The Shivah

Russell Stone is a Jewish Rabbi at a poor synagogue in New York City. He is a devout man with a problem. Membership is way down and he lacks the funds to keep his synagogue open. Things are looking very bleak, and he has grown progressively more cynical and bitter with the passage of time.

The Shivah is a point & click, adventure and indie game developed by and published by Wadjet Eye Games.
Released on November 21st 2013 is available in English on Windows, MacOS and Linux.

It has received 822 reviews of which 669 were positive and 153 were negative resulting in a rating of 7.7 out of 10. 😊

The game is currently priced at 4.99€ on Steam.

The Steam community has classified The Shivah into these genres:

Point & Click Adventure Indie Noir Singleplayer Story Rich Short 2D Pixel Graphics Mystery Detective Classic Retro

Media & Screenshots

Get an in-depth look at The Shivah through various videos and screenshots.

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Requirements

These are the minimum specifications needed to play the game. For the best experience, we recommend that you verify them.

Windows

OS: Win 2000 or higher
Processor: Pentium or higher
Memory: 64 MB RAM
Graphics: 256-colour: 266 Mhz or above
Storage: 150 MB available space
Sound Card: Supports all DirectX-compatible sound cards

MacOS

OS: 10.11
Graphics: 640x360, 1.8 Ghz system

Linux

OS: Ubuntu, Debian, Arch
Processor: 2.7 GHz Dual Core (and above, can run on single core)
Graphics: OpenGL, DirectX 5
Sound Card: Alsa/PulseAudio/DSP

Reviews

Explore reviews from Steam users sharing their experiences and what they love about the game.

Dec. 2024

This game is just okay. Dave Gilbert is one of the best developers of point and click games, and this is his first effort. He excels at dialogue and characterization, and the story's main character seems like a real, complex human being. But the story is lacking, the locations are limited, and you can finish the game in under 2 hours (the major puzzles involve figuring out computer passwords). The story deals with Judaism, but you don't have to be Jewish or a believer to enjoy the game. My advice is to get this game if it's on sale, but it's not a must buy. 5/10.

Dec. 2024

cynical, curmudgeonly rabbi russell stone has one (1) small synagogue about to collapse under poor attendance and a mountain of debt and one (1) moral dilemma: the sudden windfall that could fix said debt came at the cost of the sudden, suspicious death of an estranged former member of his congregation. stone is possessed of both a strong moral compass that leads him to pursue justice And a traditionalist stick up his behind that leads him towards clannish exclusionism, and over the course of his little misadventure he's going to learn the hard way that these tendencies are in direct conflict with each other. it is time to pick one. are you a mensch or are you a schmuck? all this might make the shivah sound grim, but it's actually full to the brim with humor both dry and playful--look no further than your ability to rabbinical method your way through every conversation! it's a quite short game but its strong character writing and new-to-this-remaster voice acting affords its flawed cast a great sense of complexity, and the care & depth that wadjet put into small details such as the internet database and achievement sfx is sure to amuse gentile and jewish players alike. this game is also highly affordable even when it is NOT on sale, which it very often is. if you have a hankering for a funny, grungy mystery story that doesn't overstay its welcome, consider the shivah today.

July 2024

This was a good game, even if it was pretty short. It's about a Rabbi who questions his faith and solves a mystery involving one of the prior members of his congregation, with whom he was not on good terms. Not a whole lot else to say without giving away too much. Only beef I had was that the sound quality of the voice acting was pretty low. The microphones didn't have any pop filters, etc. I hear this is one of the developer's first ever games. So, I'm not without understanding. Overall, it's a fun retro mystery adventure game.

June 2024

As is often the case, I heard about this game largely through reputation: An indie game made by three guys? An adventure game based around a Jewish rabbi being a detective? Such a setup may sound bizarre on paper but somehow it sounds crazy enough to work. And that is enough to pique my interest. So I went to Steam, found the game and played it all the way through - And what did I think of it? Well for starters it is terribly short. But, as is often the case with adventure games, the game is saved by some superb writing. Indeed, the plot has enough clout to see it all the way through and Rabbi Russell Stone is a character that undergoes significant changes throughout to make him a compelling one. And the voice acting is good enough, for an indie game, to make the rest of the cast believable. However what I find particularly interesting about this game is that it is a game that has some positive things to say about religion. This is indeed rare in gaming as religion is treated in gaming as either inspirations behind some truly lousy games (Super Noah's Ark 3d) or as the force opposing the PC (90% of all JRPGs ever made). That being said, I can't think of any game where the PC is a man of a religious faith who faces down corruption in his religion and, by the end of the game, learns something that restores his dwindling faith. Does religion have a place in gaming? Well one would think so provided it's done right - and in that sense, the Shivah presents a convincing case. Original post: https://gametumour.blogspot.com/2014/05/what-did-jew-say.html?m=0

April 2024

Because of really bad cover art I postpone playing this game over and over. But now, when I did, I can say it was nice. Much too short. Very gloomy and hopeless. But nice. Logical puzzles, a bit to much off password guessing. Over-simplistic backgrounds, but good drawn characters and faces. Good plot and dialogs. For sure I can recommend it.

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