I’m leaving the comment, for now, because it does point to a legitimate review from a third-party site. However, this is spam, it is commercial, and it is not dialog. Stop it LeftBehind, stop it Tyndale, and stop it marketing pukes. This is a weblog intended for dialog and conversation, not the unsolicited promotion of your video game.

If anybody’s wondering why I mentioned Tyndale, it’s because Tyndale markets the materials for LB — it’s their franchise. Maybe nobody at Tyndale is responsible for this crap appearing on my weblog, but they should know about it, and they should put a stop to this nonsense.

This is not how you generate positive public response.

And in case you don’t know it, Focus on the Family also publishes and markets through Tyndale, so take that for what it’s worth.

Rich.
BlogRodent

On the face of it, your comment sounds like you’re angry at me for criticizing your video game, when the opposite is true. Even a cursory read of my article should demonstrate that I mentioned your video game in a positive light.

Further, I don’t expect you to know this, but I’ve written about this elsewhere, at the Out of Ur weblog hosted by my former employer, Christianity Today. Here is a repost of my comments there:

Out of Ur
Praise the Lord, Pass the Ammo
A new video game uses violence and murder to spread the love of Christ

Comment:

I haven’t played the game yet — but naturally, that won’t stop me (and countless others) from reviewing it sight unseen. :-)

As I mentioned in a note over at CTLibrary (”Violence in, Violence Out”), video games teach us something while we are ostensibly being entertained. What we think about has consequences. Or, as C.S. Lewis has said, “We eventually become what we pretend to be.”

That said, I think it’s worth pointing out that most of the pre-release press I’ve seen on the Left Behind game over-sensationalizes the “blood and gore,” making it sound like a first-person-shooter. It’s not: it’s a real-time-strategy game.

There are fundamental differences between the two types of games, and I’m not yet convinced that the Left Behind game is as heinous as many make it sound. I reserve judgment until I’ve seen it for myself.

Regards,

Rich.
BlogRodent

(Originally posted on Out of Ur.)

And your closing line, “Thank you for taking the time to be a responsible blogger,” smells like a back-handed compliment. Are you saying I already am a responsible blogger and you’re conratulating me, or are you encouraging me to take the time to some day become responsible?

It’s like the old saw: “Have you beaten your wife today, sir?”

Not yet, I haven’t.

Make of that what you will, I suppose.

Anyhow, thank you for taking the time to be a responsible blog commenter!

Regards,

There has been in incredible amount of MISINFORMATION published in the media and in online blogs here and elsewhere.

Pacifist Christians and other groups are taking the game material out of context to support their own causes. There is NO “killing in the name of God” and NO “convert or die”. There are NO “negative portrayals of Muslims” and there are NO “points for killing”.

Please play the game demo for yourself (to at least level 5 of 40) to get an accurate perspective, or listen to what CREDIBLE unbiased experts are saying after reviewing the game at http://www.leftbehindgames.com/pages/controversy.com

Then, we’d love to hear your feedback as an informed player.

The reality is that we’re receiving reports everyday of how this game is positively affecting lives by all who play it.

Thank you for taking the time to be a responsible blogger.

Rich
BlogRodent

There are many games out that have combat (”violence” in some people’s minds) but have no blood-and-gore aspects, and there are some games that have no blood-and-gore, but which I will not allow in my home (GTA comes immediately to mind).

I assume when you reference “violence”, you were referring to the Mortal Kombat style voilence? If not, and you mean any form of voilence… we may need to start censoring our Bibles.

I posted on a sense of sin last night, and about our thought lives. Do video games help to fill in the gaps of our virtual reality/imagination? Or are they just a weak substitute?

If there were no sin in our adventures in imagination there would be no enjoyment in them.

True? Video games can allow us to participate in arenas we would otherwise never visit. Sometimes it’s a pro football stadium, or a jet fighter, or an alien planet. Some folks enjoy running over people to score points, or shooting anything that moves.

With the PS3 due out soon, and the Wii (GameCube’s next iteration), it’s incumbent on parents to limit what their youngsters can “visit”, particularly as the scene on the screen becomes more realistic. It’s one thing to shoot down army guys in an old Nintendo game. It’s much more intense in high-def (or is that high-death?) 64 bit dual processor power.