Books! Shiny books. Also games.
So, I finished American Gods last night. I really liked the way it ended. It also made me wonder - it's fairly apparent, throughout the book, that the various gods are strongly affected by the amount of belief in them (for example, the hall of forgotten gods, or whatever it's called.) But this makes me wonder, in a real-life spiritual context: how are the gods affected by modern practices of belief? I mean, most people do not practice blood sacrifice in any form, and in general I think that the modern world trends toward some of the "gentler" gods in most Pagan practices that I'm familiar with (your mileage, of course, may vary.)
It makes me wonder, for example, how the Morrigan has changed over the years, or how gods like Brighid - who are apparently conglomerations of many smaller local gods into a more generalized archetype - felt about the mutations they have undergone (see also: Brighid as a Catholic saint.) It makes me wonder if they remember who they were, and are bitter that they are different now, or if they are only grateful that someone remembers enough to speak prayers in their name. But are those prayers still effective, if done in a different manner than what the god is accustomed to? In Exalted, if rituals are not done correctly, none of the Essence makes it to the god in question, and it is simply lost. Does that mean that we are, in essence, crippling the gods we mean to glorify because we do not practice their original rituals?
And on a less thinky note, I finally cleared the battle I was struggling with in Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn. I'm now at the beginning of the fourth battle. Things I really like: the limits of attack range when showing movement range (HI FF TACTICS why the hell can't you do this!); the ability to see the limits of the enemy's move/attack range (see previous); inherent counterattacks. Things I dislike: lack of phoenix down, not being able (as far as I can see) to act and THEN move, sheer predictability of storyline (o noez, girl with odd coloured hair is psychic and SPESHUL, clearly she is the main character!). I have hopes for it to get better as we go on. We'll see.
And on that note, I think I want some tea, and then maybe some more Fire Emblem. In other news, today looks like a good football day - Carolina should be able to destroy the Falcons quite satisfactorily, and I have hopes for Redskins vs. Eagles and Jax vs. Tennessee. I'm not even going to comment on the Packers game, as i feel it is a foregone conclusion. :D
It makes me wonder, for example, how the Morrigan has changed over the years, or how gods like Brighid - who are apparently conglomerations of many smaller local gods into a more generalized archetype - felt about the mutations they have undergone (see also: Brighid as a Catholic saint.) It makes me wonder if they remember who they were, and are bitter that they are different now, or if they are only grateful that someone remembers enough to speak prayers in their name. But are those prayers still effective, if done in a different manner than what the god is accustomed to? In Exalted, if rituals are not done correctly, none of the Essence makes it to the god in question, and it is simply lost. Does that mean that we are, in essence, crippling the gods we mean to glorify because we do not practice their original rituals?
And on a less thinky note, I finally cleared the battle I was struggling with in Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn. I'm now at the beginning of the fourth battle. Things I really like: the limits of attack range when showing movement range (HI FF TACTICS why the hell can't you do this!); the ability to see the limits of the enemy's move/attack range (see previous); inherent counterattacks. Things I dislike: lack of phoenix down, not being able (as far as I can see) to act and THEN move, sheer predictability of storyline (o noez, girl with odd coloured hair is psychic and SPESHUL, clearly she is the main character!). I have hopes for it to get better as we go on. We'll see.
And on that note, I think I want some tea, and then maybe some more Fire Emblem. In other news, today looks like a good football day - Carolina should be able to destroy the Falcons quite satisfactorily, and I have hopes for Redskins vs. Eagles and Jax vs. Tennessee. I'm not even going to comment on the Packers game, as i feel it is a foregone conclusion. :D