An Open Letter To Kris Vallotton (et al.)

(This was originally written as an email to the above mentioned addressee. But then I thought, “I wonder if that busy guy would ever have the chance to actually read mail from a stranger?”
Then I thought that except for a few details, it’s really a letter I should write to a bunch of leaders, teachers, and encouragers we’ve been lucky enough to brush shoulders* with over the last couple of years. Folks like Ralph Bagley, Gary Barkalow, Georgian Banov, David Cook, John Eldredge, Michael Hyatt, Rick Joyner, Morgan Snyder, Rick Warren, and many others. (yeah, that list is alphabetical)
I’ll still send a genuine letter to all these folks but maybe a Google alert on their name will be more likely to catch their attention.)

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Dear Mr. Vallotton,

Roughly a year and a half ago I briefly met you in McMinville, Oregon. You were speaking at a local church and we had a few minutes to talk between sessions. I own a company making video games with a Christian worldview. Not educational bible games for kids but rather mainstream games for adults with Jesus in the mix. More Lord of The Rings than Thomas the Tank Engine.

At the time you shared some great ideas and some good advice. I have no illusion that you’d remember that 5 minutes but I did say I’d let you know how we were progressing and I reckon I owe you a quick update.

Soma Games launched its second mobile title called Wind Up Robots (http://thatwinduprobotgame.com/) just before Christmas. It’s on iPhone, Android, and AppUp but we all know that the iPhone is the only platform that really matters. 😉
Dad opened some awesome doors and the game has received some really great pickups and reviews including a Kotaku feature, an Amazon feature and Apple even had it listed in their “hot” category over the Christmas holiday – we really couldn’t have asked for a better launch.

The game is an allegorical tale of a young boy with a big destiny who is haunted by bad dreams. But really it’s a story about Calling and the spiritual warfare surrounding that. The game also touches on themes like spirit vs. flesh, our position ‘in the heavenlies’ and divine healing.

Our next project is a take on the Noah’s ark story but set in a Sci-Fi, Steampunk space world. Rather than a flannel graph story featuring a bearded old man with lots of pets, we’re tapping into the very grown up features of the story…chapter one, G Prime, should be out later this year.**

On top of the games we’ve also been fired up by a wide range of speaking engagements to address increasingly large groups on topics like Gaming for Good, Games with a Moral Compass and similar topics. IDF, Elements, Casual Connect, NRB, and Serious Play are just a few of the conferences we’ve spoken to – and the invitations creep coming. Our dad keeps on making things come together that we could never do for ourselves and that’s been pretty darn exciting. In “seven mountains” terminology we seem to making many great contacts on that entertainment mountain as well as folks from many other sprees of influence. On top of exciting…its darn humbling.

I’ll wrap this up as I’m certain you’re busy. But I wanted to keep my word to let you know how we’re doing and also to say thank you. The advice, encouragement and prophecy we’ve received from people like yourself has been immensely formative and words like those are what keep us pushing when things may look dim. Thank you again and may the Lord bless you an keep you.

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* Just to be perfectly clear, except in a few cases I don’t “know” these people in any deep sense of the word. But I have been lucky enough to trade a few lines of conversation with each of them, and all have been influential in one way or another. So no, I can’t get any autographs for you.

** Technically, G Prime is a reboot of the first chapter that we published in 2009 but that’s the kind of detail I probably shouldn’t expect a (mostly) stranger to really have to worry about.