The Biblical story of David comes to life through the largest digital media form of our day: video games. With the continued rise of gamers, a shift has taken place: more girls over age 18 are playing video games than boys under age 18.
It is a phenomenom that creaters have taken advantage of in every realm except Christianity, that is, until now.
The YouTube famous twin brothers, Efraim and Ruben Meulenberg, otherwise known as the Tornado Twins, are pushing against the tide to create not only a Christian video game, but one of the highest-quality.
EFRAIM MEULENBERG
Tornado Twins
'People have said, 'This will never work.' Of course we've had quite a few of those. We don't really mention them out loud or make fun of them in a sense, but yeah, I mean if you say we're going to make the Bible into a game before you actually have anything to show, a lot of people will say, 'Naw you'll step on people's toes or this will never make big money.'â?
RUBEN MEULENBERG
Tornado Twins
'The game industry is a little scared of going toward the religious. If there's any world religion or you're creating anything in that realm, they're a little bit afraid of it, whereas the film industry is much more easy going with that, as well as the music industry.â?
The Tornado Twins took matters into their own hands, creating their own website to start funding, while they researched and began what has been a seven-year project so far.
They want the game to be as accurate as possible, recreating the music, setting and even the original ancient Hebrew language David would have spoken. Along the way, Christian companies have offered them millions of dollars to create the game according to their vision, but the twins are passionate about staying true to the game's identity as a story from the Bible.
EFRAIM MEULENBERG
Tornado Twins
'People say how could you say no to an offer of so much money? You could make the game in a heartbeat and be done, but actually it wasn't that hard to stay true to the integrity of the game and of the stories in the Bible in a sense. We wanted to do a really good job of finding out what the culture was like in that time and recreate that, not necessarily create an abstraction of Christian culture in any type of setting.â?
They are backed by many supporters and have raised $48,360 out of their goal of $385,000. Thus, they currently have sufficient money for three of their eventual 10 episodes. While many of their sponsors are Christians, more than 30 percent of them are athiests or non-religious.
RUBEN MEULENBERG
Tornado Twins
'A lot of the non-religious that funded our project say to me, 'The Bible, I don't believe in it. To me it's like greek mytholody, but I play games on greek mytholody so why wouldn't I play games on the Bible?' And I'm like, 'Yeah, why wouldn't you?' So we hope it lets people understand the Bible better, but also...and so it brings the world together.â?
That is the goal the Tornado Twins have: a game that unites the intelligence of game creators across the board, including those from Assassin's Creed and The LEGO® Movie Video Game, while believers and non-believers alike can truly enjoy a high-quality experience.
MB
Skype/ thegamebible.com
SV
-PR
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