{"id":26827,"date":"2018-01-26T09:00:39","date_gmt":"2018-01-26T15:00:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mbcpathway.local\/?p=26827"},"modified":"2018-01-24T14:03:10","modified_gmt":"2018-01-24T20:03:10","slug":"gaming-god-video-games-ripe-for-theological-thinking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mbcpathway.com\/2018\/01\/26\/gaming-god-video-games-ripe-for-theological-thinking\/","title":{"rendered":"Gaming & God: Video games ripe for theological thinking"},"content":{"rendered":"

KANSAS CITY \u2013 Matt Millsap freely admits he made up the word, \u201ctheoludology\u201d when he chose it as the topic of his doctoral dissertation in systematic theology. Google search the term, \u201ctheoludological,\u201d and literally every single result includes his name. Broken up into its roots, his topic becomes clearer, even if doesn\u2019t become easier to pronounce. \u201cTheo-\u201d and \u201c-ology\u201d are no-brainers. \u201cLudo\u201d is the Latin root for \u201cgame\u201d or \u201cplay.\u201d Mashed together, Millsap created a new discipline: thinking about video games from a theological point of view.<\/span><\/p>\n

Millsap is the assistant director of library services at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City, and teaches courses such as Christianity and the Arts at Midwestern College. As readers might already have guessed, he is also a bit of a video game nerd. Literally every surface of his office is piled high with systematic theology textbooks and academic journals, but his home entertainment center is piled high with a PlayStation 4, Xbox One and a Nintendo Switch. While some may dismiss the gaming as a time-wasting holdover from boyhood or a trivial escape from the rigors of academia, Millsap would ask them to press pause.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Art of Story<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Millsap argues that theologians regularly interact with media and the arts. Film and television are common topic for theological dialog, and religious thinkers have been pondering painting, literature, sculpture and music for hundreds if not thousands of years. Why isn\u2019t the same true for an art form that\u2019s emerged in the past 40 years?<\/span><\/p>\n

One reason he feels the time has come to seriously consider video games with God in mind is that they have seriously evolved over the generations as technology improved. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe are naturally a story-telling people; that\u2019s how God made us to communicate,\u201d Millsap said. \u201cYou think back to arcade games of the late 1970s and the graphics were very crude. There wasn\u2019t a whole lot technologically we could do to convey a story.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So there basically wasn\u2019t one. Games were simple and straight forward. Players dropped Tetris blocks into place, urged a hapless Frogger across a busy road, or frantically pressed UP UP DOWN DOWN LEFT RIGHT LEFT RIGHT B A START to cheat an early shoot \u2018em up. Forty years later, gone are the primitive pixels of Pong or Pac-Man and the simple sprites of Super Mario or Space Invaders. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cNow, in 2018, game designers have millions of dollars and all sorts of technology at their disposal,\u201d Millsap said. \u201cThey can tell a story much in the same way that a film can. Not all games do this, but people want to play stories.\u201d\u00a0 \u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Indeed, it\u2019s now common for the most popular and awarded games to feature a 10-, 20-, or even 50-hour storyline complete with motion-capture acting and top-tier voice talent. A compelling single-player story can overcome technological weaknesses or the occasional gameplay flaw. Many high-profile games are essentially interactive movies.<\/span><\/p>\n

A Framework for Thinking<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

And just like the opening level of an unfamiliar game, Millsap has come up with a tutorial for tackling these story-focused games and figuring out what they might communicate about God and then critiquing it. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cGames are their own thing,\u201d he said. \u201cYou have to respect the medium in terms of what it does and how it communicates then bring theology into the conversation and meld them together.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So he came up with a game studies \u2013 or, ludological \u2013 analog to the Wesleyan Quadrilateral, a traditional Methodist way of approaching Christian theology that begins with Scripture, then folds in reason, experience and tradition.<\/span><\/p>\n

Being a good Baptist, he keeps Scripture in the primary slot \u2013 an \u201cextraludic norm\u201d if you want to be fancy about it. With that in mind, Millsap cautions that Christians should be discerning when they choose which games to play to ensure no content will cause them to sin, just as they should do with movies or literature, and limit games to their appropriate audiences.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAnything we discover as we dialog with a video game has to be held up against the standard Scripture,\u201d he said. \u201cIf it doesn\u2019t, then we have to reject whatever they might be saying about God as false.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

After the overarching umbrella of scriptural primacy is accounted for, game studies had its own versions of tradition, reason and experience.<\/span><\/p>\n

Gaming\u2019s traditions, or doctrines become a sort of gaming literacy. Once a player \u201cgets\u201d how a certain genre of game works and is structured, they know what to expect and how to approach the next one. One doctrine informs the next.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s much like how you can\u2019t talk about Christology (the doctrine of Jesus) without having that bleed into your soteriology (the doctrine of salvation),\u201d Millsap said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Reason equates to game mechanics and structure: the press of a button will always do this, the nudge of a joystick does that. Just as there is order and structure to the Universe as God created it and He has given mankind reason to ponder it, video games follow the rules of their own creator.<\/span><\/p>\n

Experience\u2019s ludological twin is what Millsap calls player identification and agency. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to be careful not to elevate an individual experience to a level it should not be in theology, but the way it interacts with a video games is different,\u201d he said. You\u2019re transporting yourself into the role of that character. When your character performs an action, it\u2019s different than an actor on a movie screen performing that action. You are the one controlling it. If that character believes something, do you believe it, too? Are you acting in your own beliefs or that character\u2019s?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Playable Demo<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Millsap\u2019s go-to illustration of this type of theological thinking is the game, \u201cJourney.\u201d A title originally released for the PlayStation 3 in 2012, it is also available for the PlayStation 4. Players take control of a mysterious, unnamed, hooded character and\u2026 go on a journey. You wake up, see a light on top of a mountain, and start your story. That\u2019s it. The Game of the Year according to the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences, it racked up more than its fair share of praise: various gaming publications called it \u201ca hallmark of excellence,\u201d \u201ca glorious, thoughtful, moving masterpiece\u201d and \u201cmysterious and beautiful.\u201d Not bad for a game with no dialog, no instructions and no text. Players experience the creation and inherently know the game\u2019s designers have something planned out.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThey wanted to make something you could interpret, and that\u2019s where I apply that framework,\u201d he said. \u201cWhat might this say about a Christian\u2019s journey through life in terms of what God has called us to? It all leads up to the final culmination which is this great eschatological (having to do with the end times) scene where you think that \u2014\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

He won\u2019t give away the ending for those concerned with spoilers, but the scene \u201cmakes a lot more sense from a Christian interpretation than any other religion.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Player Objectives<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

So what\u2019s the point? He\u2019s not saying that mashing buttons is a path to a deeper understanding of God or a defeating the next boss is a discipleship tool. The idea is just that it\u2019s worth considering those stories and scenarios that gamers encounter from a theological perspective.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI play video games anyway as a form of recreation,\u201d Millsap said. \u201cIt\u2019s something I enjoy in my spare time much in the same way I enjoy reading a book or listening to music, which are gifts from God that He made us able to enjoy as recreation. It\u2019s like watching someone play football or playing it yourself; we play and watch sports and games for the sheer joy of playing, even without that explicit theological component to the narrative.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cBut because so many video games now go in a narrative direction and tell a story, it makes sense that we would want to consider them from that perspective. I need to ask myself important questions, and think about whether I believe what it\u2019s saying is true. If a video game is intending to tell a serious narrative and I don\u2019t approach it seriously, thoughtfully and from a Christian perspective, then I\u2019m not doing it justice.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Game Over\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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