Digital Praise Takes Up Christian Gaming Cause

Thanks to GameSpot for its article discussing the formation of a new Christian videogame developer, Digital Praise, formed to create a "planned line of non-offensive games." CEO Tom Bean notes: "Digital Praise is founded on the principle that fun, exciting computer games don't need to be flooded with violence, sex, hate or images of horror", and the company's official press release discusses "development on two games based on the Adventures in Odyssey radio theater series", arguing: "As long as new game titles are top quality - offering exciting game play and high production value - we believe that interactive Christian games will skyrocket in popularity much like Christian music did 15 years ago."

Comments

Here we go again...

[Elledan]

From the press release:
"Digital Praise is committed to releasing fun, exciting game titles that promote virtues and family values like forgiveness, tolerance and kindness, rather than the violent and sexual behavior that is the mainstay of most popular computer games today."

This single sentence implies two things:

- most games today actively promote violent and/or sexual behaviour;
- any kind of violent and sexual behaviour is a bad thing.

Starting with the second point, I think that we can all agree that this is utter nonsense. Violence and sexual behaviour are facts of life, and are two of the things which most actively define ourselves and our surroundings. Apparently it refers to the 'turning the other cheek', and the 'no sex before marriage/sex is solely for reproductive purposes' parts of fundamentalistic Christian beliefs.

Moving on, I'm guessing that even a game like the Sims is considered to be offensive by certain people. FPSs are violent by nature, but it would be ridiculous to state that the violence in this type of games promotes more violence (looking at the crime statistics for the US, the number of crimes committed since the introduction of Doom in the early '90s has sharply decreased, and never can a criminal act be directly attributed to a game).

Besides, there are already plenty of games which are totally PC and 'lots of fun'. They're called children's games :p

Anyway, those smug, fundamentalistic Christian types never seem to change, so this press release isn't exactly news, or even mildly shocking. With a couple of minor adaptations you could turn it into a press release regarding Christian music.

Re:Here we go again...

[zhiwenchong]

Violence and sexual behavior are facts of life, true, but that doesn't mean everyone has to condone it. And no, I do not agree that they define us as people. People should be able to choose what kinds of values they want to have without being subject to derision. And that doesn't necessarily have to mean that they're necessarily divorced from reality. They just have different values.

I think we're all sick of holier-than-thou attitudes, but let's not stoop to that level ourselves.

Your post confirms something: smugness isn't limited to fundamentalist Christian groups.

Re:Here we go again...

[Elledan]

Such a way of thinking about sex was typical before the sexual revolution. It was accompanied by strict rules for how a woman should behave herself, before and after marriage.

A woman should never take the initiative, leave all important decisions to men, including who to marry (which was decided upon by the potential groom and both families). Once married, a woman should only concern herself with keeping the house tidy, taking care of the children, and ensure the continuing comfort of her husband, regardless of her own condition.

It took a world war (when women had to work in the factories, because most men were away, fighting) to shake up these widely held convictions and a revolution (from the '60s and onwards) to get things to change.

Sexual behaviour (e.g. flirting) has been accepted for a while now, and sex itself is becoming less of a taboo as well. The reason why sex was treated like something 'special' for such a long time was because it was a taboo, thanks to good old-fashioned Christian values (re virgin birth), not because not talking about it made it somehow 'better'.

The man can say, "She wants to have sex with me and no one else!" The woman can say, "He wants to have sex with me and no one else!" Man: "My body is ALL for YOU!" Woman: "My body is ALL for YOU!" You can imagine what that does to the hormones! And the mutual love. A third person, whether a participant or spectator, contaminates the marital purity and spoils the "one flesh" sexual intimacy.

...which is why all men absolutely can't stand the thought of a trisome.

Thank you, please come again :)

Re:Here we go again...

[nathanh]

Appropriate signoff for your fast food philosophy. You know nothing about life. You choose flings over marriage? You will die a bitter death. You will never know love.

Spot the loving and caring Christian.

Re:Bad Analogy Time?

[Landaras]

I know you are (sucessfully) making a joke, but I'll go ahead and respond.

I do agree that the quoted individual did mispeak a bit. I believe Christian music has significantly gained credibility in recent years, but I wouldn't describe it as "skyrocketing" and I disagree with his history.

Christian music was HORRENDOUS for a very long period of time. The musicians had a heart for God, but not an aptitude for writing lyrics or music.

Originally the genre was nothing more than the equivalent of hymns or thinly-veiled theology set to not always competently played music. Obviously this brought a lot of deserved ridicule.

I put 1995 as the year that Christian music started to not suck.

That year the self-titled Jars of Clay disc debuted (along with it the song Flood), as well as dcTalk's Jesusfreak. Both displayed expert musical skill along with lyrics that actually MEANT SOMETHING to listeners.

Fast forward to today, and it's not unusual to hear about overtly Christian artists having secular success. Switchfoot (and their Meant to Live) is the current poster child for this.

But I think the biggest impact is in the bands that you aren't aware are Christian, which I (and others) call "Christian-influenced."

2001's most played radio song (as determined by Broadcast Data Services) was Lifehouse's Hanging by a Moment .

Lifehouse is comprised of Christians, write on Christian ideas and themes (many of their songs can be properly interpreted as worship), but also intentionally allow their music to be correctly interpreted secularly.

They don't compromise their Christian roots and beliefs, while not beating non-Christians over the heads with the Jesus Stick.

Bringing this back to gaming (since this is the games section of Slashdot), I believe Digital Praise will be successful if and only if they are able to produce games that are as technically credible and enjoyable to the player as that which is currently on the market.

It's great to focus on God and attempt to glorify Him. But in order to have impact in the world at large, you have to have relevance as well.

Christian music (eventually) learned this lesson. We'll see if Christian gaming does.

- Neil Wehneman

Niche Market

[SiO2]

The words "niche market" come to mind. They are obviously targeting a very specific audience: people who want to play games, but who want to feel safe and moral while doing so.

I would posit that the vast majority of us who play games with violent or sexual content do so for the following reasons:

1. They're fun.

2. Normal, being a relative term, people can't do the things in meat space that they can do in computer games. They like that. They feel free. They get to step outside the boundaries for a bit.

3. Fragging helps to release tension. Sure, you would really like to go after Phil at the office with a rail gun, because he fucked up again and really made you angry. Go splatter some bots instead. You won't end up in either the electric chair or strapped to a gurney with a needle in your arm that is about to deliver to your bloodstream some chemicals of a very dubious and harmful nature.

4. A lot of geeks, nerds, dweebs, dorks, and whatever term you choose were kicked around a lot when they were younger. Violent games are a way for them to kick back in a manner that, while cathartic, is not harmful to others.

I suppose most of these points are intertwined.

There are already a great deal of fun games available that are non-violent, non-sexual, and non-Christian. I submit, for example, games like Enigmo, Text Twist, the wiley veteran Tetris, UpLink, etc. These are but a few examples.

I think that this company is merely using the tired argument that violent games lead to violent behavior. If anything, I would argue the opposite. I, for one, have become so jaded by violence in the news that I really don't care anymore. Some more soldiers exploded in Iraq again today. Some more Jews killed some more Palestinians. Some more Palestinians killed some more Jews. I've heard and read it so many times that I don't even care anymore.

This company just wants to offer alternatives that disseminate Christian values, which, I think, is not necessarily wrong. More power to them. However, I do believe that their market share will be rather slim and limited to Christian fundamentalists.

SiO2

Umm...

[King_of_Prussia]

Whereabouts in the bible does it say "and ye faithful shall not gaze upon or take part in scenes of horror"?

Calling horror and violence something foreign to the church seems a little off kilter- anyone remember the crusades?

I think this is a positive thing

[Zachary Kessin]

Here are a bunch of people who are saying we don't like the current crop of games for a number of reasons. So instead of protesting and trying to make it so that others can't play they are going to make their own games. In a free country this is exactly what people should do. One of the points of free software is that people can take it and make it better, for whatever value of better they happen to want. Even if its something that is totally un insteresting to you and me.

If these folks want to make their games power to them. Remember in the USA fundemtalist christains are a very large number of people.

Shame on non religious people.

[jotaeleemeese]

It is a shame that it takes a group as descredited as any religious organization (don't start me on this one, just my opinion OK?) to tackle excesive violence and demeaning or exploitatve sex stereotypes.

I, being a non religious person, am sick and tired of games whose only aim is to brutalize as many characters as possible in the worst possible way.

I think game designers have a moral responsibility towards society, specially having in mind that many of their "customers" are impressionable young persons, I am not saying that there should not be ultraviolent, sexually explicit or politically incorrect games, the point I am trying to make is that game developpers seem to think that without at least one of the above they can't sell.

It is a testament to how wrong they are how Tetris, Pac Man, Myst, SimCity and other games like thes are perhaps the most successful in all time,

Re:Shame on non religious people.

[dafoomie]

Yeah, because all religous people so abhore violence, they'd never make something as excessively gruesome as Passion of the Christ.

Yes, shame on all of us non-religous types.

Re:Shame on non religious people.

[Jerf]

Someone pointed out that this was similar in concept to Doom, you go around killing demons. But Doom is considered a "bad" or "evil" game by many fundamentalist types, whereas the christian game was okay for some reason. Is there really a difference between killing demons with a sword in an "christian" game and killing them with shotguns in secular one?

Speaking as a Christian who frequently finds myself critical of same, I tend to agree.

A more contemporary example: Explain to me why Harry Potter is evil, but the Chronicles of Narnia are not.

Actually, I can draw a meaningful line between the two (this not being a theology site its probably not worth posting it as laying the necessary groundwork would take too long); my point isn't that it is impossible, but that the way that most Christians have condemned it also condemns significant amounts of other classic literature.

(Also, for the record, I believe there is a huge difference between this is a story and claiming this is true. Until such time as JK Rowling starts claiming it is true, I'm not inclined to worry about it in older children. I do believe younger children (4 or 5) should not see the movies, but more from a developmental psychology approach them a religious one; it is important to develop a sense of reality vs. fantasy, and that is getting increasingly hard in our world as multi-sensory entertainment gets more and more realistic. Expect to see this as an issue sometime in the next decade or two in the developmental psychology discipline.)

Stories?

[LittleBigLui]

"Digital Praise is founded on the principle that fun, exciting computer games don't need to be flooded with violence, sex, hate or images of horror"

So the games won't be based on bible stories then?