Atheists Complain About Spore

According to over 9000 publications, Will Wright (creator of The Sims) has recieved numerous complaints about his new game, Spore.

A little about Spore, in general:
It's a "massively single-player online game" that simulates life on a planet, starting from the microorganism all the way to a civilization that colonizes other planets. The concept of evolution, which some Christians have a problem with (particularly since the well-intentioned yet misguided young-Earth creationists still ridicule our most-likely origin as "Darwinism" and attempt to scold and disrespect everyone who acknowledges the postulate) is the entire game.

Now, wouldn't Wright expect complaints from the religious side?

Well, he did, apparently. But he got zip. Perhaps because the religious are increasingly taking the stance of the Pope, in that evolution is the "how", not the "why". However the case, there is one group that Wright couldn't have forseen complaining about the game.

"Militant atheists".

They don't have issues with the evolutionary process. Not the gameplay, the graphics, the fun-factor. What secular complaint could they possibly have fathomed?

Well, it's not a secular complaint. They're complaining that religion is featured in the "civilization" stage of the game. That's right, just because imaginary societies are capable of developing religious beliefs once they are evolved enough, these militant atheists are barraging Wright with hate-mail and complaints. Why should they take issue with this, considering every civilization ever developed has had a component of religion?

It's simply a matter of political correctness.

Atheists are sensitive to the mention of religion; after all, there lies a history of persecution amongst atheistic views. And perhaps we, the religious, do have some fault in that history. But to keep religion out of games, just (from what I can tell) out of spite for religion itself? That's censorship. This could have gone the exact opposite way, the anti-evolution creationists attempting to censor the game out of spite for a scientific process.

As I recall, the issue of the censorship of religion had to do when it was intertwined with the state. Our secular constitutional republic. Yet this game is being developed by Maxis, a private, citizen-comprised company. Well, perhaps Wright and Co. are, ooh, evangelical theocratists who need to be stopped. Well, that's not true either. Wright is an atheist himself, and he's worked with people both religious and not to develop the game. Apparently, he's gone to great lengths to not offend Christians with the portrayal of religion in the game. Somehow, he's done the opposite.

For instance, your role as the creator is never clearly defined.

This isn't the first time that atheists have complained about religion in video games. They complained when "Captain Bible in Dome of Darkness" came out back in 1994, and they complained again when "The Bible Game" came out for the PS2 more recently.

As for me, I'll be buying Spore when it comes out on the 7th. Hopefully the "militant atheists" will too. I'd hate for them to miss out on all the fun.


EDIT: I realize that this doesn't apply to all atheists, I don't mean to generalize. I'm specifically talking about those "militant atheists" that Will Wright himself referred to.