Christians decry fake Dante protest

EA is being attacked by Christian bloggers for staging a fake religious protest against Dante's Inferno during E3 week.

A viral marketing agency hired 20 people to picket the game outside the Los Angeles Convention Center, bearing signs reading "Hell is not a game" and "Trade in your PlayStation for a PrayStation". They even blamed a rare day of rain in LA on the godlessness of EA's game, based on Dante Aligheri's Divine Comedy.

Although the LA Times fell for it, Associated Press later exposed the stunt.

Now Christian, specifically Catholic, bloggers are taking exception to EA's marketing tactics, reports GamePolitics.

"It's been clear for a while now that the entertainment industry views Christians on the whole as priggish, thin-skinned fun-killers," said Maragret Cabaniss of InsideCatholic. "Has anybody at EA actually read the Inferno?"

Catholic Video Gamers was more direct: "Gamers of all varieties will buy this product if it's, well, actually a good game. So instead of engaging in a shamelessly anti-Christian stunt to promote your poor excuse of a product, maybe you ought to work on making this game, you know, something better than a blatant God of War rip-off and make it, ya know, something worthwhile?"

Touché. Dante's Inferno is out next year for PC, 360, PS3 and PSP.