“My name Mertens…” This is the very first line of dialogue
of my favorite outright video game, Colony
Wars: Vengeance. Never heard of the game? That’s not surprising given the
obscurity of the game and the all but dead space simulator genre. Colony Wars: Vengeance is the sequel to
the outstanding space simulator, Colony
Wars, which came out in 1997. The
first game of the series holds a special place in my heart as it was the first
time in Science Fiction I had seen Earth and its forces as the villains. In Colony Wars, it is the 5th millennia
AD and you take on the role of a nameless pilot enlisted into the League of
Free Worlds in the fight against the greedy Earth Empire thirsty for resources.
This view of Earth was very shocking to the young teenage
mind of mine as it went against the optimistic view of shows like Star Trek: The Next Generation and
movies like The Fifth Element and Independence Day. While Colony Wars was a great game it did tend
to be a little long and its narrator was a random guy who sounded somewhat like
James Earl Jones (most likely intentional), Colony
Wars: Vengeance was a better game in every respect. The first game was
impossible to beat and Vengeance, while
extremely difficult in its own right, was easy enough to get to the end boss.
What really set the second game apart were the story and the new narrator,
Mertens.
Vengeance takes
place 100 years after the first game. After the League of Free Worlds makes it
to the Sol System, they are unable to defeat Earth’s Navy outright and decide
to escape and seal up the warp hole to the outer colonies trapping the Sol
System which reverts to civil war. Here’s the awesome part of the story, you
take over as Mertens, a pilot in Earth’s Colonial Navy, set on revenge against
the League. Unlike the first narrator who was just there to move the story
along, Mertens is someone who you really endure yourself to throughout the
game. Quint Boa, the voice actor who portrayed Mertens, does a great job of
exuding the character’s sadness and cautious optimism throughout the game. My
only gripe is that they did not continue Mertens’ story into Colony Wars: Red Sun. Instead we get the
generic miner, Valdemar.
Best portrayal: Colony Wars: Vengeance
Favorite moment(s): Mertens
defeats the Widowmaker who killed his
friend Klein in an earlier mission.
It is not secret that I am a huge Batman fan and I have been
one ever since I was a little kid watching Batman:
The Animated Series. Kevin Conroy, in my opinion, is Batman and nobody else
in television, film, or video games will ever take his place. As time
progressed, Superman received his own show and it was only inevitable that the
two heroes would cross paths. As the popularity of these two shows increased
and the DC animated universe became intertwined, spinoff series were discussed
and greenlit. Enter the first of these series, Batman Beyond. What could have just been a kid show about a young futuristic
Batman turned out to be my favorite out of the DC animated universe. Wait, did
I say Kevin Conroy is Batman? Oh, sorry, I meant Will Friedle.
Ok, I am somewhat joking because Kevin Conroy will always be
Bruce Wayne’s Batman, but Friedle portrays Terry McGinnis who is my favorite
Batman out of them all. But, the original Batman is a classic, why would I like
the beyond counterpart better? Well, there are a number of reasons I like Terry
McGinnis better than Bruce Wayne. First Bruce Wayne is utterly psychotic. Have
you ever read any of Grant Morrison’s run on Batman, the Batman of Zur-En-Arrh,
anyone? Bruce Wayne’s Batman is a man who is just too obsessed with his war on
crime that it has clouded and pushed out every other aspect of his life. Terry
McGinnis, on the other hand, experiences a tragedy in the death of his father
but deals with this death in a much saner manner. While, he does don the Batman
suit to carry out vengeance against those who caused the death of his father,
his main purpose for being Batman is to make up for past sins. Also, McGinnis
is able to still lead a somewhat normal life. He even gets married eventually which is something Wayne was never able to do.
Second, I like my superheroes with powers and I consider
Batman Beyond as a batman with superpowers. His suit provides flight, super strength,
and super vulnerability. He is able to take punishment the original could only
think of. Last, the dynamic of having two minds behind Batman instead of one
makes Batman better in that if Wayne can’t think of something McGinnis can come
up with a solution which he does on different occasions. Plus, the entertainment
of having the two superb voice actors converse back and forth is great and
enjoyable.
Something that got me really interested in the character
again is the fact that DC Comics brought Terry McGinnis into the comics proper
and even put him into continuity with Damian Wayne behind the computer instead
of Bruce Wayne. However, with the death of Damian Wayne, I don’t know what that
does to the continuity. I have been enjoying Adam Beechen’s writing in the Batman Beyond Unlimited series which
continues the continuity of the animated universe (It is not a kid’s comic by any
means, however) and it is my favorite ongoing comic series at this time.
Best portrayal: Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker
Favorite moment(s): Terry
at the behest of Bruce Wayne takes out the Justice League after one of their
villains ransacks the mall where Terry’s Mom and Brother are shopping.
As he is chasing after Aquagirl in a water tank in the
Fortress of Solitude, hundreds of Starros latch onto Terry to control his mind.
With the batsuit, he electrocutes every one of them.
A few years back, I was a huge Star Wars fanatic and I was even one of those rare guys who knew
Leia’s cell block number on the Death Star in A New Hope. I read many an Expanded Universe novel (X-Wing series was my favorite) immersing
myself in the universe; but, that was before the dark time, before the Empire
(prequels). When I first saw the prequel trilogy, I didn’t think it was too
bad; however, repeated viewings have shown me the error of my ways. I stopped
caring about the Star Wars universe
altogether and starting getting back into superhero comics, the Halo series, and Star Trek. In 2008, my outlook on the series changed with the release
of a game called Star Wars: The Force
Unleashed.
The game was one of the best written I have ever played as
it really made you care about the story and the characters. It also helped that
each character in the game was played by and resembled a real life actor. The
Force Unleashed instantly made me a fan of Sam Witwer, a prolific genre
actor, as he portrayed my fifth favorite Sci-Fi character of all time, Galen
Marek or better known as Starkiller. Marek also happens to be my favorite
character in the whole Star Wars saga.
Why would a video game character beat out movie and book
characters such as Wedge Antilles, Kip Durron, Mace Windu, or Luke Skywalker?
Well, as I mentioned before, the writing in the game is superb, but that is
only half the story. The Jedi in the movies tend to be very weak with special
pathetic focus on those in the prequels as the Sith seem to outsmart them on
every turn. In addition, their rules were very strict and were broken by almost
everybody. Gelen Marek is a Jedi who just let loose and was extremely powerful
and this is what attracted me to the character.
Marek was a Jedi who had to find his own way to light side
of the force because he started out as Darth Vader’s apprentice and ended up
founding the Rebel Alliance (I am following the canon story, the good ending). His history turned out to be beneficial
because Galen was able to harness powers from both sides of the force. Let’s just forget about the sequel.
Best portrayal: Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
Greatest moment(s): On
Raxus Prime, Starkiller takes down a Star Destroyer with the force.
He beats the crap out of Darth Vader in one of the final
boss fights of the game.
We go from the superspy, James Bond to a character who was
partly inspired by one director’s (Spielberg) desire to direct James Bond. Number
six was probably my most contested spot on the list. Which character did I like
enough to place before some great characters listed so far, yet is not worthy
of my top five? Well, I came to a conclusion which settled on Indiana Jones. Indiana
Jones is just a character that exudes coolness and one thing I have always admired
about him is that he is actually an academic travelling on these quests. His
profession is not as adventurer but as professor of Archaeology.
Indiana Jones, as with any great character in Sci-Fi or
Fantasy, is not just relegated only to the movies everyone has seen, but he has
appeared in many books, video games, and television series. I will admit,
though I have only seen the movies with Harrison Ford and The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles with Sean Patrick Flanery as a
young Indy, these portrayals of the character were a good enough sample to make
Indy my number six character on the list because both the show and the movies
were just so enjoyable and fun.
Another reason why I love the character and the movies so
much is the type of artifacts he searches for in both Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana
Jones and the Last Crusade. In Lost
Ark, Indy attempts to beat the Nazis to the Ark of the Covenant which is of
particular interest to me because of my Biblical research. However, for the
record, the Bible never speaks of the Ark “leveling mountains and laying waste
to entire regions” as Brody says. In the
Last Crusade, it is a fitting continuation of stories of Arthurian legend
concerning the Cup of Jesus Christ.
Best portrayal: Raiders of the Lost Ark
Favorite moment(s): Through
knowledge of how the Ark of the Covenant has worked in the Bible, Indiana Jones
realizes the best course of action is to keep his eyes shut when the Nazis
decide to open the Ark.
I have been witnessing an alarming trend lately among people I know
or people I have been reading about and, while it is an issue we in the
apologetics circles know all too well, the trend needs some addressing.
Lately, people have been compromising on some of their beliefs in the
face of so called “scientific evidence.” We have all heard somebody say,
“The Bible and Christianity say one thing (insert any subject here),
but I just can’t believe it in the face of such overwhelming scientific
proof to the contrary.” Usually, these same people cannot name exactly
what evidence would cause them to doubt but that’s another article for
another time. What I want talk about today involves the reasons why
people will end up compromising and why the whole idea of scientific
evidence versus the Bible is ludicrous.
In my experience, even the most stalwart believers are not immune
from this crisis of faith. I have known different individuals who stood
for years just to give it up and resign themselves to the omniscient
biology text book. Let me get this straight, these same individuals
don’t usually stop believing in God or Jesus Christ entirely but they
doubt different aspects of Christian thinking usually involving ideas of
creation and history. I have wondered for years what could cause
somebody to forsake a belief they have held for a long time and then the
answer came to me in the statement, “I have no friends when it comes to
the Word.”
What does this statement mean exactly? It means that when it comes to
believing that the Bible or the Word of God is 100% true and the
ultimate authority of our lives, few are going to stand with us. This
statement is a very profound observation but it does not cooperate with
the way humans want to conduct their lives. We have all heard the
statement, “We all want to be loved,” and I think it is very prescient
concerning this argument. Those of us who, as Paul would say, have been
fighting the good fight for a while know how lonely it can get sometimes
defending the faith and I believe it ends up weighing on people to just
get some acceptance from their academic peers.
The act of not being accepting can be a horrible feeling and one
which most people are unable to bare. However, isn’t that the problem
anyway? We tend to think and act according to feelings instead of the
knowledge of the Word which we have been taught and have researched. It
is to this idea of feeling which 2 Timothy 4:3-4
is so eloquently written, “For the time will come when they will not
endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to
themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their
ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.”
In addition to the inquiry of why compromise happens in the first
place, I want to address the false idea that scientific evidence
contradicts the Bible. As apologists, we defend the faith, why? Because
we know that God has loved us so much that, through His Son’s sacrifice
and resurrection, we have attained salvation and are now given the
ministry of reconciliation, reconciling men back to God. How did we
attain this information? It is through God’s Word that we have learned
this; so, we acknowledge that God’s Word has to be true and has to be
the ultimate authority on such matters. Otherwise, how could we ever
believe that any of our beliefs are true? Therefore, if we believe that
the Word and its account of God and Jesus Christ are true then
scientific inquiry can never disagree with what the Word says.
Linus Pauling,
winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, once said, “Science is the
search for truth.” This, pretty much sums up the way I feel about
science and its role in our civilization. Now, we ask the question,
“What is truth?” Well, Jesus Christ Himself answered that question in John 17:17, “Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.”
Attention all you current and aspiring Christian leaders.
Don’t ever do this:
Despite the fact that the answer to this woman’s search for
an answer is pretty chauvinistic and trivializing, the “this” I’m talking about
is speaking out of your butt when a person comes to you with a genuine
question. For any Christian leader, one
must realize that people are going to ask questions expecting the answer to be
from a study of what God has said in His Word. However, what Abby got at this
particular moment was solely coming from one man’s point of view and not God’s.
What does God have to say about cheating and adultery,
anyway? I am pretty sure it has less to do with “men tend to wander” and more
with sinfulness. Romans 13:9, “For this, Thou shalt not commit adultery, Thou shalt not kill, Thou shalt not steal,
Thou shalt not bear false witness, Thou shalt not covet; and if there be any
other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou
shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.” Galatians 5:9, “Now the works of the
flesh are manifest, which are these; adultery,
fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness.” God seems to consider cheating on
the same level of many other sins. Thus, in this particular situation, the sin
of adultery should not cast be upon the poor Abby in this subject, but upon the
man who has actually committed the sin.
Now, God’s point of view seems to be very far from what Pat
Robertson said on the subject which highlights a sad fact of many Christian leaders
today. Many leaders spread their own opinions instead of the Word’s opinions
and this is not to be taken lightly by God. 1Timothy 3: 1-7:
This is a true saying, if a man desire
the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work. A bishop then
must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour,
given to hospitality, apt to teach; Not given to wine, no
striker, not greedy of filthy lucre; but patient, not a brawler, not covetous; One that ruleth well his own house, having his children in
subjection with all gravity; (For if a man know not how to rule
his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?) Not
a novice, lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of the
devil. Moreover he must have a good report of them which are
without; lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil.
This last part of the passage about having a good report is
especially important because it has everything to do with teaching. Where does
this good report come from? Does it come from the leader’s experience? Heck no,
it comes from the Word of God. In other translations the phrase, good report,
is the word, testimony, and testimony is found multiple times in the Word of
God. Every time we see that word, it is in reference to the truth of God, the
truth of Christ, or the truth of the Word. Revelation 1:2 is a great example, “Who
bare record of the word of God, and of the testimony
of Jesus Christ, and of all things that he saw.”
God’s children are precious to Him and He wants His children
to know Him. If the people who have made themselves leaders in the Church don’t
carry a testimony concerning God’s Truth or Word, as we see in John 17:17, then
what’s the purpose?
Lastly, a big problem in this world of social media is that
something like this is a horrible witness for the Church because it will go
viral in no time and the media is waiting to destroy any Christian it can.
Talking out of your butt and not from God’s Word does absolutely nothing to
help the Church and only hurts it as it gives the devil ample chance to
ridicule a Christian. So, for any of you out there who want to someday be
leaders in the Church, start studying God’s Word to align your opinions with
God’s opinions and, thus, exhorting His children while building up the Church
in a positive light backed by the testimony of God.
