What game names do you choose?

I'm pretty much always HaciendaSquish, but if I'm in an RPG or something where my screen name is supposed to be the name of my character, I'll usually swipe something from Kafka. Gregor or GregorSamsa, most of the time, but my very brief stint in WoW was as JosefK as Gracchus was taken.

If the game provides a default, I often stick with that. If I'm feeling silly, I'll name my character "Master" or "Dude" for added humor. Otherwise, the names I choose tend to vary based on stereotypical character "personalities."

- Alan

I want random name generators. When a game like WoW disallows my go to name, some manner of base line gibberish, it makes my life difficult. I am not putting on any form of second skin.

I may crib off of my friend Steve and just start naming myself after pork related breakfast meats.

This thread reminds me, however, of a hilarious series of screenshots I encountered a few years back, but can't for the life of me find now. Basically, this guy meticulously documented all the funny things that NPCs would say in RPGs when he gave his character an off color name, generally "my penis." Then the dialog would be printed out with people saying things like

"my penis is quite a hero!"
"Where did my penis go?"

There's at least a sporting chance that the page you saw was mine.

Other than that, I'll often use 'Qezzo' if the game doesn't look like it will sport any good screenshot material.

zeroKFE wrote:

a male character is Nahte and a female character is Ymme. Folks who know me will probably be able to determine why.

You don't have to be a genius to figure out those are just Ethan and Emmy spelled backwards.

nsmike wrote:

Hey... Is this just a clever ploy to get name ideas for that fantasy novel you've been writing on and off since 10th grade?

lol, nah....

I just see so many wacky names on forums,in mmo's and fps's I'm always curious to why people pick them...

But speaking of my fantasy novel...

AP Erebus wrote:

But speaking of my fantasy novel...

Well, you certainly can't use my names. They're already in use in the novels I'm writing.

AP Erebus wrote:
nsmike wrote:

Hey... Is this just a clever ploy to get name ideas for that fantasy novel you've been writing on and off since 10th grade?

lol, nah....

I just see so many wacky names on forums,in mmo's and fps's I'm always curious to why people pick them...

But speaking of my fantasy novel...

If that's the case, I recommend highly the Seventh Sanctum in general, and the Name Generators List in specific.

These are also great for building settings and NPCs for pen-and-paper games.

I usually choose something that starts with Duc or Duck.
If it's singleplayer, I often don't care enough to do much more than Dude or Ducki

Edit to add, the reasoning behind prefixing all my MMOG character names with Duc or Duck is that it's pretty easy to know if I'm on or not, unlike some of you folks.

If it's a generic male protagonist and I only have five or six letters to play around with, I usually just go with Nyles, and if I get two names, Tristram Nyles. If it's some kind of bulked-up steriod dude, I'll go with something especially masculine, like Throbemy, Engorgifer, or Wangly. Women: Noctia, Penumbra, Io, that sort of stuff, and sometimes names like Evegenia Arsenik, Janine du Pliciteaux. I had a Titan Quest character named Imachillea (I'm 'a kill 'ya) and my Persona 3 character was Scubadew Pokeball. Oh, and I steal names from Patrick O'Brian novels like Preserved Killick, Awkward Davies, Clarissa Oakes, if the game has any sort of nautical or historical themes.

I usually crack open the Silmarillion and combine a few roots to make a name.

Probably my favorite two names I ever used were in EQ: I had an Enchanter named Massah Mezzah and a Druid named Rongo Walnuts. Though I almost always go with default names, especially in JRPGs probably because I don't actually associate myself with the character on any sort of role playing level deeper than attacking and customizing skills and what not.

I use my cat's name -- Floyd.

Sili something..silifaira, silivina, silifwen,

Everything is based off Mateo...either my call sign GWJMateo, or something like ToroMateo (Tauren Warrior). If the game requires a last name, then I try to choose something appropriate to the character and class.

And yes, I went through Mass Effect as Mateo Shepard.

I had a mage in WoW named Mechashiva.

Quintin_Stone wrote:

I had a mage in WoW named Mechashiva.

I was going to let it go when Hank said he could read Sanskrit.

For Mass Effect, I'm going for all manner of Jack Shepard. I like Lost.

It depends on the game but it boils down to a couple of things. For RPGs I go with names that I started using back in the AD&D "gold box" series on the C64. I used them all the way through each new edition (WTF was Hillsfar?).

With WoW however my NE rogue, Jarraxel was a variant (mispelling from memory) of the dark elf character by RA Salvator. Since then all of my WoW toons have been predominantly "Jarrheads" (Jarranne, Jarrandre, Jarramond, etc).

Tony Hawk was an idle and inspiration to me so in military or Sci-Fi games I usually go with Hawk or some variation of it.

Finally TonyBone is a combination of my first name and a nickname from college (T-Bone). It's a call-sign that has served me well through flight sims and FPS staring back with Falcon 3.0 and Doom on my ol' 486-25.

Dated myself I think. A few more greys just popped into the mane. I can feel them.

Grenn wrote:

For Mass Effect, I'm going for all manner of Jack Shepard. I like Lost.

Oh man I so nearly did that, but decided on a female character to prevent it happening.... Went for Evangeline instead, Lol.

for MMOs I prefer to use normal sounding names like jeff or gordon, simply because I hate the silly fantasy names that some people come up with like Baldasour or Legoverinnaughtyway or something equally silly. What's wrong with chatting to someone called Frank?

I find I have a problem with picking a name for a character I don't yet know. In games where I can bring in my own backstory, I'll often try and spend at least some time thinking about the symbolism of the name as well as the traditions the character's parents would be drawing from in naming their child.

Some games make me feel more like the viewer/reader than the author/plot designer. The less control I sense over the story, the more likely I am to go with the default name, as I figure that any name I choose would at best be a guess as to the character I'll soon experience.

For most single player games its either PCMAN or Joren. For MMO's its a derivative of either of them with extra syllables like Pcmanya or Jorengar. For some strange reason I always name my female alts Cynimin and yes they are always redheads.

MrDeVil909 wrote:
Grenn wrote:

For Mass Effect, I'm going for all manner of Jack Shepard. I like Lost.

Oh man I so nearly did that, but decided on a female character to prevent it happening.... Went for Evangeline instead, Lol.

I made my character a girl. Still called her Jack. Hey, if it can work for Chuck on Pushing Dasies, it can work for Jack.

Generally if the game gives the character a name I don't bother to change it. When it doesn't (or only offers some vague random name generator) I use some variation of tanstaafl if it makes any sort of sense. My Troll Shaman in WoW is named Tanstaafl.

Otherwise my two default male names are "Drake Tungsten" and "Dirk Rapier". Drake Tungsten comes from a Mystery Science Theater episode where they are talking about perfect names for macho characters and Dirk Rapier comes from a comedy routine where it was proposed as the ultimate romance novel male lead name (since it sounds dangerous and phallic).

Of course, nothing beat my commando team of Sears Roebuck, J. C. Penny and Marshal Fields.

For female characters I try to use "Miss Anne Thrope" (say it out loud) or some variation thereof. I've also used "Anne Drogen" or the names of my dogs (Dayna and Cally).

I normally use Stengah/Stengar or Bloodfist for the last name, and use Jeron as a first name. If I can only have one name, I'll usually use Jeron in single player games, Stengar for multiplayer. For female characters I usually use Tarantella.
Puce, those screenshots are hilarious, I demand more!

Dwarfzilla_fuge wrote:

combine a few roots to make a name.

Potato Mandrake, at your service. ^_^

Disgusting names that are not disgusting at first blush. I delighted in having WoW characters named Santorum and Autopenotomy. Currently in one of the Civ multiplayer games I am naming all my cities for Michael Jackson and his siblings. Should I be so fortunate as to run out of siblings I will go for the neighborhood kids that were in the original Jackson 5.

I usually use 'Weebl' or some variation thereof, after the legendary web cartoon 'Weebl and Bob'. That didn't quite fit my City of Heroes character, so he became legendary pie-factory owner 'Doktor Weebl'

Did get me quite a few cheery greetings in Ironforge, and in the more sedate world of LOTRO. It didn't seem quite right for Eve Online, and as I'd just ploughed my way through all 5 seasons of Babylon 5 and the only season of Crusade, I went for Elizabeth Lockley.