Holy Brawls

I’m usually disinterested in media that picks at religious sensitivities. Maybe it’s because it seems too easy an avenue for being shocking and doesn’t usually require much cleverness on the creator’s part.

However, there is something charming about Molleindustria’s Faith Fighter. Intended to be a comment on using religious symbols to fuel violence, they describe their game this way:

Faith Fighter is the ultimate fighting game for these dark times. Choose your belief and kick the shit out of your enemies. Give vent to your intolerance! Religious hate has never been so much fun.

The game is styled like Street Fighter, but features religious icons as the competitors. Monotheistic symbols are evenly balanced with Far East ones, allowing Muhammad to square off against Ganesh. Even though caricatures of religious deities isn’t exactly reverent territory, Faith Fighter offers a sufficiently badass depiction to each. For some reason, this seems to take an edge off.

When considering games as a replacement to editorial cartoons, Faith Fighter brings up an interesting point. This game allows for a censored and an uncensored mode of play, the former covering Muhammad’s image during play. After the Danish cartoon depicting the Prophet caused an eruption last year, it’s interesting to see the carry over into the game space.

The choice offered by an interactive game is an interesting balance between sensitivity and artistic credibility. While a printed paper would be cumbersome to print in censored and uncensored versions, it’s a relatively easy addition when working in Flash. Also, offering the choice makes a more interesting point than if one was never offered at all.

With that said, I really don’t know if the option of censoring Muhammad’s visage is sufficiently sensitive from a Muslim’s perspective. The awareness that the depiction exists, even if one isn’t personally exposed to it, could still create tension.

Even more interesting, Molleindustria included a secret boss at the end of the game whose depiction could be as much of a headache for a creator as that of Muhammad. I won’t offer a spoiler though, you’ll just have to play it.