Among the folks shilling videogames in front of this year's E3 were some faux protesters claiming to be outraged Christians. The object of their simulated righteous indignation was Dante's Inferno, a game about hell based on Dante's Divine Comedy and Sony's God of War. The LA Weekly picked up the story with nary an inkling that it wasn't authentic.

While it is a sort of funny ploy, I think it's in poor taste. But E3 has never been about taste, so at least it's not inappropriate. And whoever mocked up the website for Salvationists Against Virtual and Eternal Damnation (S.A.V.E.D.), which went live the first day of E3, did a great job of making a pretend bad website with warnings like this:

Those who fall victim to the trappings of this VIRTUAL HELL game will not have to wait long until the find themselves in REAL ACTUAL HELL where they will not be given any weapons or power ups to protect themselves from fiery demons, razorblade babies, or spewing bodily fluids.

Razorblade babies? Intriguing. Note the links to the game's official trailer and website with the entreaty to "CLICK HERE TO GIVE DANTES INFERNO A TASTE OF IT"S OWN MEDICINE!!!"

The faux protesters were also passing out fliers which you can see here.

(Thanks bago!)

UPDATE: Apologies for baseball legend and MMO publisher Curt Schilling for misspelling "shilling", which has been fixed.