Congratulations Dave Gilbert!

[RedBlob]

I just saw your game advertised on the CNN website. Great going man!

[Sam.]

to clarify:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/fun.games/12/13/shivah.rabbi.reut/index.html

thanks to ildu for the link.

[ildu]

Hey, I just posted that not more than a minute ago on IRC :O.

Still, very many congrats, Dave .

[SSH]

See also: http://news.google.co.uk/news?hl=en&ned=uk&ie=UTF-8&ncl=1111949080&filter=0

[thewalrus]

     Wow, way to go Dave!!! It's good to see we are making an impact.... Go Dave!!! Go AGS!!!

[Dave Gilbert]

If I wasn't so tired trying to get Blackwell done on time, i'd jump for joy!

The main thanks goes to Manifesto, who offered to distribute the game on their site and have laid the PR smackdown on it.  They are going to do an interview webcam thing with me on Monday, so I'll let you know what the deal is with that.

[Lucky]

T'was also mentioned in a Finnish tabloid, in the funny little news section. Nice going and I'm not being sarcastic.

[Domino]

Congratulations Mr. Dave Gilbert. Keep up the great work. That is friggin CNN, yeah baby, CNN!!



edit: i could care less about CNN, and that is why i made that funny reference to CNN (sarcasm baby, yeah sarcasm)

[TheYak]

Not as inspiring as CNN, but just thought I'd toss up another sighting:
1up.com

[Andail]

Massive respect, man!

[Nikolas]

Just wanted to tell everybody, that Dave would be a zero without me.

Now without the BS jokes: Congratulations Man! You deserve it! Brilliant news! YAY!

[Dave Gilbert]

I've been living under my little Blackwell rock and haven't shown proper appreciation for this thread.  Thanks for the kudos, everybody.

[Nostradamus]

Hey Dave, congratulations, you and your game appeared on the back page of Israeli daily newspaper Maariv. And the full story will be on sunday in the computer section of the paper. I have translated it for you:   (could include spoilers for those who didn't play the game)

THE COMPUTER'S GAME HERO: A FIGHTING RABBI

Computer games hereos are usually secret agents or beautyful women who control firearms. But a new game that have took over the USA puts in the role of the hero a New York jewish community's Rabbi.
The game named "The Shivah" and its  hero is the Rabbi Russell Stone, the head of a small synagogue in New York that is suffering from people leaving it and financial hardships. Just when the Rabbi thinks about leaving, a former friend in the community passes away and decides to leave the Rabbi and his followers a hefty sum of money. The problem is that Rabbi stone doesn't know the source of the money, and so decides to go around Manhattan to investigate it. Then, as computer games go, Rabbi Stone gets into a murder story and of course fights his enemies. "I had an idea to create a game about a priest that loses his faith", told game creator Dave Gilbert to a Jewish internet site, "the problem is I know nothing baout priests. I', jewish, so I made a game about a Rabbi instead". The Game "The Shivah" cna be purchased for only $5 in the internet.
The full story in the magazine on Sunday.

There was also a screenshot.
So again congratulations for your games getting this kind of publicity. Makes me proud to see you appear in our newspapers here. 

And here's a link for another article on the paper's online edition, a different article, differnet writer, which I'll also translate below.
http://www.nrg.co.il/online/11/ART1/517/565.html

MURDER IN THE SYNAGOGUE

Forget the action, the efffects and the naked shikshes in the goyim's games. A new exceptional adventure game, that carrise the exotic title "The Shivah", will allow you to enter the kosher shoes of a Rabbi in Lower East Side New York who's trying to solve the mystery of the murder of a member of his community.
The modest game, which uses nostalgic graphics and a point and click GUI which reminds of classic 90's adventure games, features a Film-Noir plot with a Yiddish colour. Rabbi Russel Stone (!) heads a declining community and faces the possibility that his synagogue might be closed due to cash shortage. Meanwhile he battles thoughts of blasphemy. When the synagogue gets a surprising inheritance from a exceptionallly rich decist, the Rabbi recruits the remnants of his faith to go to comforting the decist's pained family and finds himself investigating the suspicious causes of death of the Kind jew.
Manifesto Games company which sells the game is proud  of its honor to the tradition - and not only Israelite tradition. With the 90's GUI the game also include a plot homage to the famous insult battle of Monkey Island, as the battle are based on a unique Rabbi debate or in other words: to answer every question with another question. But except that comic wink, the game proclaims to seriously discuss questions of morality and faith.
You can try a demo version in the author Dave Gilbert's website or download a full version for $5. Included in the price: a dictionary for Yiddish terms.

[SSH]

Ironically, Maariv seem to have spelt the title wrong... next to the screenshots  :

[Dave Gilbert]

Neato!  Thanks, Nostodamus!  ALthough one question - do you mean there's going to be a full story thus coming Sunday, or you translated an article that appeared last sunday?

A shame I don't remember a single word of my two university semesters of hebrew or I could read it myself.

[Nostradamus]

No, there's gonna be a full story on this sunday, there's a weekly PC section on sundays and there's gonna a big story\review about it. Don't worry I'll translate it for you too.
I think you can buy Maariv in America if you look for it, especially in NY, so you could get it a few days later and save it as a memento.

[voh]

Jewish protagonist in a heavy on Judaism-story game, and you get mad propz from the Jewish community?

I'm all verklempt now, but in a good way

[m0ds]

Well done Dave Great news! Literally! You are like a true New York hero! And the best part is, we'll be cnnyou soon! Ok, that was poor. But your dedication to game making is something else! Looking forward to teh Legacy!

[Nostradamus]

Here's the big article from yesterday's paper. I have no scanner but I'm gonna try to post a digital camera picture of it later.
Article contains spoilers.

LAST ACTION HERO: RABBI RUSSELL STONE


[10 screenshots]

Lara Croft - out. The Rabbi - in. A Jewish programmer created a computer game starring a charismatic Rabbi who's trying to save his life achivement. In The United States they loved the concept and marketed it commercially, but Rabbis in Israel are not fond of it


Action game heroes are usually young, strong, weapon expoerts and look great. However the Rabbinite world heroes have a long beard, convincing rhetorics and great knowledge of the bible. A new game that have been released lately in the USA is trying to break that pattern and make the Rabbi an action hero.
In the game called "The Shivah" after the jewish mourning tradition, is starring Rabbi Russell Stone, who's the head of a small synagogue in one of the jewish neighbourhoods in New York. Rabbi Stone is in crisis, his community members have stopped arriving at the synagogue an d the estbalishment he's head of is in a serious financial crisis.
Until here it sounds like a sad tale, which at best can end in another lesson from the jewish world - but thats exactly the point where things change. When another lecture in the empty synagogue ends a cop arrives at Rabbi Stone's and tells him that one of his followers has been murdered abd has left an inheritance of $10,000 to him. Stone, who needs the money to save his life achivement, goes out to investigate the source of the money. In opposte of what you would expect from a Rabbi, he gets involved in the murder story and tryes to collect evidence. To finish the game, the Rabbi must overcome an evil competitor, who acts in a big synagogue in a more prestigous part of New York.
The distance between Rabbi Stone and Lara Croft is still big: she looks realistic and he looks like he got ou of an 80's game - but with a lot of faith you can overcome the small details. Stone's character is differnet from the classic Rabbi character: he's grumpy, swears and does not wear black clothes and a yarmulka. Despite that, if anyone would try to find antisemistic messages in the provocative character of the Raabi, will not try to find them. The reason is that the brain behind the new genre of Jewish computer games is, of course, jewish himself.
Dave Gilbert created the game in only 30 days, to compete in a young programmers competition. After winning the competition a computer game company has decided to market "The Shivah" commercially. Lately Gilbert has bene interviewed in a New York Jewish life website and told how th eplot came to his mind: "I had an idea to creat a game about a priest that loses his faith, the problem is I don't know anything about priests. I'm jewish, so istead of a priest I made a game about a Rabbi."
In his words, "The Shivah" raises questions about the intergrity of faith and the ability to forgive. The game uses a line of known jewish cliches, for example the napping of followers in the synagogue. Additionaly the player who is not knoledgeable in Yiddish receives a small dictionary with words such as "yente" and of course "shikse". However Gilnert takes pride that at least Rabbi Stone never says "oy vey" even once.
The game achieved a worldwide recognition, including being mentioned in the large news website and agencies , but the media coverage did not being angry comments by the American Jewish community. However, there' a big doubt if such a game can be marketed in Israel.
"In Israel people have much more tradition, and the people know more about the meaning of the Rabbi", explains Rabbi Isaac Batzri, the son of one of the most important Rabbis - Jerusalem's Rabbi David Batzri. "There's no concept of a Rabbi that swears and hits, and there's no Rabbi who is involved in conflicts and plots. If there's a Rabbi that's invovled in crimical activies, he's cast off. Such a game wouldn't pass in the country.". Batzri was surprised to hear that the game has been designed by a jewish programmer: "It is lack of valuse. A jew iwht values wouldn't in a character of a Rabbi a person who's invovled in wars, fights and violence." explains Batzri". "if a jewish person makes such a game he jsut doesn't understand. A Rabbi is not a politician, and his poweris spritual. The biggest Rabbis have been discovered due to their spirirtual powers, and any connection to materialistic things is wrong."
In opposition of Rabbi Batzri, Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu, a member of the Main Rabbinistic Council is less agitated with the game - but worries more about the dangers of the internet. "one more game or one less, it's nothing," says Eliyahu. "The entire gneeration that gew up based on what's available in millions of websites cannot manage a normal family". Eliyahu warns that the web dishonors the woman and makes the husband answer his needs outside the family. In the last few years the Rabbinistic community has started co-opeatring with the computer industry, and dozens or hunderds of religious website hae been established. Rabbi Eliyahu himself has been answering religioius questions through the internet for a few years. However jokes about Rabbis are still off limits.

HISTERIC CULT GAME
By Dora Kishinevski


Most Adventure games must be boxoffice breaking epics to justify the price tag, but there's also games that alloow themsleves to the gamer version of a short cinemateque film. "The Shivah" is such a game. It's a jewish adventure game, which has been made independently by a young American programmer and is downloadable from ManifestoGames.com for no more than $5.
In "The Shivah" - which looks and behaves like the classic io's adventure games, including the pixelized graphics - you will play Russel Stone, a sexy bitter anti-hero, who is a Rabbi of a dwindling jewish community in New York. the Rabbi is not happy with followers' abandonment, from the holes in the synagogue's carpet, the fate of the Jewish people and life in general. He's not even satisifed when he's informed that a guy who has been cast out from the commnuity in the past has left a huge inhertiance to the synagogue. Stone maybe has differences with god, but his conciouns still makes him to investigate why the man has decided to give the money and more importantly - who the hell murdered him.
Such begins an adventure that features inside monologues of the hero and conflicts with questionable people - all with a heavy jewish twist. From the house of the shikse widow till the "bastards" in the Irish pub it's hard to find a character that has nothing to say on the bible people, and doesn't have a sentence that include diaspora humor or a juciy Yiddish swear. If the American can still take part in this concept seriously, for the Israeli gamer - who's not used to seeing himself as a member of an exotic religious group - it's an histeric cult game.
As for gameplat, it's nothing brilliant: it's short, not hard and linear, meaning the player usually doesn't have a real freedom of action in the gameworld. However, you will find a serious and interesting approach ti games and a lot of 90's nostalgia, including a witty homage to dialogue battles in the classic adventure game "Monkey Island". Besides, you might learn some Yiddish.

Now I'd just like to comment on what the Rabbi Btazri says - he's dead wrong. There's a lot of indescency and dishonor and criminality in religious communities in Israel - including some Rabbis. He just chooses to ignore those and say otherwide to cover for it and uses religiuos leaders bullshit cliches.
As for Rabbi's Stone looks and his community people must understand it's not about a Rabbi in Jerusalem or Israel - it's about a Rabbi in New York, and that's how some Rabbis look like in America. so the comparison is unfair. I bet the people who wrote thsoe comments don't understand American synagogues.

[Dave Gilbert]

Sweet!  Thanks for the post, Nostradamus.  It's nice to see the game has gotten some worldwide recognition.  Except...

Stone's character is differnet from the classic Rabbi character: he's grumpy, swears and does not wear black clothes and a yarmulka.

Hm. "Grumpy"?  I'll give you.  "Swears"? Eh, maybe a few yiddish words here and there.    "Does not wear black clothes and a yarmulka"? Er... perhaps they didn't look close enough?

Anyway, I can see where Rabbi Btzari is coming from.  Stone is hardly a "nice" guy by any means, although that was kind of the point.   Still, sometimes negative publicity is good publicity, so I ain't complainin'!

I'd love to see a scan, if you can snag one.

-Dave