Wisdom Tree Games

So, in a post about the Nintendo Entertainment System game Spiritual Warfare, I already touched upon the game development company Wisdom Tree. This company develops video games with a strong Christian message that aims to offer a religious alternative to the secular games. They have a hard time doing this though, where at best they seem to produce uninspired knock-off versions of classic games. This still puzzles me, for somewhere I'd expect the devoted religious armed with rich mythology and ruthless dedication to excel at it. Yet it stops short at the "here, we tried, like it or not" level. Partly perhaps because people might buy it anyway since "it's Christian!" This already might secure a public, making it easy to sell your product, no matter what that product is. Without the grinding competition of a larger marketplace then, products might not get polished into perfection. Game developers might reason somewhere along the lines of "nothing to worry about, so why bother?" Another problem might be estrangement. This Christian development company does not seem to look (closely) at what it is they are imitating, perhaps thereby severely underestimating the art and craft. Add to this a bit of cultural isolation, enough to assume that kids will enjoy being presented with bible excerpts when they are included in a fun quiz that is part of an "exciting" quest, and you have some great ingredients for epic failure.

So let the banquet commence! I only added a few Wisdom Tree games, since there are quite a lot out there. But these ones made me particularly happy.

I wonder what happens might he run into the Jews in Space.

There is more to say about the phenomenon of Bible Man, but more on that later.

Website: http://wisdomtreegames.com/

Dance Praise

If you like to stomp your feet more than plastic guitars, then consider Dance Praise. I say it's a missed opportunity that the dance pad hasn't been turned into a crucifix!

The manufacturing company is the same as that of Guitar Praise, http://www.digitalpraise.com/flash.php

Guitar Praise

So I wanted to cut down on posts on music, musical instruments and all of that. But the Cornerstone newsletter is a gift that just keeps on giving. Just when I had come to terms with the Golfdfish guitars and the Jesus guitars, I am confronted with Guitar Praise. Was Guitar Hero too heathen for you but you still secretly kinda enjoyed it? Then Guitar Praise is the Christmas present for you!

Interesting choice of disclaimer there. I wonder what the aim is.
Manufacturer's website: http://store.digitalpraise.com/guitarpraise.aspx

Moral Decay

This is a video game, ultraviolent, starring none other than. In a description I found: "MORAL DECAY. Chris T. [get it?] has risen from the grave to stop a terrorist plot, restoring peace and justice to the world. Guide Chris T. as he battles Yakuza goons, wild animals, aliens, and the Dark Lord himself!" Sounds quite interesting alright. After some more digging, I found out that in fact Apple (it is for iPhone/iPad) rejected the game a few times before it could live with a watered-down (wine jokes, anyone?) enough machine-gun-wielding Messiah. I wonder if the original game is still out there.

The development company is Infinite Lives. There is a nice little article here on the short history of the game.

Spiritual Warfare

This is a game released for the Nintendo Entertainment System. It looks pretty much like a Legend of Zelda knockoff. It was produced by the legendary Wisdom Tree production company, blowing ever new life into sucky video games, aimed at stimulating Christian kids in their faith or, more likely, offering a Christian alternative to the secular games that gave the parents a good feeling about what they bought for their children and gave the children in turn a poor video game experience. It's another moment where I think: Why? If anyone should be good at making video games, it should be Christians! Such a rich mythology from which to draw inspiration for a good game. They should have been able to make games that made kids amongst each other go "I know it's a Christian game and all, but Goddamn that shit is just too good!" And yet what do they come up with? Knockoff games based on already existing formulas in stead of innovative games that celebrate the rich cultural resources of Christendom. They had the holy grail and they decided not to use it! In a way I am thankful because as much as I appreciate good video games, I appreciate the blundering failures as well of course. My sympathy does go out to you if your parents thought somewhere in the 1980s that getting you a Wisdom Tree game was a good idea. I worry for your soul if today you still agree with them on that!

Might I also draw attention to what the front of that video game might lead you to expect and the crushing disappointment if with this image still upon you, you flick the "on" switch on your console and are greeted with the lameness shown above? Granted, that happened a lot with Nintendo games in those days, be they secular or religious, but still, this one, Spiritual Warfare. Hello, what a title! And with a warrior figure, sword heaved high, ready to mercilessly strike down the many evil spirits, demons, monsters and who knows even Satan himself as a final boss... and then you get this? Again, my Christian brothers and sisters who grew up playing this video game, my sympathy!

I cannot resist including a link to the review of this and some other Wisdom Tree games by an artist in his very own right, the Angry Video Game Nerd: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkNvQYiM6bw The good man has a website as well, why not throw that one in too: http://cinemassacre.com/category/avgn/

Jesus Pixel Art

Pixels are the smallest bits that your computer screen is composed of. Nowadays the pixels on your screen are numerous, but in the olden days it was usually limited to something like 256x240 pixels because of 8 bit limitations. If the largest variables you can assign values to are 8 bits big, that gives you a range of 0 to 255, so your screen isn't going to be wider than 256 pixels. Which is not a lot. 8 bit art or pixel art therefore refers to art that is very rough. It was indeed an art to make illustrations still recognizable and believable when you're working with small resolutions, but into an art it was turned indeed. Only after about 1992 did people start to appreciate this type of art for it's aesthetics rather than for it's practical dimensions. The appreciation is probably in part based on the fact that with so very little you can still make an illustration come alive. New artists in the era where a creative approach to the 8 bit limitations was no longer a necessity seem to have been still inspired by that creativity and set out to make art in that style.
        Under every rock will you find Jesus and the pixel rock is no exception. People seem to have applied the 8 bit style to depict Jesus and all his crazy friends. One artist that made the art work for the cover of the 8-Bit Jesus Christmas album is Jude Buffum. This guy seems to be actually a very talented artist, with a feel for themes as well as being able to get them right. The scenes he depicted from late 1990s movie Big Lebowski really looks like still shots from a 1980s Nintendo NES video game. The Christmas album itself, by the way, might deserve a story of its own. More on that later. I also have to mention the game Run, Jesus Run! by Molleindustria, 2010, which some of these still shots are taken from. I actually realize now (after playing it a million times) that they used Sonseed's Jesus is a Friend of Mine song as the (8 bittified) theme! There seems to be a nice 8 bit rendition of Jesus as a T-Shirt design by the company spreadshirt. That, in turn, someone seems to have used as a design for a tattoo.

By the way, this is a three pixel jesus in that last one! I don't think I'll ever find a more minimalist depiction.