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

Re:Bad Analogy Time?

[dasunt]

Article: "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."

Well, if that is their baseline for success -- we can only hope.

You may not be familiar with it, but the amount of Christian music being sold isn't small -- 47 million albums/year according to one source.

Or how about "$800 million in [Christian music] sales [that] topped sales of classical music and jazz combined..." (from a story talking about, oddly enough, the piracy of Xian music).

Christian music is big business, with its own famous bands, concerts, and record lables. And don't think that its all old time gospel music either -- it runs the gauntlet from folk music to pop to Christian metal.

A Couple of Issues

[Hungus]

Label me what you will, Mac Freak, BSD Zealot, Rolemaster 2nd Apologist, Grey Hat, Young Earth Creationist, Bad Typist Speller, and Poor Grammarian. (I just figured I would get it out of the way). On top of all that (or rather underlying it) I am an Evangelical Christian of the Reformed Tradition with Jewish roots. Oh, and I love radio dramas, and as a subset Adventures in Odyssey.

All of that being said, I don't really like they way this company seems to be headed. Christian music has become to popular, to the point it is often difficult to tell the difference between sacred and secular. It is my entrenched belief that once you cannot see the line anymore, it isn't there. Christian games should strive be the best out there, not the most popular. Christians these days often lose sight of it not being about money. You do what you are called to do, not because it is easy or popular but because you were called. You needs will be met, and by that I don't mean your need to drive a Lexus and live in a 3000+ sq. ft home. (unless of course it is a generational home or something similar).

Christian games can be fun, exciting challenging etc. All to often, however, they are cheesy, shoddily made, or quite droll. The Christian life isn't some go stick your head in the sand way of living (though again some have made it that). People forget that it is a Christian world view that shaped Tolkien's works and yet I would argue that there are a fair number of /.'rs who enjoy the works yet do not have a similar belief. In my mind it should be the same with Christian games. In the end, games for me are about story telling and use such to challenge the mind and soul.

In any case I will leave you with the following quote ascribed to CS Lewis regarding one of the many conversations he and JRR Tolkien had on issues of myth, storytelling and its effects"

"Now the story of Christ is simply a true myth: a myth working on us the same way as the others, but with this tremendous difference that it Really happened: and one must be content to accept it in the same way, remembering that it is God's myth where the others are men's myths; i.e. the Pagan stories are God expressing Himself through the minds of the poets, using such images as He found there, while Christianity is God expressing Himself through what we call 'real things' ... namely, the actual incarnation, crucifixion, and resurrection."