Moral choices are in play in faith-based Left Behind
"If there's anything that recent events in the Middle East have shown us, it's that the children are the future of religious wars." So said comedian Rob Corddry a few months back on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show." But Corddry wasn't riffing on efforts by Islamic extremists to recruit youngsters to strap on suicide bombs. He was mocking a video game -- a Christian video game called Left Behind: Eternal Forces.
Inspired by the massively popular series of Christian novels, the game takes place in New York City, 18 months after millions of human beings mysteriously disappear. A handful of those who remain know why: Jesus has spirited the true believers away, literally. Only the faithless are left behind.
You'd think all the disappearances, the millions of pairs of suddenly empty wingtips, would give anybody religion. Not quite. A few people fall to their knees, while others reach for their guns. One in particular, former Romanian president Nicolae Carpathia , finally gets the job he's always wanted -- Antichrist. Now Carpathia's goons scour Manhattan, in an effort to wipe out the Bible-believing scum. For their part, the believers form an army of sorts -- the Tribulation Force. Their goals are simple: Spread the gospel, and stay alive.
But staying alive may sometimes lead to the taking of life -- "fighting hellfire with hellfire," as Corddry put it. And that raises a knotty moral conundrum for any game designer who worships Jesus, the Prince of Peace.
Left Behind follows the classic real-time strategy format. Game characters explore the map, acquire resources, build and upgrade structures, tools , and weapons. But some of the weapons are unusual. Prayer, for instance. The game's most powerful character is a woman whose prayers can bring hordes of enemy forces over to the side of virtue.
"That really enters in this whole new dimension called spiritual warfare," said Troy Lyndon , CEO of Left Behind Games. "You can actually play the entire game without firing a shot."
Or you can create a band of soldiers who'll protect Tribulation Force territory from Carpathian incursions. But they're supposed to use minimal force. Every time they kill, even if it's justified, it weakens their moral fiber. Force them to kill too often, and they'll fall away from the faith and move to the Dark Side.
The game's ambivalent attitude to violence comes naturally to Lyndon, whose son has served tours of duty in Afghanistan and Iraq. "The more I've talked to my son, the more passionate it's made me about understanding the realities of war," said Lyndon. "When our kids are coming back from overseas, their hearts are affected. Their hearts are harder . . . . It's a horrible thing."
Lyndon thinks something had to be done to put the Taliban and Saddam Hussein out of business, but he doesn't like the way the conflict has morphed into an endless cycle of atrocities. "I don't know what the answer is," he said. And Lyndon has injected that same moral ambiguity into the game.
There's nothing new about games that impose moral choices on the player. Even a gangster game like "The Godfather" punishes the player for gunning down innocent bystanders. But the gameplay in Left Behind reflects an explicitly Christian perspective on the rights and wrongs of violence.
It also provides interesting and sometimes amusing insights into the cultural crotchets of evangelical America. Characters keep shouting "Praise the Lord!" at odd moments. Bad guys fight back with the devil's music -- rock 'n' roll. Let a member of your Tribulation Force listen long enough, and he'll lose his religion.
And while there's little explicit preachiness in the game, you'll find plenty in the segments between game levels. Press the "clue" button and you get a screenful of fundamentalism which you can read at your leisure, accompanied by easy-listening Christian pop music.
The theory of evolution comes in for a good deal of rough handling along the way, and there are friendly invitations to the faith for unbelieving gamers. By clicking links at the bottom of the page, you can go to a Left Behind website and post your reactions to the game on a community blog -- a clever feature that ought to be more widely used in the gaming business.
It's easy to jeer at a group of Christians seeking to make their mark in an industry that so often celebrates amoral savagery. Yet you can't help respecting the effort that went into Left Behind: Eternal Forces. Like Ned Flanders, the absurdly pious neighbor on "The Simpsons," the game is odd and sometimes annoying, but with a good heart. 