While in his cherub form, Bob is weak and unable to fight, and can very easily be killed; however, he may possess any biological lifeform by jumping into their body.

In more difficult levels, Bob can only possess another body when the target is oblivious to his presence, thus adding a stealth element to the game.

Once in control of a host, he can interact with the environment and non-player characters (NPCs) by using switches or weapons and fighting in unarmed combat.

Bob is then asked to return by God, telling him that if humans are prepared to tamper with His creations, there is no place for Him on Earth and leave them to their own devices.

Lead designer David Perry intended Messiah to be targeted towards adults, in contrast to Shiny's previous games such as Earthworm Jim,[3] and predominantly towards males.

[5] The development team heavily touted the game's tessellation technology, which they said could reduce or increase the number of polygons displayed in real time based on the hardware running the game, thereby maximizing the level of detail possible on any given hardware setup, stabilizing the frame rate, and enabling real-time interpolation and volumetric lighting.

[3][7] It was announced that Messiah would be released simultaneously for the PC and PlayStation in the second quarter of 1998,[8] with another console port following as a launch title for the Dreamcast.

In February 1998, a couple years before Messiah was released, the Los Angeles Times reported a public outcry over the title.

Jeff Green of Computer Gaming World stated, "You can't use the word 'messiah' and not know you're going to tweak the sensibilities of the religious community."

"[4] In August 1999, Interplay recorded several promotional commercials with Hank the Angry Drunken Dwarf from The Howard Stern Radio Show.

The review detailed that beside "a level of sexism that goes beyond the usual demeaning stereotypes" and "adolescent edginess" that "there's a general atmosphere of cruelty, of enjoying violence not for the adrenaline rush of the action or even for the fun of cartoonish bloodshed - but for the realistic pain it causes.