Changing Your Gamertag - Why'd You Do It?

I'm looking to change my gamertag, and I was just curious who else has done so? I don't need advice (unless you know an uber cool gamertag that's not taken), was just looking for stories on who changed what to what and why?

I write and record music under the name adiosFamous, so it became annoying when a google search would show up more xbox related stuff rather than good music related stuff.
So I changed it to buddySideshow which was the random name generated for me when I tried installing SecondLife for a day. I couldn't run it on my laptop (which is missing the 'j' and 'l' keys), but the name lends itself to online play as it is clear and casual (not punctuated by punctuation or enumeration).
Riveting stuff, eh?

I registered Lobster Mobster when I was doing a free trial on XBox Live (back in the XBox 1 days), then couldn't figure out how to re-up it when I decided to join permanently. Either that crap account is still sitting there collecting dust or when it expired someone else scooped up Lobster Mobster. I had to take Liberty Lobster and the only thing I dislike about it is the uber-patriotic feel and that people keep calling me "Liberty." At this point it's not worth the phone calls and money to get it changed to Lobster Mobster.

I haven't changed my gamertag... but if I hear that Irongut chant one more time.... I'm gonna explode.

LobsterMobster wrote:

I registered Lobster Mobster when I was doing a free trial on XBox Live (back in the XBox 1 days), then couldn't figure out how to re-up it when I decided to join permanently. Either that crap account is still sitting there collecting dust or when it expired someone else scooped up Lobster Mobster. I had to take Liberty Lobster and the only thing I dislike about it is the uber-patriotic feel and that people keep calling me "Liberty." At this point it's not worth the phone calls and money to get it changed to Lobster Mobster.

How would people pick "Liberty" over "Lobster" is beyond me. It's like you'd call me "Mister"...

You'll always be more crustacean than patriot to me, Lobster.

Thanks, Mister.

Here's an followup question - those that put GWJ in their gamertag, is that okay? Or do we have a clan I don't know about?

I used to be known as Bob McBob on xbox Live and pretty much everywhere. on Steam my user Id still is McBob78.

At one point I decided to use Interstate78 everywhere for two reasons. Interstate '76 is probably my favorite game of all time and Bob McBob was just a bit not serious enough. People in chat would repeat my name everytime they spoke to me

"Over here Bob McBob"
"Throw a grenade Bob McBob"
"... Bob McBob!"
rinse, repeat

Sometimes you got no choice, hehe. On Steam I didn't care much because I can change my name on the fly like you would on MSN so it didn't matter much. I actually had to pay to change my gamertag.

I think there's a way to change your gamertag for free but I don't know how

Does anyone know if you can change your STEAM ID ?

I tend to go by 'Datin' instead of 'Datyedyeguy' whenever I play games as I'm tired of being called "Dat Yede Guy!" Besides that, haven't changed my name since I signed up for AOL back in the day.

I had a few random names early on in my Internets experience. I don't even remember what most of them were. When I started playing EverQuest (and became thoroughly addicted for a few years) my name was Quemn Wyndrunner. When I went back to some other games (I then became obsessed with Tribes 2) I shortened it to MrWynd and haven't changed it since.

I changed mine when I joined GWJ, and actually had a reason to have an online personality.

trueheart78 wrote:

Here's an followup question - those that put GWJ in their gamertag, is that okay? Or do we have a clan I don't know about?

I put "GWJ" at the end of my tag for a couple of reasons.
Reason 1 was that adding it allowed me to pick a name that I wanted without having to add multiple numbers at the beginning or end.
Reason 2 was that I felt like I belonged to a clan of great people.
Reason 3, It allowed me to play an awesome meta-game called "Lets see if anyone in the random populace of matchmaking will recognize 'GWJ' and say something about how great the site is!". No one has yet, but I don't play with pubbies much anymore.
Reason 4 ....
Reason 5, Profit!

I originally had Lothar registered on the original xbox but for some reason that expired and I went with Lothar71 but I wish I could get Lothar back for I could change the name but I don't believe there's anything I can do to get Lothar especially since it was with the original Xbox.

interstate78 wrote:

Does anyone know if you can change your STEAM ID ?

You can make your display name whatever you want (just ask Lobster Mobster!) and you can also change your custom url in the Steam Community profile.

I'll probably change my GamerTag if I ever start to play games online, if only so people don't make fun of me for having my first name as a GamerTag. It's just too lame for some people to handle without making a comment.

I have had two names in my entire I need a handle gaming. The first was Jester, but between the name always being taken and WOOHOOO JESTERS DEAD!! Comments I got mad and I made up a random name.

Pharacon - don't ask me what the hell it means I just was mashing buttons and this is what came up. Mysteriously there is another Pharacon and he is on Xbox live.. I think he is a Goodjer who has stolen my name but I have yet to find proof...

As for the GWJ tag, this was started when we where playing [OO] and [CP] and other websites across various games for dominance (hint: we won.. always.. except that one time but it didn't count because we lost) Now it is just a quick and easy way of making sure who is a Goodjer and who is not. In order to use it just must post once... so use it and most people will say hello if they catch you in game and only be mildly upset if you turn around and unload an auto-shotty into them.

Also there is no set style of how it is suppose to go in your name, IE front, back middle. But those guys that have it after their names.. weirdos.

LobsterMobster wrote:

I registered Lobster Mobster when I was doing a free trial on XBox Live (back in the XBox 1 days), then couldn't figure out how to re-up it when I decided to join permanently.

Kinda similar to me, I was originally AcidCat on the original XBox ... eventually cancelled Live, then resubbed a year or so later with the 360, couldn't reactivate that name somehow. So instead of calling and wasting time on the phone I just came up with another name. Kinda wish I had taken the time to figure out how to keep my original now though, would have made it much easier on people who know my name from message boards.

I just want to say I really hate Hiro Nakamura.

I couldn't get Hemidal, so I went with Hemidal GWJ. It beat Mr_Clark_DAS (which was an old school Counter-Strike handle), and made it a lot easier to figure out who I really was.

I originally came up with Trueheart as the surname to my first EQ toon (a paladin) that hit 20. The surname stuck for all my characters, and has thus become my forum moniker. Google "trueheart78" and you can probably track my online activity rather consistently - it's rather scary, actually.

And, I'm fine with it being a surname, but as for my gamertag? On my PS3, I'm rarely online, but I am a lot on the 360. And, well, I have a fear of people seeing it and thinking like this when they meet me online. I've not come to accept that as a good thing, well, not yet, anyway.

We'll see what happens.

My last name is Clemens. And when I'm playing with people I know, they're gonna call me this anyway, so might as well conjoin real life and fakey internetweb life. The station part comes from the fact that I would like to have my own TTC subway station. "Clemens Station... now arriving at Clemens Station." Inside joke I guess.

I used to be realponcho, but that was because at one point back in the glorious days of MPlayer (anyone remember that site/service?) I was PonCho and one day another Poncho showed up. I was super pissed because I was a teenager, so I changed my handle to realponcho just so nobody would think I was that other guy. Of course, fake poncho disappeared not long after but still.

imbiginjapan wrote:
interstate78 wrote:

Does anyone know if you can change your STEAM ID ?

You can make your display name whatever you want (just ask Lobster Mobster!) and you can also change your custom url in the Steam Community profile.

Yeah, but since your display name can be the same as thousands of other people, it is worthless for friending someone up (which pretty much makes it pointless IMHO). Unfortunately if you really want to change your steam ID the only way to do it is start a new account.

EvilDead wrote:
imbiginjapan wrote:
interstate78 wrote:

Does anyone know if you can change your STEAM ID ?

You can make your display name whatever you want (just ask Lobster Mobster!) and you can also change your custom url in the Steam Community profile.

Yeah, but since your display name can be the same as thousands of other people, it is worthless for friending someone up (which pretty much makes it pointless IMHO). Unfortunately if you really want to change your steam ID the only way to do it is start a new account. :(

The way I've found to overcome this is to make my Steam ID page linked to Interstate78 because you can decide of what comes after id/ so my page is http://steamcommunity.com/id/interst... even though my ID is mcbob78

LobsterMobster wrote:

I registered Lobster Mobster when I was doing a free trial on XBox Live (back in the XBox 1 days), then couldn't figure out how to re-up it when I decided to join permanently. Either that crap account is still sitting there collecting dust or when it expired someone else scooped up Lobster Mobster. I had to take Liberty Lobster and the only thing I dislike about it is the uber-patriotic feel and that people keep calling me "Liberty." At this point it's not worth the phone calls and money to get it changed to Lobster Mobster.

You should change it to Lobster's Mom's Son.

back in the glorious days of MPlayer (anyone remember that site/service?)

YES. Gizmo!