I wouldn't really agree that EoS is quite "Lovecraftian." The Great Old Ones in Lovecraft are really not malevolent or cruel... they're just horrifically alien and indifferent to human suffering. Just like I don't go around seeking the smush ants, but I don't have any grief about poisoning an entire anthill if I need to.
Maybe "Derlethian" would be a better descriptor... but I suppose that doesn't quite have the same ring.
"Inspired by H.P. Lovecraft" is of course not a phrase that can be called into question. But, uh, it has in the past been used to promote some truly wretched crap.
None of this is a knock to EoS, by the way. But I think literary "purists" may be a little taken aback by this particularly depraved (and I mean that in the most complimentary way!) vision.
it's a nice suprise to see Guy's review since i've been busy working on the big, hard cover, full color, and diceless version of Satanis that will be out in stores and conventions in 2006.
from a not-so-purist perspective, i think that Satanic evils "infecting and/or influencing humanity" is extremely Lovecraftian.
for instance, try and count how many references to demons, demoniacal, satanic, hell, satan, infernal, etc. there are in his works. i'd say over 100. for a handful of short mythos stories, that is pretty darned obsessive.
however, a word like satanic means different things to different people. i'd agree that Lovecraft might have been trying to put unknowable, alien forces into a perspective that humans could understand: evil personified by the creatures of darkness that oppose god and christianity. one can only go on about how beings are ineffable, unknowable, and indescribable so long before they leave absolutely no impression on the reader at all. hence the forced cultural take on the above adjectives.
of course, it's just my opinion and i'm very biased since i happen to be a Lovecraft lover and a Satanist.
for instance, try and count how many references to demons, demoniacal, satanic, hell, satan, infernal, etc. there are in his works.
Actually, the only explicit reference to Satan (apart from swearing and quotations from religious documents) that I can think of can be found in "The Horror at Red Hook: "Satan here held his Babylonish court, and in the blood of stainless childhood the leprous limbs of phosphorescent Lilith were laved." And the critics seem to agree that the passage is somewhat uncharacteristic in HPL's fiction.
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i'd agree that Lovecraft might have been trying to put unknowable, alien forces into a perspective that humans could understand: evil personified by the creatures of darkness that oppose god and christianity.
The vast majority of the entities in the Mythos are perceived as foulness by the human senses because they are essentially incomprehensible to our species, not because they are malicious in themselves. If they personify anything, it's the ultimately alien nature of the universe and its fundamental laws rather than any form of objectively existing "evil". Besides, the closest thing to God in the stories is Azathoth: there's no need for Cthulhu and company to oppose Christianity, since all religions as we know them are basically meaningless.
(An afterthought: you have presumably noticed that Lovecraft favoured the word "daemon" over "demon". In the Classical era, the term was of course neutral and didn't necessarily refer to evil, and as someone who loved Greek and Roman mythology HPL was very much aware of this.)
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Meh. I read the PDF they had up on their website (which I _think_ was the whole game), and I wasn't as impressed.
First of all, the PCs and their enemies _aren't_ Lovecraftian, except in the sense of 'having tentacles'. (And that's only the prostitutes.) They're mutated humans, and like most humans, they want to get rich, famous, revenge, or laid, or possibly two or more at once. Those are _very_ human motivations, not the stuff of Cosmic Horror.
Secondly, maybe I've become numb from a combination of White Wolf, Unknown Armies, and the ten o'clock news, but very little in this game struck me as 'dark' or 'disturbing'. (Except for the "Candy Land Magic". That shit's just not right.) It struck me a lot more like a bunch of teenagers trying hard to _be_ Dark and Spooooky.
And if all the PCs are endlessly-backstabbing ruthless powerhungry scum, how do you stop each game from degenerating into a backbiting TPK? Do you even _try_?
There did strike me as a few neat ideas. I _like_ that characters' increasing prestige allows them to bend the cosmos to their will--it seemed to fit.
To be fair, I _can_ think of one way I'd like to run the game. I noticed in the section on antagonists that the humans who occasionally try to invade the demon-worlds come in spaceships and are armed with laser-guns. This gives me a GREAT idea for a KoS campaign.
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(An afterthought: you have presumably noticed that Lovecraft favoured the word "daemon" over "demon". In the Classical era, the term was of course neutral and didn't necessarily refer to evil, and as someone who loved Greek and Roman mythology HPL was very much aware of this.)
It is also important to remember that Lovecraft was also an avowed Materialist and Rationalist which would preclude any sort Christian-based interpretation (whether that would be Christian or Satanist) of his Mythos. At least, it should preclude that.
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Originally Posted by darrick3909
i'd agree that Lovecraft might have been trying to put unknowable, alien forces into a perspective that humans could understand: evil personified by the creatures of darkness that oppose god and christianity. one can only go on about how beings are ineffable, unknowable, and indescribable so long before they leave absolutely no impression on the reader at all.
(emphasis mine)
Except that interpretation goes against what Lovecraft explicitly stated was his credo. It also goes against what he wrote. As was mentioned upthread, any G vs. E elements to the Mythos were introduced by August Dereleth, and they were introduced long after Lovecraft's death...because he himself was against the concepts.
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It is also important to remember that Lovecraft was also an avowed Materialist and Rationalist which would preclude any sort Christian-based interpretation (whether that would be Christian or Satanist) of his Mythos.
A "mechanistic materialist" was what HPL called himself, that's true, and by all accounts he was utterly incapable of seriously entertaining the notion of the supernatural actually existing in any shape or form. That hasn't stopped Burleson and others from pointing out that "The Dunwich Horror" could quite easily be construed as a parody of the Gospels...
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