The thing about the bleak nihilism that's the basis of 'cosmic horror' is that it means not just humans are intrinsically worthless, but so are your space spaghettis and octopus lords. Humans are but ants to them, you might say, but we're ALL ants to the universe, and there's nothing scary or unsettling about that. These monsters that drive people mad are not better than you - yeah they may be stronger or have magic or something, but since there's no objective meaning, YOU decide if them being stronger or having magic even matters.
Human beings and their civilization may well strike you, as it does me, as vastly more important and consequential than aliens and their silly mysticism. So then there's absolutely nothing scary about this whole genre at all. Its ability to upset you is based strictly on how much you're ruled by moral cowardice.
Asher Fisher
>b-but muh tentacles! >scary!
Eli Cooper
But that's wrong and you're retarded.
Isaiah Kelly
Oh, well I guess you showed me.
Michael Mitchell
Depends on the scale of the alien. Mi-Go are specks of sand in the vast space. Azazoth is not.
Jackson James
Size doesn't actually matter, user. Nihilism takes away all that bullshit.
Juan Mitchell
>Cosmic nihilism can be overcome through existentialism and willpower
You don't say.
Leo Myers
You can't decide anything if you're dead though.
Isaiah Cruz
I want ease the burden of existential doubts through some /d/-tier acrobatics with this lovely creature. While maintaining eye contact.
Cameron Adams
>Humans are but ants to them, you might say, but we're ALL ants to the universe
Well, that's wrong. Servitor races are just ants - gigantic by the standards of humankind though they may be.
But the Outer Gods are most definitely important to the entirety of the universe.
Elijah Cox
Except that's wrong. Look up what Azathoth is. He dreamed the universe.
The great old ones may be small on the cosmic scale but the outer gods are big players in the universe.
Mason Morris
The thing about "lol Lovecraft so spoopy" threads is that the people complaining about how it isn't scary to be a meaningless species clutching for life on a piece of sand whirling through an uncaring universe on a collision course with entropy completely forget that during the time the typical game is set, this is a big deal for most people. You're supposed to be roleplaying as someone in that time period, not a jaded faggot in 201X.
Making these complaints is like going into a D&D thread and posting "Hey guys, I'm such an intellectual, don't you know that Eberron isn't a real place and nothing you pretend happens there matters, so what's the point of getting excited every time you roll a natural 20?"
Xavier Jenkins
Grant Us Eyes
John Mitchell
>1) It doesn't matter that they're small in the grand scheme of things. They will fuck you and those you love up.
>2) They look like fish, dude that's pretty scary.
Christian Ortiz
This. They're themselves cosmic forces, creation, destruction, space-time, and their offspring, all manifest as creatures worse than most peoples ideas of demons. Basically the problem is there are gods, but they're all beyond human comprehension beside leaning evil by virtue of how dangerous and uncaring they are towards men, so hope of a comfy existence beyond death or even in life is temporary and futile. That's the deal with the "other gods" that are more powerful than the few that protected man in those dream adventures Lovecraft wrote. Mankind is fucked and there's no hope beyond going unnoticed for a bit longer. You better believe finding that out is going to shake up someone living in 1920s protestant America.
Caleb Hill
Not OP, but that kind of goes along with his point. I have a running analysis of the Lovecraft universe, and I think that Azathoth being the "dreamer of the universe" actually sets the bar that the old ones, deep ones, anything and everything in his universe is meaningless.
>In Dream Quest of the Unknown Kadath the main character is Randolph Carter >Basically Lovecraft's self insert >in DQUK, it is implied that Randolph is an aspect of the great dreamer Azathoth
Basically I think that Lovecraft is saying that he is literally Azathoth, and that's why so many of his characters are so similar to him, his stories are mostly based on night terrors and dreams, and he highly revered the realm of dreams. Especially since a lot of people have dreams where they are multiple "things" or "people" without it seeming unnatural in context. This would also explain why a lot of his stories end in sort of anticlimaxes, because that reflects the anticlimactic nature of dreaming (Junji-Ito does this and he draws a lot of inspiration from Lovecraft) This isn't to say the whole mythos is just brought down to "lol, it's a dream" because, as I said before, Lovecraft was very obsessed with dreams and the realities of dreams being just as real as the waking world. It's more that those concepts exist more as ideas and fears in the real world. There's also probably a fear that even this isn't the "last layer" of consciousness, and that maybe this is all the dream of some other dreamer (I think bloodborne really captures the idea of dreams as other realities very well, if you want a reference)
Lincoln Robinson
No, they are not gods. If they are forces then they are forces. If they are powerful then they are powerful. But they are not gods, any more than you or I. Their importance is contingent upon some kind of objective value by which they may be cast as such. But there is no such value. They are only important to those that would consider their properties important.
>You're supposed to be roleplaying as someone in that time period, not a jaded faggot in 201X. No, because it's clearly stated by all the /ysg/fags that their shit is !!OBJECTIVELY SPOOKY!!. Like, it's not supposed to matter where or when you're from, if you look at the wrong space spaghetti you go crazy. Just because.
CUUTE!
Xavier Gomez
Isn't possible that there IS some objective purpose and worth out there in the cosmos, and it just alien and indescribable to us little scuttling microbes? It would be functionally identical to there being no such purpose, most of the time, but what about when the inhabitants of such a universe get a glimpse of the TRUTH and find it to be totally anathema to everything they've ever known and felt?
I agree that nihilism can be uplifting, but I like to take the genre at it's thematic word, rather than shrugging and saying 'Well, tentacles and strange aeons don't bother ME!'
Noah Williams
>Their importance is contingent upon some kind of objective value by which they may be cast as such.
They are objective value.
There is nothing greater, nothing more true. The further mankind reaches out, the closer they come to the Outer Gods - and it is only a cruel cosmic chance that our corner of the universe has been lonely enough that we developed as we did, into beings that cannot withstand in our current forms of sanity and morality, the true wisdom and knowledge that defines and rules.
You don't have to hold respect for them - just as you don't have to respect gravity or evolution or U-235. But they're fundamental, self-directed and sapient - and there's nothing that fits the definition of a god better than they, and nothing that can challenge them if they chose to be regarded as such.
That said, it's just a setting element.
Personally I always thought it made most sense as some kind of latent psychic awareness that causes mental damage when exposed to things from outside our little bubble of sanity, as it isn't adapted to deal with it.
>CUUTE!
This, however, is objectively correct.
Eli Gutierrez
Azazoth IS the universe tho >Nietzsche is a nihilist 5 int
Landon Adams
I think that's incoherent nonsense but I will let it slide since you have good taste.
Oliver Gonzalez
I think you are saying pretty much what I said here. In short, Cthulhu trumps moral relativity. (in-universe, anyway)
Jaxon Hernandez
Dispite how freaky mi-go, elder one, yithian can be if you saw one in real life especially if you take mindset of age into account I always belive that whole cosmic horror came to play in different angle. To give proper analogy: You are lifting, lets say, 10 kg dumbbell and then all of sudden those 10 kg morph into 1000 kg dumbbell and it all crushing down. Same thing but with mind and comprehensive ability. Their existance it to big to normal human mind to properly get so mind is getting overloaded or crushed should it meet a proper manifistation and servitor races are just assholes in general. Thats said I think Bloodborne really catches a strong human protagonist in general cosmic horror theme vibe.
Thomas Cruz
>he posted Nietzsche while commenting how nihilism can be overcome with willpower >you assume he called Freddy N a nihilist
take a deep breath and ask yourself who is the true retard.
Christopher Lewis
Actually the Gazer is an excellent example of Lovecraftfags getting BTFO. She looks like an evil monster but she's actually just a cute girl that wants someone to treat her that way! I'm sure all these noodle monsters are the same.
James Garcia
Loli cosmic horror struggling with nihilism has already been done before in Kagerou Daze. She's an eternal projection of some unfathomable greater entity, and eventually came to mimic the form of a living thing for inexplicable reasons. From that point, she became aware of how out of place she was and started trying to rationalize her own existence in the universe. Despite not being able to find any purpose for herself, the results of her actions when viewed as a whole seemed to follow some kind of higher order. At points seeming to strive for something human-like, but at the same time acting to prune away qualities that are seen as fundamental to humans.
Jaxon Richardson
The silver key story flat out says he's an aspect of Yog Sothoth. And Randolph Carter's great revelation was that absolutely everything is merely an aspect of the outer gods.
Leo Long
>No, they are not gods. If they are forces then they are forces. If they are powerful then they are powerful. But they are not gods, any more than you or I. Their importance is contingent upon some kind of objective value by which they may be cast as such. But there is no such value. They are only important to those that would consider their properties important. Have you never actually read H.P. Lovecraft?
The entirety of the universe and physicality, as well as all the other outer gods, great old ones, servitor races, and literally everything comes from Azathoth. He created everything.
Hudson Reyes
>he created everything So what?
Brayden Taylor
>Not having your lovecraftian beasts absorb thoughts and spin hallucinations of their target's worst doubts, forming a maddening panic not of their universal insignificance but their own ability to exist in the what little universe they do know, begging the question that perhaps everything else is human and they're the ones that aren't The boundaries of one's confidence make for an excellent prison.
Lincoln Martinez
Even lovecraft could not foresee the horrors of gamergate and neo degeneratism
Tyler Gomez
>the Gazer is an excellent example of Lovecraftfags getting BTFO. She looks like an evil monster but she's actually just a cute girl that wants someone to treat her that way! I'm sure all these noodle monsters are the same wut?
Isaac Garcia
...
Julian Murphy
Sorry, I mix up Yog Sothoth and Azathoth all the fucking time.
