Post a Comment On: Catholic Video Gamers

"One born of human flesh man,
man is now a race of some power
you, son of man,
must face the power you hold
and you must face your destiny as well...

Though your days be peaceful, the fated time draws near
I am your judgment
I sundered the tongues of your fathers
and shattered their arrogant power
so long as the Lord does not live in you, all living beings hold darkness in their hearts
if you truly wish to be yourself, then rise and fight the darkness within - the demon inside!
If you have the will to challenge your destiny, son of man, state your name!"

Ok, so it's not like this is like an ultra-deep theological exegesis or anything, but in all honesty, I've heard homilies at mass with less "spiritual value" than these two paragraphs. Reminds me of some of the psalms, actually. Perhaps my Catholic and Christian readers can chime in with their thoughts?

Anyway, here's the game from which the above monologue can be found:

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Basically, the game's about a demon invasion in Tokyo. You play as a character who is given a handheld computer that is able to summon other demons to stave off the demon invasion in the city.

The occult thematic is obviously strong with this one; I find the theme and imagery somewhat disconcerting, but not being much of an expert on occult-related matters, I've had to rely on information from more learned sources than myself about just what exactly I should "watch out for" when I'm playing a game like this. I'm hoping to see more of the kind of stuff from the aforementioned excerpt as I play through it; apparently the game has multiple endings depending on what you do throughout the course of the game, so I may or may not find what I'm looking for. The game system itself, irrespective of the graphics, story, characters, music, and the like, is actually really, really fantastic; it's basically a "grid-based strategy" game (think chess) with the standard role-playing conventions one would associate with a Final Fantasy game. Either of these solitary game elements would probably make for an acceptable, though not exemplary, gaming experience, but they meshed peculiarly well in this game. Kudos to Atlus for creating a solid, if not spectacular, gameplay system.

I hope to have more to share about this game in a future post - which will most likely have to wait until the end of the week, as I'm Milwaukee bound tonight to visit some brother seminarians. St. Nicodemus, ora pro nobis!