I run another blog on religion and digital culture, and it’s been poaching a lot of my posts on games recently. I’ve decided to post them here instead, and simply link to this blog over there.
A user on a gaming forum I frequent mentioned his preference of “Buddha Mode” mods over God Mode ones, the other day. Apparently the distinction is that, while God Mode makes the player immune to damage, Buddha Mode will reduce the player’s health to 0 or 1, but no further. I imagine this is so that low health effects such as red flashes or reduced movement remain, but the character doesn’t die.
The naming of this mode doesn’t sit entirely comfortably with me, as I don’t really imagine the Buddha as someone immortal but eternally suffering. To keep with the Buddhist metaphor, it might be more correct to call it Boddhisattva mode, as these beings have dedicated themselves to remaining in this realm of suffering until all have attained Nirvana. Gautama Buddha did stay around for a little bit after his own Enlightenment, but certainly not to that degree.
Jesus is famous for his “Turn the other cheek” ethos and, to some extent, his existence was defined by his suffering (or Passion, to use its archaic meaning). But he was also defined by a very real death, before his resurrection.
I figure that whoever came up with the first mod of this sort (the earliest reference to which I can find is for 2004′s Half-Life 2) simply couldn’t think of a better name than Buddha Mode.
Pitcure derived from: