Forum Overview :: Gamerasutra :: Mormon on New Vegas & Christianity in Games: disrespect is the safe route.

[quote name="fucking newbie"]Here's what Skip Cameron thought you should know about a religious person's view on religion in games: [quote name="Another hack from Kotaku"]Rather than taking <b>the safe route</b> in the entertainment industry of making Christianity, and especially Mormon Christianity, <b>a punching bag or the butt of a string of jokes</b>, Obsidian has shown that at least in post-apocalyptia, Mormons can get a fair shake.[/quote] I know it's <a href="http://kotaku.com/5988935/im-a-mormon-pop-culture-often-mocks-my-faith-but-fallout-treated-it-right">an old as shit article from Kotaku</a>, but that's not interesting and neither is the fact that they're sucking developer cock - <i>that's what game journos do now.</i> I'm quite struck by theis perspective on religion, which makes the article a window into the perspective these editors have on the industry and its consumers - and presumably that perspective is a product of forces working within the industry, as in publishers, as in the guys running Kotaku knew it would please Bethesda and Obsidian and EA if they released a submission that didn't make the game industry out to be militant and derisive atheists. Is this a problem for the industry now, did Jack Thompson and Tipper Gore make video gaming godless? Have I missed something? The guys who made the original Fallout were deathly afraid of creating controversy just by mentioning religious matters, and the only mainstream game I can think of that puts Christianity in a prominent role is Assassin's Creed, which sweeps the whole thing under the rug by going on about a corrupt knightly order and some kind of goddamn conspiracy. Where are these jokes exactly? Are they in <i>Gabriel Knight? Lionheart: Legacy of the Crusader?</i> Maybe the Cain & Abel story in World of Darkness we see in <i>Vampire: the Masquerade?</i> The papal mechanics in <i>Total War</i> games? <i>Crusader Kings?</i> Show me a game that is some kind of incredible success - or just well-known - and even mentions Christianity in a negative context and I'll show you a hallucination. Or am I wrong? Tomb Raider gives us implied rape, Heavy Rain is daddy's self-dismemberment for the kids, Persona 3 has suicide after suicide, Hotline Miami is another in a long line of blood-smear gorefests that nevertheless can't meet the bar Soldier of Fortuneset for realistic violence, but there's not one goddamn game I can think of that shits on the Christians.[/quote]