Parents seeking to protect their kids from cyber gore have created a boom in Christian computer games, write Justin Norrie and Richard Cooke.
A dam was turning out to be the perfect date. He was dishy, debonair and had a good job in computing. But a couple of drinks and a marijuana cigarette later, the unfortunate girl was getting an unwanted abortion from a crooked doctor, all because she took the advice of a demon in a tuxedo.
That's the way God deals his cards in The Choice Game, one of dozens of Christian computer games making inroads into a global leisure software industry that was last year worth $25 billion and is growing at 10 per cent a year, according to British research firm Screen Digest.
The new wave of faith-based games gives children the chance to smite demons from the minds of suicidal teenagers, convert heathen Roman soldiers and explore ancient civilisations while learning verses from the Bible along the way.
It sounds like proselytising, but Christian gaming developers claim they're only offering kids good, wholesome fun. The Canadian developer, Mackenzie Ponech, whose company Two Guys Software created Eternal War: Shadows of Light, in which players are sent by God to counsel depressed youths, aims to create games that can be enjoyed by Christians and non-Christians alike: "It's not about taking a Bible, rolling it up and shoving it down the person's throat who's playing the game. It's about fun."
Christian computer games aren't new, but in recent years they have become more entertaining, adopting the production values of popular commercial games. The first evangelical titles appeared on the market in the mid-1980s, but their insipid game play (Bible Baseball anyone?), low-rent graphics, and elementary plots confined them to strictly niche status. Most were produced by two-man garage operations, working for the love of God, not money.
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