What's In A Name?

[Fry Crayola]

Some games have exceedingly shit names. What the hell is "Metal Gear Solid" anyway?

Others have great names. Doom. Grand Theft Auto.

Some almost make it. Hitman: Codename 47. The Hitman part is great. I want to be a hitman. But Codename 47? Meaningless.

Some have lovely arty names that mean nothing from the off but make sense when you play it. Like Ico. Fits brilliantly with the game.

So what are the best and worst game names of all time? And why did they work? Or why was it such a monumental cock up?

And let's ignore Final Fantasy 7, which is clearly absurd.

[misterSquare]

Mr. Driller. He drills, and is called 'Mr', so you know he means business.

Devil May Cry sounds good, but is a bit rubbish on closer inspection. I love the way they try to shoehorn the phrase in at the end of the game.

[Swainy]

Continental Circus. A complete balls up there.

[Nosh]

Silent hill captures the atmosphere of the games quite good. Cause it's silent and a hill, so it must be scary. Right?

[Jack]

I prefer it when they leave numbers out of sequels, for example the new Prince of Persia game, Warrior Within (Or Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Redemption. ). It just looks tidier.

[Boutros]

I prefer it when they leave numbers out of sequels, for example the new Prince of Persia game, Warrior Within (Or Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Redemption. ). It just looks tidier.

It's Eternal Darknes: Sanity's Requiem...

Which is an even cooler title.

[Jack]

It's Eternal Darknes: Sanity's Requiem...

Which is an even cooler title.

I know what I said.

[Boutros]

Best name ever:

Eye of the Beholder

[squirtle]

Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Redemption.

I thought this was just a rumour. Has it been confirmed?

I've never liked the way Nintendo stick Super at the start of everything, or on the N64 evrything was game name 64! Bloody crap.

And Tomb Raider became more of a misnomer as the series went along.

[Guest nomenclature]

Worst name ever: anything with a colon in it.

Best name ever: anything without a colon in it.

[Rin]

FAO: sub-titles

Halo: Combat FUCK OFF.

[Benny Blanco]

Metal Gear Solid is a wicked name.

[Mogget]

WORST NAMES: Anything that includes a pointless subtitle.

[roskelld]

I love the titles Metal Gear Solid and Devil May Cry, in fact I was only talking about the Devil name the other day, saying how it's not a straight forward name like "Acrobatic shooty knife killer", it's got a certain mystery to it.

The same can be said about band names, the amount of bands I've listened to over the years without actually thinking of the name on a word-per-word basis. Off the top of my head, Tears for Fears comes to mind, only now (cause of this thread) have I actually digested each word for its own meaning.

One last cool name... Viewtiful Joe. You just can't make that stuff up.

[zektbach]

Rockman... yes? no? why?

[Jack]

I thought this was just a rumour. Has it been confirmed?

Sanity's Redemption was a sanity effect, but Denis Dyack has said a sequel to Eternal Darkness is kicking about in development.

[Luke]

Pokemon, when pronounced 'correctly' really pisses me off:

'Pock-ee-mon' - just sounds crap.

'Poke-ee-mon' - sounds much better.

Dare Devil Denis was an ace name (and game). He's Denis. He's a Dare Devil. 'nough said!

[Chorlton]

Off the top of my head-

Good Names:

Body Harvest, Fable, Captive,Xenomorph, Rise of the Robots, Metroid Prime, Vib Ribbon

Bad Names:

Zelda: The Wind Waker, MGS: The Twin Snakes, any EA sports game (although what else would you call them)

Harder to think of bad names

[outspaced]

Pokemon, when pronounced 'correctly' really pisses me off:

'Pock-ee-mon' - just sounds crap.

'Poke-ee-mon' - sounds much better.

Dare Devil Denis was an ace name (and game). He's Denis. He's a Dare Devil. 'nough said!

and Pocket Monsters was even better.

Game names are a lot like band names I think, it's easy to find a bad or mediocre one, and good ones are entirely subjective.

[Pob]

PC games get is the worst with names, especially all this subtitle/colon stuff.

I hate beardy RPG names. Stuff like Morrowscape: Guardians of Arpeth of whatever.

Also the zillions of tactical shooters, all with names made up of the words 'special', 'shadow', 'desert', 'operations', 'combat', 'team', 'rogue', 'squad', 'counter', 'tactical' etc.

Resident Evil is probably the best name for a game, ever.

[outspaced]

Resident Evil is probably the best name for a game, ever.

It is a great name. Much better than Biohazard, strangely.

[Mitchell]

...Like Ico. Fits brilliantly with the game.

What, really short?

[caveman]

Good:

"Resident Evil" (9/10)

"Tomb Raider" (9/10)

"Mario Kart" (10/10)

"Driver" (8/10)

Intermediate:

"Tony Hawk's Pro Skater" [descriptive but boring] (6/10)

"Half Life" [trying too hard] (7/10)

Bad:

"Halo" [cool word, but says nothing] (4/10)

"Project Gotham Racing" [sounds bad + meaningless] (3/10)

"SSX" [obviously chosen only because it looks like SEX] (4/10)

"Prince of Persia" [sounds lame] (2/10)

[Matt G]

Some games have exceedingly shit names. What the hell is "Metal Gear Solid" anyway?

I always thoughtMetal Gear Solid was a good name. Metal Gear being the mecha type thing and with the move into 3D everything would appear more 'Solid'. And it's well 'ard too

Resident Evil has always been a funny one for me but that's maybe because of the stupid pronouncing of it at the title screen. My favourite one was "Resident... Evil" *long pause* "Zeerooo!" I think Biohazard is quite a good name for the whole series, Resident Evil kinda only works for the first one. "It's like evil y'know, and it's residing in that house over there..."

Something I've been playing recently, Story of Thor?!?! Nowhere in any of those games is an ancient viking deity mentioned, I don't get it at all. The american titles are better, Beyond Oasis and Legend of Oasis, since the country the games are set in is called Oasis.

[RabMyself]

Silent hill captures the atmosphere of the games quite good. Cause it's silent and a hill, so it must be scary. Right?

Have you ever seen a noisy hill?

[will]

Metal gear is such a cool name my dad even knows it, and he only knows super cool stuff, like how to make nice cheese sauce.

[outspaced]

Metal gear is such a cool name my dad even knows it, and he only knows super cool stuff, like to make nice cheese sauce.

Dads do that well, also excellent porridge, and omelettes.

[scruffycat]

Doom - I always thought that was quite a good name, short and to the point.

Quake - Similar style name to the above but doesn't quite work so well.

Knights Of The Old Republic - Bit of a mouthfull but not too bad a name (forgetting the Star Wars stuck to the beginning)

Animal Crossing - Rubbish

[Ste Pickford]

I also think Metal Gear Solid is a brilliant name. No idea what it means, but it sounds great.

I also agree that titles with colons in them are absurd, even after having been involved in at least one game with a colon title. They reek of compromise (developer has created the game with one title, marketing want a compleltely different title, usually inaccurate and unrelated to the game in any way, as a compromise both are used, on either side of the colon - result, a title which nobody likes).

[daveodeth]

Worst name ever: anything with a colon in it.

Best name ever: anything without a colon in it.

must.... resist.... bum.... jokes.