The makers of the Left Behind series of religious video games says Walmart is expanding the Christian game test-market it opened last year in Texas, with an eye toward distributing such games nationally.
The statement came in a recent SEC filing by Left Behind Games. The additional states weren't specified, but the expansion was described as a "new market test [that is] is a follow-up to the marketing trial conducted in approximately 100 Walmart stores in Texas during the 2009 Christmas sales season." Left Behind CEO Troy Lyndon, citing sales figures for Christian and Gospel music, posits that the U.S. south central and Mid-Atlantic states - aka The Bible Belt - will see the expansion.
Lyndon said Walmart asked that the test market expansion be announced to the company's shareholders through the filing rather than by a news release to the general public. If Walmart likes what it sees in the test market then "their marketing resources will be utilized to facilitate a full-fledged launch," Lyndon wrote. Elsewhere in the statement to shareholders, Lyndon refers to the company's pending merger with Digital Praise, announced back in February. That will bring the Guitar Praise line of Christian music rhythm-gaming under the same brand.
Joystiq reported that Lyndon said Left Behind's games are no longer available in the 100 stores comprising the original Texas test market, and that the new test will actually put its products in fewer stores, just spread out over a wider geographic area.
Left Behind Games Expands Walmart Distribution to 'Broad Area of States' [Joystiq]