for such things are collected beforehand.

The player can additionally collect blue, red, and green circles, which are shown in test tubes on the top-left head-up display. If the player collects a certain amount in one level, they can get an extra life.

Reception
Santa Claus Saves the Earth mostly received negative reviews from critics. GameFAQs gave the PlayStation version a rating of 2.83 out of 5, and the Game Boy Advance version a rating of 2.63 out of 5. The game received extremely negative criticism from YouTube reviews by the comedian and video game critic Caddicarus, who criticized the game's music, camera angling, physics, graphics, and story plot, among many other elements.