Saturday Side Quest - AI Fails & the litRPG

Where has faith and fandom intersected this week?

This week brought about some interesting things for me. I’ve been in a weird cross-section of things going well and then quite poorly.

I continue to be amazed at and baffled by the efficacy (or lack thereof) of AI generation. I rendered an image that truly brought up the opposite meaning that it was supposed to. I needed a thumbnail and decided to give a new thumbnail generator a try. I needed something that gave across the vibe of encouragement for lonely gamers to celebrate a toolkit for loneliness I found from Humble Bundle. But then the AI decided to twist the knife deeper.

You can imagine my surprise. I burst into laughter and quickly moved on to making my thumbnail. For all of the amazing things that AI can assist with, I remain consistently unimpressed with image generation.

On the other end of that, I rendered a trap remix of a video game OST and it sounded better than I could have ever hoped for—to the point I would listen to it unironically. I won’t release it, of course. I find that immoral. But using it for a stinger is significantly better than finding some random track online.

On another note, I’ve recently learned of the burgeoning genre of litRPG. Have you heard of this yet? I watched this video describing the concept. It reminds me of my beloved gaming genre, the visual novel. Mix that with the anime genre of the isekai, and you’ve got a litRPG. I’ll report back in future weeks as I can read through some recommended entries, namely Dungeon Crawler Carl.

Speaking of books, I finished a few this week. Despite some bizarre chapter breaks, Kaliane Bradley’s The Ministry of Time was an absolute delight from cover to cover. If you’re a fan of time travel, it’s a must-read. The story's ending dealt with some delightful themes of hope and forgiveness, referring to them as forms of time travel. I don’t consider books when I write my nerdy sermons, but this would be a shoo-in.

I also finished Jay Kranda’s Online Church Is Not The Answer. I appreciated the full-on approach that Kranda took with the book. There wasn’t much missing, including major chunks of the book focused on what I’ve learned in the purely digital world that phygital churches miss. I also appreciated the push toward a more normative experience of the online church, instead of allowing digital ministry always to be new and novel. It reminded me a bit of Jim Keat’s arguments that there is not more a thing as digital ministry than there is youth ministry.

However, not everyone agrees with that sentiment. Heidi Campbell et al. released a true tome of a book The Oxford Handbook of Digital Religion. I hope to have my hands on it sooner rather than later. I have read all of Campbell’s work in my research these past years. Campbell and Craig Dettweiler were the two names that popped up when I first began learning in 2020.

I officially began the latest from Seth Godin, as well. I’ve been a longtime follower of his and do not doubt that This is Strategy will blow me away again.

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Will It Preach?

I finished a few things this week, so I will reflect on them in this space. Would they preach? See if you agree with my take.

• The Bitter Tea of General Yen (1932)

  • Doesn’t hold up particularly well. This one has some intriguing elements about the Christian mission to China. However, the possible analysis of that is seriously overshadowed by a love story that will end when she realizes she’s a victim of Stockholm Syndrome. Will not preach.

• Moon (2009)

  • An incredible film! I couldn’t stop watching. I could see a myriad of ways to preach this one. Themes of abandonment, corruption, ethical breaches via technology, the human desire to play as God… the list goes on and on. I think even an analysis of GERTY would make for a fun sermon. Will preach.

• Saturday Night Fever (1977)

  • Oof—I almost wished I hadn’t checked this one off of the list. The vibes in this movie are fantastic, but the story is rough. Travolta’s iconic character is not particularly endearing in a modern context. However, I think there are plenty of things to touch on for growth. Travolta’s brother is a priest who sets aside the cloth and pursues tragedy. Why? What led him there? A fascinating study. There is also an exceptional example of not listening in a diner as Travolta’s misogynist persona ignores the more-than-simply-beautiful woman trying to talk to him. Will preach. If you can stomach the film itself. At least the music is great.

• Dead Ringers (1988)

  • Perhaps David Cronenberg’s entry with the least amount of body horror, saving the worst of it til the bitter end. Jeremy Irons masterfully plays his part as twin gynecologists who commit nonstop malpractice. The themes of this one are a bit heavy for a sermon, but there are some real gems in this one nonetheless. An exploration of habits, whether it’s drug dependency or personal codependency. Will preach.

• Bones and All (2022)

  • I was beyond disappointed by this film sold to me as an exceptional entry in filmmaking. It was beautiful but about as poorly told a story as possible. It was as if they blended a masterful cinematographer with a writer for a serialized Disney television series. Even the deeper themes it seeks to explore aren’t worth their salt. I tolerated two hours of viscera and didn’t enjoy where it left me on the other side of things. Will not preach.

• The Ministry of Time (2024)

  • This one was mentioned a bit above. This book is a fun romp, but the ending dives deep into its theme of forgiveness and hope as forms of time travel. An easy sermon drawn out here. Atonement? Justification? Yes please. Will preach.

• The Plucky Squire (2024)

  • While I only enjoyed this game slightly, I think some fun themes of camaraderie and working together could lead to good conversation. Will preach.

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The Credit Roll

These are some of the things I found this week that I am sharing as a bonus. Enjoy my custom For You feed.

• Alan Wake showed up on the Talk Tuah podcast in this delightful fan edit.

• Tony Hawk played some Tony Hawk Pro Skater and then did some tricks IRL

• I found the scariest imaginable pumpkin carvings

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Let me know what you think about this Saturday Side Quest concept! I am hopeful it can be an extra way to connect with the Pixel & Pulpit community. I see other Substack folks creating this type of paywalled content. Maybe it will work here? Time will tell.