Strawberry Eggs

Continuing with the three games I mentioned above. I just beat a certain boss and encountered a certain Mechon, and I'm off to Colony 6. Not before I do some quests, of course. There's always time for side quests. Character models and certain other objects have oddly flat looks to them, but the environments are breathtaking and huge. I've also encounted a handful of high-level monsters (70+ when my characters are only 21. I've heard of this before but I kind of thought this would indicates areas that I shouldn't be in, not having them be only a few yards away from more appropriately-levels beasts. At least they are easy to avoid and most monsters don't attack you anyway. Still collecting pieces of heart and other items in Major's Mask. I need to hurry with that game. Not much to say about Oracle of Seasons, either.

I've been juggling my gaming among The Legend of Zelda: Oracles of Seasons, LOZ: Majora's Mask and Xenoblade (Chronicles). It's my first time playing the first two games, though I'm much farther along in OoS than I am in MM. I just started Xenoblade, but am really liking it already.

This is awesome to have in one place. Thank you! I heard that Tor is interested in releasing the last Alcatraz book, but it's news to me that they'll be rereleasing the previous books first.

Here's a question for you: How much will you be covering non-Cosmere Sanderson works other than in the news? Will the book summaries (Shardcast Companion?) eventually cover, say, the Alcatraz series?

I had learned about the news that Brandon would be completing the Wheel of Time series. I wanted to see how well this guy could write, so I took out a few of his books from the library, first Elantris, then Mistborn: The Final Empire. I thought he was amazing, and devoured the rest of his books from then on. I ended up preferring his books over WoT. XD

a certain very

If it were an alloy, it would change the metal entirely. It wouldn't make the Feruchemist sick as wrong alloys of metal would do to Allomancers, but it probably wouldn't store anything.

I'm utterly fascinated by the Megami Tensei Franchise. It has quite the storied past (did you know it actually started as a short novel series and the first two games on the Famicom, Digital Devil Story: Megami Tensei, share the title?) It's quite vast and has so many various sub-series. Heck, the Persona games are practically their own entity now. The number of MegaTen games I've actually played can be counted on my hand. (Devil Survivor/Overclocked, Devil Survivor 2, Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey). I am absolutely stoked for SMT IV and Devil Summoner: Soul Hackers.

I recall from an earlish episode of the RPGBacktrack podcast one guest describing the Mistborn series as something like "the repeated use of 'Nice Job Breaking it, Hero' before things finally get better." (for the characters. He loves Sanderson's books.) Certainly not as amusing as those comments on Tumblr.

Same here. I think it would be best to go in order of release, so Elantris, then the Mistborn Trilogy.

As I recalled in Warbreaker, the Return gods tend to be promiscuous since they don't have to worry about pregnancies (and STIs, I imagine). It's not hard to imagine that the gods wouldn't care so much about the gender of their lovers as well. I can imagine Idrians being more against homosexuality. They seem to have strict gender roles and perhaps homosexuality would be more associated with Hallandren.

I remember reading about Sanderson making Alloy of Law into a series on the book's TV Tropes page. I didn't know how true that was, though.

All of the ones that have been published, yes. I even own a fair number of his physical books and some audiobooks. I've only read the Elantris short story he wrote.

Sazed could probably leave pieces of his own body for people to use, I imagine.

The name is on purpose. I use it almost everywhere on the Internet. My handle comes from a fairly obscure anime series, I My Me! Strawberry Eggs. It's both an odd, eye-catching name and I occasional introduce people to the series.

Yes, that's what I meant. A mailbag episode(s) would work just as well.

Not too long ago I finish City at the End of Time by Greg Bear. Talk about your mixed bags literature-wise. City at the End of Time is a sci-fi novel with some fantasy elements, taking place both in contemporary Seattle and the last human city 100 trillion years in the future called the Kalpa. As the book's title implies, the Kalpa exists in an artificially generated space, as the universe/multiverse (from what I can gather, the many universes converge into one chaotic mess at this "time") is so ancient, it is "worn out," so to speak. This seems to have either developed into or called the attention of an entity/force called the Typhon, which turns old space/time into pure chaos. The descendants of humanity living within the city largely try to ignore the universe turning into chaos, but some have been working on the problem of reversing it. Somehow this involves using bio-engineered beings called "Ancient Breeds" made from "primordial matter" (ordinary atoms, as most of the inhabitants of the Kalpa are either virtual or made of exotic material). The way these Ancient Breeds are described, they are either suppose to resemble pre-human ancestors, or the people of the distant future don't quite remember what old humans looked like, so they gave them fur over some areas and odd-shaped ears. In any case, the Breeds live away from human descendants, but some special members are trained to go out into the Typhon, seeing if they can find another city in the chaos. The Typhon is not only making the multiverse as we know it cease to exist, the effects are reaching back in time, so that eventually it would be like the familiar multiverse never existed in the first place. Meanwhile in the present, there are three special young people, all of them with the ability to jump to other universes in which a version of themselves exist. They all carry strange items called Sum-runners, which are somehow key to saving the multiverse. Because of this, the forces of a goddess-like cosmic entity called the Chalk Princess are after them. Two of these youths, a girl named Virginia and a guy named Jack also have dreams of a city, the Kalpa itself and seem to be able to briefly see through the eyes of two of the Ancient Breeds there, a male named Jebrassy and a female named Tiadba. So how does all this save existence as we know it? I'm still trying to figure parts of that out. This book has such fascinating, grand ideas of what it would be like in an incredibly distant point in time, the technology, the history, and the people that inhabit the Kalpa. The notion of the universe not only ceasing to exist, but never existing in the first place is also awe-inspiring. However, this book handles it rather clumsily. It's a slog to get through. Chapters upon chapters of not much at all occur before something interesting or revealing happens. Also, the parts that take place in the Kalpa are written in too much of an in-universe voice so that it can come across as confusing. Worst of all, despite the book's length, there is very little time spent on meaningful characterization. None of the protagonists feel like distinct individuals. They all just seem to be pushed along by the grandeur of the novel's concepts. Oddly enough, only one of the villains feels like a substantive and interesting character. This book has some great ideas, and I didn't entirely dislike my time reading it, but it can be difficult to comprehend and a real chore to read at times. On a side note, I still can't decide if how the Typhon meets its end is one of the most awesome things I ever read or one of the dumbest. Let's just say it involves millions upon million of cats. I'm currently re-reading the manga Love Attack by Shizuru Seino to tide me over until I can get to the library.

I did some rudimentary searching and didn't find another topic for this, which I'm a little surprised. It's possible the search function isn't very good and I missed one or more. My apologies then, for bringing up something that is old hat. But in any case, I've noticed a number of similarities between the Cosmere and Gnosticism. For those who don't know, Gnosticism is/was a religious and philosophical movement that started around (and possibly before) when Christianity started. A large number of gnostic groups are even now identified as Christan Gnostics. Their beliefs and myths varied, but the general idea is that there existed one true god. He/it is called Abraxas, Monad, the One, among other names. From this one came divine emanations called Aeons. They all represent aspects of the One, but still comprise it. Altogether, they are referred to as the Pleroma (fullness). These Aeons usually represent and are called abstract ideas, such as Incorruptibility, Mind, Pleasure, Truth, Faith, and Love. The parallels between Cosmere theology and Gnosticism are already apparent here. It still isn't know if Adonlasium is/was an actual entity or a force/power, but it could still be compared to the Gnostic Monad. The shard gods are likened to the Aeons; they make up the One and their Intents are usually abstract notions (I can't find any directly similar names, though some can be stretched, like Incorruptibility to Preservation). If the theory that a Shard's power can create sentience is true, this also has some similarities in Gnosticism. While the method varies, people (or only some people) were born with Spirit only after it was introduced into the physical world from the realm of the Pleroma. Another major aspect of Gnosticism doesn't quite match up, but it does lead to some interesting ideas. According to most Gnostic systems, the youngest Aeon, Sophia (Wisdom) was either upset that she was so far from the Monad or was merely curious about the rest of the universe that she somehow fell away from the Pleroma. This caused her to give birth to a monstrosity, a being called the Demiurge and sometimes named Yaldabaoth. She abandoned it, and somehow it never learned of the Pleroma, the Monad, or even its mother Sophia and believed itself to be the one true god. Rather than creating the world, the Demiurge shaped existence ("Demiurge" means "craftsman," the idea being that an artisan doesn't create something from thin air, but carves and manipulates substances like stone or clay), forming the physical world. This was considered an abomination. The universe was meant to be spiritual, but the ignorant and arrogant Demiurge trapped parts of it in matter. Humankind is thus born into a fake world of physical substance, most of them not knowing of the true realm of the spirit, the Pleroma. The Demiurge was usually identified by the Gnostics as Yahweh/Jehovah/YHVH, ie. the god of the Old Testament. Only a small number of humans, those born with the spark of Spirit (Spirit and Soul was usually seen as two different things to the Gnostics), would be able to awaken from the illusion created by the Demiurge and join the Pleroma. Every so often, a Revealer, one of the Aeons, would get past the Demiurge and his Archons (sort of like evil angels) and awaken humans on earth. Jesus Christ was usually identified as one such Gnostic Revealer. There is no real Demiurge figure in the Cosmere. While Shards like Ruin and most certainly Odium are seen are negative ones, they are still considered important parts of the whole. The Demiurge may have been descended from the Aeons, but it is not considered a part of the Pleroma. Still, perhaps the shattering of Adonalsium can be compared to the fall of the universe. Maybe like in Gnosticism, Adonlasium also had Shard "emanations" even when it was "whole." The shattering was thus not necessarily Adonalsium breaking up, but rather the Shard emanations falling away from each other. The fullness became empty, and if the Shards had any minds of their own, they lost them. Of course, that last part is just pure speculation. Heck this entire theory is. The idea of multiple gods being the fragments is hardly new, but still, it's fun to wonder if Brandon Sanderson was thinking of Gnosticism as he came up with and developed Cosmere theology. I imagine he'd be familiar with Gnosticism. Even if there was some Gnostic influence, the idea of Shards already existing as Aeon-like emanations before shattering is just pure conjecture. It's still fun to speculate, though.

Not bad for a first time. I would have liked it to be a bit longer. I'm rather used to podcasts that are at least an hour long. 40 minutes is fine, though, if you prefer. Having a section with listner feeback is always fun. Comments, questions, random odd things, whatever you find on the forum thread for the episode or perhaps sent by email. You can introduce that later when things start getting more comfortable for you guys. I would also like to see this podcast go up on iTunes (unless I just can't find it). On a somewhat related note, I can totally picture Vin with a Lucario. In fact, I can imagine her sparring with said Lucario.

Arceus, how does he write this often? It's always exciting to hear of a new book. Can't wait to learn more!

Mine would likely be forgetfulness. My short-term memory is awful. The disadvantages are obvious. As benefits, perhaps I could forget that I didn't know useful information. For instance, I could forget that I didn't know any martial arts. Or I could forget that I didn't know how to pilot a ship. Or I could forget that I didn't know first aid.

Eh, not really a big deal, though it would have been a big way to introduce others to the series. I am glad that book 5 is still planned. The audiobook's narrator has grown on me. It's not good, I just don't think it's that irritating.

I've been lurking here for some time, but finally decided to join the forums. I can't say how often I'll be posting, but I'll make the effort. I first discovered Brandon Sanderson when it was announced that he would be continuing and finishing the Wheel of Time series. I wanted to see what he original work was like, so I set out to read Elantris. Sure enough, I was hooked and devoured every book from him I could. What I most love about his work is his creativity, though just about everything is wonderful. Just as something neat that is Sanderson-related, here is an article I wrote for the video game website RPGamer.com, where I am currently a staff member. This was for a special feature on books that the staff would love to see made into RPGs. I wrote one for the Alcatraz series, so perhaps you may find it interesting.