Facebook Files: Dissecting Game Titles

By Ishaan . December 13, 2009 . 8:40am

Facebook Files: Dissecting Game Titles

Welcome to Facebook Files…again. Here’s a rundown of how things work: Every week, we look through our Facebook group for the best community discussions. The ones that stand out are published on Siliconera as part of this feature every weekend. If your topic isn’t chosen one week, don’t lose heart…it might get picked up the next! (Although, I’ve been doing these for a couple weeks now)

 

Games from Japan — and sometimes even the West (see: Giants: Citizen Kabuto) — often tend to have ridiculous names. A lot of the time, the names don’t even mean anything in particular, but we still love them and probably wouldn’t have it any other way.

 

So let’s hear it: Which games do you think have the worst or best names ever? Link to full thread here.

 

Fabio wrote:

Well, my favorite name might simply be Myst. It has both a nice ring and a chilling feel about it.

 

As for worst name ever, uhm. It’s not “bad” per se, but a name like Grim Fandango sure doesn’t do much to attract customers (too bad, because the game was awesome).

 

Mattias wrote:

Here’s a few good ones:

 

• Brütal Legend – It’s clever and hilarious, you can’t really argue with that.
• Dragon Quest: The Hand of the Heavenly Bride – It’s fittingly epic and not a bunch of non-relevant bullshit.
• Freshly Picked: Tingle’s Rosy Rupeeland – As quirky as the game :D
• Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha vs the Soulless Army – I kinda fancy long titles and this one’s just spectacular.
• Holy Invasion of Privacy, Badman! What Did I do to Deserve This? – Shows how good translations can be if you adapt them to the relevant culture. Doraemon? Batman!
• Cyber Troopers Virtual-On: Oratorio Tangram – So full of nonsense you get intrigued. I know I was!
• I MAED A GAM3 W1TH Z0MB1ES 1NIT!!!1 – Humorous title for the internet generation.

 

Ishaan wrote:

Bad:

 

Tales of Graces – Just…ugh. Don’t get me started. At one point, they’d registered “Tales of Gracia” and even that sounds better.

Nier Gestalt / Replicant – Sounds nonsensical, completely uninteresting and gives you zero idea of what to expect.

 

Anton wrote:

For some reason I’ve never really liked the title Hoshigami: Ruining Blue Earth. For me, it just sounds awkward when I saw it out loud, which is why I normally say Hoshigami. =P

 

Not that it’s a bad title per se, it just seems awkward to me. Same with Arc the Lad. Fantastic series, but the title just seems so awkward. =/

Abraham wrote:

I’m leaning towards suckitude with Prinny: Can I Really Be the Hero? The name is relevant and I’ve built up tons of goodwill towards the penguin-bomb folk, but I hate that title more every time I have to say it. I mean, read this out loud: Prinny: Can I Really Be the Hero? Prinny: Can I Really Be the Hero?P rinny: Can I Really Be the Hero?

 

[Next week: What's your favourite ninja game?]


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  • daizyujin

    WORST: Anything that has the word “Final” in it along with a number at the end.

  • Silentg

    I think one of the most ridiculous game names ive heard this year is “Infinite Undsicovery”.
    It's such an absurd amalgamation of words and it just boggles the mind if you venture to analyse it.

    It turns out that the name actually fitted the game very well, since the game held “Infinite Undiscovery” for me.

  • Masengan

    I think Demon's Souls sounds weird.

  • lostinblue

    Good titles… I thought Baten Kaitos Origins had a pretty kickass one when it was called Baten Kaitos 2: The Beginning of the Wings and the Heir of the Gods, but then they changed it to… Baten Kaitos Origins.

    Man, I was pissed.

    As for ridiculous, I'll go with Infinite Undiscovery, I see it was already stated ago, but damn… it's really, really ridiculous.

  • Silentg

    Demons souls isnt weird its exactly what the game is about!
    To each thier own i guess

  • Aoshi00

    I thought “FolksSoul” was kind of weird and “Folklore” sounded much better (village's name was also changed from Lemrick to Doolin for some reason..). “Drakengard” was also much cooler than “Drag-On Dragoon”. “Last Guardian” also improved on “Trico”. The one I dislike the most has to be “Riz-zoawd”, just silly..

  • http://www.yetikitn.com MelodyKitn

    Hmm.. here's a few for good:

    Silent Hill / Fatal Frame – Had creepiness factor all rolled into the name
    Castlevania: Symphony of the Night – Great game & soundtrack to match
    Elektroplankton – It's a groovy strange name, but it worked

    and my not so favorite:

    P.N. 03 – Completely forget-able name
    Shining the Holy Ark – Are you a hero or some kid with a chore to do?
    Don't Panic Seaman – Yeah…
    Catz, Dogz, Rabbitz – Repetitive enough

    Will have to remember more later!

  • JiNKusanagi95

    Fighting Street lol

  • Volcynika

    Then we have the upcoming game End of Eternity or whatever. They must throw darts at a dartboard!

  • TheCleaningGuy

    The punctuation gets to me. Are there a bunch of souls that belong to one demon, or what?

  • TheCleaningGuy

    I concur. You can't undiscover anything, let alone do it infinitely!

  • Aoshi00

    But I thought “End of Eternity” was based on Isaac Asimov's Sci-fi novel by the same name, sounds cooler than Resonance of Fate in my opinion. Well, I liked Infinite Undiscovery, so the name didn't bother me that much, even though it didn't make sense.

  • Volcynika

    I never read the work, but it's still a weird sounding name! Eternity doesn't end! MIND BLOWN! etc.

  • TheCleaningGuy

    Favorites
    No More Heroes – It just sounds so ominous, but really cool. I was excited about it before I even saw gameplay.
    Ryu ga Gotoku – Just the phrase “Like a Dragon” sounds so badass.
    Devil May Cry – As soon as you read this, you pretty much get what the game is about.
    Guilty Gear – It's the kind of title that makes you curious.

    Bad Titles:
    BlazBlue – The fact that it sounds like a Doujin fighter is bad enough, but the lack of an “e” still has people calling it “BlazzBlue.” The katakana is just BureiBuruu which just causes more problems. BraveBlue anyone?
    Valkyria Chronicles: in fact, most things with the with “chronicles” in their names bug me. Great game though.
    Viewtiful Joe: I have a love-hate relationship with this title. It means nothing, but it's so amazing.

  • Aoshi00

    Hence the paradox of time travel, though I don't think the game deals w/ such subject (maybe it does w/ those gears of fate turning in the trailers?), so Resonance of Fate might be more appropriate to the game's story.

    I never read the book either. At first I thought it was a “Final Fantasy” knockoff, but sounding cool nonetheless. Well, if it's cool enough to be the title of Asimov's novel, it's cool enough of a game title for me.

  • Aoshi00

    I was going to mention BlazBlue, I still don't know how to pronounce it correctly, I've always thought it's “Blaze Blue”, then the Jpn sounds like “Blay Blue”, then my friend pronounced it in another way I forgot how..

    “Chronicles” are a dime a dozen since it's cool to say “something Senki”, at least now it's called Valkyria Chronicles instead of the subtitle under the Jpn title “Senjo no Valkyria – Gallian Chronicles” (Valkyria of the Battlefield).

  • TheCleaningGuy

    I think “Blaze Blue” is the proper way to say it, but I've also heard “Blahz Blue.” “Blazz Blue,” and about 100 other different pronunciations.

    As for the Valkyria thing, I was hoping that the US title would keep the “Valkyria of the Battlefield” title in some way, shape, or form, so I was disappointed when I heard it was “Valkyria Chronicles.” :p

  • Extra_Life

    Games with really long names that sound cool when spoken to yourself in your head, but are a real mouthful when someone pops their head over your shoulder whilst playing them and asks: “What's that you're playing?”

    What do I say, the whole mouthful, risk missing a bit out, have them lose interest, completely baffle them… I might end up saying, “It's a bit like [insert game]“

    I'm speaking of a title like 'Super Robot Taisen Original Generation Saga: Endless Frontier', and the sequel's name is longer! Fortunately the quality of the game more than makes up for the title, which in my head at least, does sound cool.

    I also don't care for the name 'Feel the Magic XY XX', has anyone, in all honesty, ever spoken the 'XY XX' bit?

    Of course, there are loads of game names that I do like, such as Mirror's Edge, Silent Hill, Star Ocean… Games that evoke a sense of awe, mystery and intrigue.

  • Masengan

    Yea that's what I mean, I know the game is all about souls ( I'm gonna get it soon), the title just sounds weird.

  • klarfis

    I still really like the name Doom. It manages to be descriptive, definitive, and concise, all at once.

    Runner-up: Donkey Kong. It's hard to effectively explain why this title is great. Donkey Kong.

    And I agree that “Demon's Souls” is not a great name. Whenever I hear or read that name, I feel like I missed the first half of the title and just heard the subtitle.

  • Nika

    I actually quite like 'End of Eternity”.
    Granted, it doesn't really make sense, but it sounds nice.

  • cj_iwakura

    As altered titles go, the PAL title for SMT Nocturne was a great alternative.

    “Lucifer's Call”.

  • abasm

    I love the titles for the Xenosaga series. All three games are named after the books of Nietzsche, “The Will to Power,” (Der Wille zur Macht) “Beyond Good and Evil,” (Jenseits von Gut und Böse) and “Thus Spoke Zarathustra,” (Also sprach Zarathustra) respectively. Very classy.

    Can't say I've played the games, though.

  • shirokiryuu

    Worst name:
    Ys: The Ark of Napishtim- I have to stop and think how it's pronounced.

  • BK0000

    It does make sense. In the book The End of Eternity, Eternity is an organization that travels through time rewriting history to try to protect humanity. The plot of the book is the main character trying to destroy Eternity.

  • http://superficialsubtext.com/ Scypher

    I'm playing SMT: Devil Survivor right now. It's a fantastic game, but man, I imagine it's quite a turn-off for many would-be customers. And yes, there are devils AND survivors, but none of the survivors are devils, nor is the game about devils surviving.

  • http://www.myanimelist.net/profile/Hraesvelgr Hraesvelgr

    You have to survive the devils, though.

  • TheCleaningGuy

    Part of the reason I didn't buy it was due to the title. The other part was my DS RPG backlog.

  • http://superficialsubtext.com/ Scypher

    Yes, I suppose in that case you'd be a Devil-Survivor. :P
    Still not a very thought-out name, IMO.

  • TyeTheCzar

    I've always liked the nonsensical-yet-appealing titles of the Touhou games. Embodiment of Scarlet Devil, Perfect Cherry Blossom, Immaterial and Missing Power, Phantasmagoria of Dim.Dream, etc.

  • TyeTheCzar

    I've always liked the nonsensical-yet-appealing titles of the Touhou games. Embodiment of Scarlet Devil, Perfect Cherry Blossom, Immaterial and Missing Power, Phantasmagoria of Dim.Dream, etc.

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