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Best games that have a religious/biblical themed story

VAVA Mk2

VAVA Mk2

Member
LordOcidax said:
290020-bible.jpg
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LOL I had this! My Mom's religious friend got it for me. Was awful! 🤣😂
 
soulbait

soulbait

Member
Religion is such a tricky subject to try to do correctly in any entertainment medium, let alone video games. As someone who is a Christian and been part of several ministries, I can tell you anything with Christian themes will be a hard sell, even to Christians. First, look at the Christian film industry. Most of those movies are just long sermons. The message the movie teaches is more important to them than the actual quality of the movie. And if the movie attempts any challenging messages that the wider evangelical world does not agree with, it will turn into a bunch of theological debates about who is right vs who is wrong. Even the big production show, "The Chosen", is highly debated among different Christians, because some believe it presents an unbiblical Jesus, where others believes it does. Then you have movies/books like "Blue Like Jazz" which are more about people struggling with their faith and growing as a person, and you see many Christians speak out against it (it is a good movie BTW, and the book is even better).

Just today, my FB feed is full of my Christian friends arguing of the He Gets Us ads from the superbowl. Some think they are great because they mention Jesus. Others think they are terrible due to not going hard against LGBTQ. And then you have others going against the money spent.

Too be honest, Christians cannot win when it comes to this many times. Either the stuff they create is very shitty/cringey that mainstream people do not like it. Or it starts to get mainstream acceptance and then other Christians shit all over it.

As for video games, they would have the same problem: if Christians made it, they are going to want the game "teach a lesson" rather than just be fun within Christian themes.

If a non-Christian company attempts to make a game with heavy Christian themes, anything they add that are not agreed will be treated as if they were trying to go against Christianity or trying to "disprove" it. One small thing out of place, and Christian groups will be all over it. If a game like that ever gets mainstream attention, these groups will be tearing it down, making it very risky to make.

I personally would love any medium that is able to treat Christianity and other religions with respect. Whether in movies, music, games, or more, present something that shows the human experience of struggling with faith and figuring out what you believe in a believable, respectful way. Show atheists not as these terrible villains whose goal in life is to tear people away from their beliefs, as most Christian movies do, but as just normal people. Show Christians or other peoples with faith as normal people and not overly cringey, who have normal struggles.

You will see video games based on ancient religions and mythologies because you are not going to get many people mad with those. The moment you start attempting to have anything based on the Bible or strong Christian themes, you are going to be judged from every angle possible.
 
Muffdraul

Muffdraul

Member
The first time I heard of Xenogears was reading about its announcement at The Unofficial Squaresoft Homepage in probably late 1996 or early 1997, and the big hook for me was along the lines of "We likely will not release this game outside of Japan because it contains religious themes which would probably be found offensive in Western countries." I couldn't WAIT to import it, and then they ended up releasing it in the US anyway!
 
Dazraell

Dazraell

Member
Try Pentiment. It's really different from games you've listed, but these themes works so well with the story it's telling
 
NotMyProblemAnymoreCunt

NotMyProblemAnymoreCunt

Gold Member
Muffdraul said:
The first time I heard of Xenogears was reading about its announcement at The Unofficial Squaresoft Homepage in probably late 1996 or early 1997, and the big hook for me was along the lines of "We likely will not release this game outside of Japan because it contains religious themes which would probably be found offensive in Western countries." I couldn't WAIT to import it, and then they ended up releasing it in the US anyway!
Click to expand...

That's something I'm happy about especially over the years. That any game etc from Japan that would be offensive due to the religious themes would not be brought to the west in the past has been coming over ever since Xenogears proved it doesn't matter

I think that Nintendo still has the no mention of religious themes that they do when it comes to localizing their games like Xenoblade. I might be wrong but I think they still censor the religious themes in that franchise when bringing it over to the west
 
F31 Leopard

F31 Leopard

Member
SMT4IV Apocalypse
"" is the final boss.

SMTV has multiple religious themes from Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism

Silent Hill has Christian, Judaism influences.
 
Last edited:
Fredrik

Fredrik

Member
soulbait said:
Religion is such a tricky subject to try to do correctly in any entertainment medium, let alone video games. As someone who is a Christian and been part of several ministries, I can tell you anything with Christian themes will be a hard sell, even to Christians. First, look at the Christian film industry. Most of those movies are just long sermons. The message the movie teaches is more important to them than the actual quality of the movie. And if the movie attempts any challenging messages that the wider evangelical world does not agree with, it will turn into a bunch of theological debates about who is right vs who is wrong. Even the big production show, "The Chosen", is highly debated among different Christians, because some believe it presents an unbiblical Jesus, where others believes it does. Then you have movies/books like "Blue Like Jazz" which are more about people struggling with their faith and growing as a person, and you see many Christians speak out against it (it is a good movie BTW, and the book is even better).

Just today, my FB feed is full of my Christian friends arguing of the He Gets Us ads from the superbowl. Some think they are great because they mention Jesus. Others think they are terrible due to not going hard against LGBTQ. And then you have others going against the money spent.

Too be honest, Christians cannot win when it comes to this many times. Either the stuff they create is very shitty/cringey that mainstream people do not like it. Or it starts to get mainstream acceptance and then other Christians shit all over it.

As for video games, they would have the same problem: if Christians made it, they are going to want the game "teach a lesson" rather than just be fun within Christian themes.

If a non-Christian company attempts to make a game with heavy Christian themes, anything they add that are not agreed will be treated as if they were trying to go against Christianity or trying to "disprove" it. One small thing out of place, and Christian groups will be all over it. If a game like that ever gets mainstream attention, these groups will be tearing it down, making it very risky to make.

I personally would love any medium that is able to treat Christianity and other religions with respect. Whether in movies, music, games, or more, present something that shows the human experience of struggling with faith and figuring out what you believe in a believable, respectful way. Show atheists not as these terrible villains whose goal in life is to tear people away from their beliefs, as most Christian movies do, but as just normal people. Show Christians or other peoples with faith as normal people and not overly cringey, who have normal struggles.

You will see video games based on ancient religions and mythologies because you are not going to get many people mad with those. The moment you start attempting to have anything based on the Bible or strong Christian themes, you are going to be judged from every angle possible.
Click to expand...
I agree with most things you say. Most games only do the extremes. It’s the low hanging fruit I guess but it’s also boring.

Starfield usually gets shat on here but I think it’s doing some interesting things. It’s fairly safe no doubt but there are still very obvious atheist spoken lines and written texts, without hate, and also religious takes without going into extremes and normal people leaving the door open that there might be something else out there. And they’ve kinda made a church from evolved atheism which I thought was interesting. Plus you can have religion as a perk on your character.
 
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Darkmakaimura

Darkmakaimura

Can You Imagine What SureAI Is Going To Do With Garfield?
Darksiders

Agony Unrated

Requiem: Avenging Angel

Warhammer 40,000

Dante's Inferno
 
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King Dazzar

King Dazzar

Member
Danjin44 said:
I actually I would say Persona 5 is much more about politics rather than religious.
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Must give this another go at some point and explore for myself. Loved the art style, just didnt get much gameplay in what I touched. Will try again and push onwards.
 
Punished Miku

Punished Miku

Gold Member
Fredrik said:
I agree with most things you say. Most games only do the extremes. It’s the low hanging fruit I guess but it’s also boring.

Starfield usually gets shat on here but I think it’s doing some interesting things. It’s fairly safe no doubt but there are still very obvious atheist spoken lines and written texts, without hate, and also religious takes without going into extremes and normal people leaving the door open that there might be something else out there. And they’ve kinda made a church from evolved atheism which I thought was interesting. Plus you can have religion as a perk on your character.
Click to expand...
If you never saw the movie Contact they definitely seem to have taken some subtle inspiration from that movie. The whole thing is about religion vs. science. I think they could have had a larger role for Matteo in the game, and I wanted whole faction quest lines for the multiple churches, like in Elder Scrolls. There's actually a great religious base for the game but its under-developed, especially if you include the Va'Ruun.
 
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Singular7

Singular7

Member
Dark Souls / Elden Ring, its not overt, but without Christianity and Europe those games don't exist.

If you know the Bible well you'll find themes from the middle ages view in the subtext/stories.
 
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Fredrik

Fredrik

Member
Punished Miku said:
If you never saw the movie Contact they definitely seem to have taken some subtle inspiration from that movie. The whole thing is about religion vs. science. I think they could have had a larger role for Matteo in the game, and I wanted whole faction quest lines for the multiple churches, like in Elder Scrolls. There's actually a great religious base for the game but its under-developed, especially if you include the Va'Ruun.
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Agreed, under-developed like many other things. (still love the game! but you know that already)
Still better talks than in some, or even most, games, I liked that the talks weren’t as hateful as they can get, no matter the perspective. I tried to make a religious character minding his own business, always doing the right/good thing. Certainly took some wrong steps along the way lol but had lots of interesting talks. Ended up trying to convince previous church goers to return to the church in a quest. And met someone in space and talked about existential things.
 
soulbait

soulbait

Member
Fredrik said:
I agree with most things you say. Most games only do the extremes. It’s the low hanging fruit I guess but it’s also boring.

Starfield usually gets shat on here but I think it’s doing some interesting things. It’s fairly safe no doubt but there are still very obvious atheist spoken lines and written texts, without hate, and also religious takes without going into extremes and normal people leaving the door open that there might be something else out there. And they’ve kinda made a church from evolved atheism which I thought was interesting. Plus you can have religion as a perk on your character.
Click to expand...

Yeah, Starfield did a good job with adding fiction religions to their world. When I first started to play the game, I thought those religions were going to play a larger role in the overall story though. Outside of a few story beats, they felt like background, world building elements. Having different members of your team have different religious ideals and the ability for your character to say what they believe when it comes to a higher power, was cool and allowed for the world building. I wish they had a little bit more consequences through your decision making, but it was still a nice add.
 
soulbait

soulbait

Member
Punished Miku said:
If you never saw the movie Contact they definitely seem to have taken some subtle inspiration from that movie. The whole thing is about religion vs. science. I think they could have had a larger role for Matteo in the game, and I wanted whole faction quest lines for the multiple churches, like in Elder Scrolls. There's actually a great religious base for the game but its under-developed, especially if you include the Va'Ruun.
Click to expand...

I was hoping for more involvement of Va'Ruun. Even the loyalty quest that involves them felt undercooked.
 
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