神河当時 - 神の命名規則

昨日の記事の続きです。

Another question that hit us right away was how to deal with names for Kamigawa’s kami. I sent an e-mail on the first day of Champions of Kamigawa naming asking Brandon how to deal with kami names. If I had a kami associated with lava, I asked, do I name it: Lava Kami? Kami of Lava? Kami of the Burning Water? Kami of the Angry Volcano? Spirit of the Lava? Lava Spirit? Lavaswimmer? Soul of Magma? Seed of Anger? Blistering Wanderer? Lava Kaijin? Etc. etc. etc. You see the dilemma. With a whole new concept for creatures (and particularly bizarre, immortal creatures at that), we needed a way to characterize them that was both consistent across the set and that made sense.

I distinctly remember Brandon’s response:

“Yes.”

Followed shortly thereafter by:

“Okay, no Spirits in the name. Spirit is a creature type in Kamigawa but we want to keep it out of the kami names.”


As a result, you can see kami names in Champions run the gamut in terms of creative flavor. There are Brutal Deceivers, Earthshakers, Guardian of Solitude, Hearth Kami, Kami of Fire’s Roar and Kami of the Waning Moon. Just as the kami were given really loose guidelines to the artists (the only real limitations being that they have floating objects around them and look bizarre), so too were the creative writers able to stretch their own imaginations. Kami look freaky and other-worldly in their art; the goal was to make their names similarly freaky and other-worldly.

引用元
LAND OF TEN-THOUSAND LEGENDS Posted in Feature on October 4, 2004
https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/land-ten-thousand-legends-2004-10-04

神河の神は、クリーチャー・タイプこそスピリット(Spirit)ですが、「"Spirit"という単語は神のカード名に使わない」というのがルールになりました。

"Spirit"が名前に含まれる『神河物語』ブロックのカードを検索したところ、クリーチャーはヒットしませんでした。《霊魂の奪取/Rend Spirit》《霊的な訪れ/Spiritual Visit》の２枚は"Spirit"が入っていますが、クリーチャーでなく呪文です。

そして、Spiritの代わりに、"Kami"という日本語がそのまま使われています。

こうした制限が、神の名前を創造性に富んだものにしている、とのことです。マローがよく語る、「制限は創造の母」ということでしょう。




追記
webアーカイブに、日本語訳の記事があるのを発見しました。

一万の伝説の地 ――神河物語の名前とフレイバーの幕裏
https://web.archive.org/web/20041217002944/http://www.hobbyjapan.co.jp/magic/articles/files/20041013_01.html