Interactive Bible App Teaches Kids Fun Lessons, Leaves Theology to Parents
A new app is bringing to life biblical stories for kids, giving children fun and interactive ways to learn about the Scriptures.
Kids can listen, read, tap and touch epic Bible stories with their parents or their friends through the new BibleKids 3D books created by RocketPop Games LLC, an independent game development company based in Texas.
“BibleKids 3D brings to life an engaging line of digital books that entertain your kids, friends and families time after time,” Charles Joyner, co-founder of RocketPop, told The Christian Post. “Your kids will laugh and play.”
“Our stories are told in a light way. We believe parents like children’s stories to be fun, educational and immersive – and leave the theology up to them.”
Designed to be played over and over again, the BibleKids books are different from others because of their full 3D development. The creators of the app used their experience from multi-platform game development to make the Bible stories, which play like an interactive movie.
“The Founding Team has been involved in multi-platform game development for many years,” Joyner shared. “We wanted to use our skills and experience to make Christian games.”
Being involved in the church and the Christian community for many years, the RocketPop leaders decided it would be great if kids could learn by “playing” Bible stories.
With that idea in mind, Jason Padgett, co-founder of RocketPop Games, envisioned BibleKids 3D, hoping to make biblical stories interactive and in full 3D.
“Bible stories are simply the most incredible stories ever,” Joyner, who spent a few years building technology and engineering for large churches, explained. “There are so many fantastic stories that need to be shared. Children may not read the Bible and parents that read the Bible with their kids may not be able to keep the attention of kids – at least it was hard for me as a totally energetic youth.”
“So we thought, ‘let’s make something for kids that blows them away. Something they can ‘play’ with, something they can play with other kids, and something parents could spend time together with their kids.’”
Wishing they had something like this when they were growing up, the creators felt that the new 3D books would be a great learning experience for their own children now.
“BibleKids 3D’s books are simply totally fun entertainment and what better than a kid having fun learning,” the co-founder added.
Currently, BibleKids 3D has two books out, one of which launched just in time for the Christmas holiday.
“Christmas Story” takes children on a 3D interactive journey through the birth of Jesus Christ in Bethlehem. Kids could witness the moment when Mary first learned about her divine pregnancy from angel Gabriel to the time when she gave birth to Jesus in a stable.
“I recently saw on the ‘Bill O’Reily’ show something that [confirmed] our goal of making awesome books,” Joyner stated to CP. “They interviewed kids in a store. The kids were asked, ‘what is your favorite holiday’ [and] the kids all answered ‘Christmas!’”
When they were asked what the meaning of Christmas was, however, 10 out of 10 did not know the answer.
“We know 100 percent [that] these books would change the children’s answer and it just motivated us more.”
In addition to “Christmas Story,” the story of Noah has also been brought to life and is for sale now at the app store.
The ultimate goal of BibleKids 3D is to create an expansive library of Bible stories to be played with by kids, used in children’s ministries, and shared in several languages all over the world.
RocketPop is in development of three more BibleKids 3D books, including the story of Daniel and the lion’s den, the prodigal son, and David and Goliath, all of which will be released sometime between January and February of 2012.
For this Christmas season, the company also created a special iPhone and iPad augmented reality app called “BibleKids 3D A Window Into Christmas.”
Through the app, users can project a 3D image of the Nativity scene like a hologram onto any surface like a table or desk.
The response to the BibleKids 3D apps has been positive so far. “Every single family that has tried our books absolutely loves the books,” Joyner said. “The feedback we are receiving could not be more positive.”
“Christmas Story” is currently number 87 on iTunes/Books “Top Books.”
Though the app is normally priced at $4.99, for this weekend only the app will be on sale for $0.99.
On the Web: BibleKids 3D
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