We make much hay about suspension of disbelief in the context of narrative and mechanics, where it can often allow you to accept what is ridiculous or impossible (“maybe people do actually talk like that” or “it makes you feel like spiderman”). Well, the same is often true of the very names of these games. Sure, it makes sense in context, but Final Fantasy XIII - 2 is a pretty silly name when look at it with fresh eyes.
I love me a good laugh at a ridiculous or unwieldy video game name and after seeing Final Fantasy XIII -2 come up in the game quiz thread, I feel inspired to ask – What are some of your personal favorite game names? My personal tastes skew toward the long, arcane, and absurd, but feel free to throw out anything that gets you going. [Edit: bonus points for any non-Japanese entries]
To qualify, a name must have been used in some official capacity. (So, “Shin Megami Tensei Persona 2 Innocent Sin” would count, but you couldn’t get away with “Shin Megami Tensei Persona 5 Royale”)
Here are some of my favorite:
Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3
Mortal Kombat 1 (the 12th main-series game, 2nd reboot)
R Type Tactics II: Operation Bitter Chocolate
And finally, my personal favorite, one that I can’t even really think about too long without suffering from laughing-related oxygen deprivation.
@deepspacefine I think a lot of late 90s/early 2k visual novels had great names but all of them escape me now - just combinations of english words that would never be combined by a native speaker but somehow feel compelling.
Another genre of name I like is the word that sounds real but is made up. Games like Prismaticallization, Galerians, or Astonishia Story have words that feel real without being so.
My favorite game name for a long time has been something I saw in the back of Famitsu’s “coming soon” section, but which never came out: Living High ↑ Killing Low ↓
Some other cool names glancing around the room:
Lunatic Dawn
Blue Breaker
Bible Master
Yanya Caballista
Eve of Extinction
Dino Crisis
there’s a lot of cool names out there but I feel like for me most of them come from folks whose english is not 100%, because that has a greater capacity to surprise me!
Whenever I hear concerns from friends in the US or UK games industry about them having to promote a game with a seemingly stupid or non-sensical English title, I usually only reply with the three magical words: “Metal Gear Solid” to reassure them everything’s gonna be alright and they shouldn’t really stress too much about the title making sense.
I am not sure how to express this coherently with just 2 hours of sleep, but my favorite game titles are those that manage to immediately convey emotions and agency that, through not only their meaning or etymology but also the sound of the word(s), somehow match your mental and physical experience when playing the game. Recently Splatoon and Neurodiver (that 2064ROM sequel) come to mind as game titles that fit that description.
Following @Rlan ‘s recent post in the Anything Sega thread, I was wondering just a couple hours ago how Sega came up specifically with the name After Burner. It’s a great title, don’t get me wrong. The rhyming and balance of the words are very catchy. But it’s a very specific term that I don’t think someone whose first language isn’t English would come up as a first idea to conjure exciting dog fights involving F-14 Tomcats. Was the term “after burner” used in the movie Top Gun?
@deepspacefine I think even more egregious than Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue is the game contained on that disc: “Kingdom Hearts 2.8: 0.2 Birth By Sleep - A Fragmentary Passage -”
The use of "-"s, I mean… that’s comedy
I think posting either Shin Megami Tensei titles or Anime fighters feels a bit like cheating. One ice always found funny was “Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late[cl-r]”.
Realizing this is just a list of my favorite games:
4.6 Billion Year Monogatari
Hani in the Sky
Gomola Speed
Cubivore
Dicing Knight.
For the Frog the Bell Tolls
Chameleon Twist
JUST BREED
SYVALION
There’s a few that were on the tip of my tongue… Trying to remember
KING’s FIELD
CAVE NOIRE
FRAME GRIDE THOUSAND LAND
GET BASS
Obvious Gimmies:
Can’t Stop Mr.Domino I got an Irritating Stick for ya
Tokimeki Memorial Hospital
Have you ever thought about the name ALTERED BEAST? That one new age stoner rock group did like three EPs named altered beast. when I was a kid we called playing Altered Beast ““Getting Altered””… “do you wanna come over and get altered?”
Seems like either I’m more inclined to think a game rules if it has an awesome name, or game developers name their game something awesome when they know it’s a weird little contraption.
You know what was always whacky to me ever since I first saw it on a bootleg NES on a chip in like 1999?
NUTS & MILK
And
BIRD WEEK
I thought for sure it was some weird bootleg name, but nope, those are actually officially published titles, lol
