Naming For Noobs: A Guide To Originality!

Hello!


Welcome to a hopefully handy guide to assist with one of the more smaller parts of our game, City Of Heroes/Villains. In the subject ahead, I will help you decide in different ways how to define your place in the world of spandex (or leather, whichever you prefer!) But first, a brief history to put you in the context of why this might be important to you and your hero or villain!


Part 1:History


Heroes and Villains, since the dawn of pulp and our current age of comics books in many forms, have always been defined by their name. A select minority have been able to be identified by a symbol or some such, but for most it is the name. That’s what this old spider is gonna help you with. Iconic characters in comics such as Superman, Batman, Green Lantern, Wolverine, Daredevil and so on are usually all associated with having a great name, and a look to match. See that blazing red and yellow “S” symbol coming into focus? You instantly know it’s Superman coming to save the day. Green Arrow is another good example, you know what he’s about and what he can do.


There are many different “ages” of comics history, depending mainly on the time period. You have ones like the “Golden Age”, where characters like the aforementioned Superman was born into. It was a simpler time, a new open range for characters to exist in the minds of the creators. Names along this period are often very straightforward. Batman, Spider-Man, Invisible Woman, Doctor Doom and so forth. These names are instantly recognizable and are some of the most honored names in the culture of comics. Doing a simple search on the internet for Golden Age will expound on this area. The next one I will briefly explore is the “Silver Age”. Things started to become more loosely based, the lines between good and evil sometimes encountered a grey area. Heroes and Villains of this period generally are more defined in depth, such as some X-Men for example. With names like Wolverine, Banshee, Colossus, Nightcrawler and the like. Also the Punisher is a great Silver Age example. These character names were more focused on character persona, abilities and certain areas of precise expertise. It wasn’t that all the good names were ‘taken’, but more a sign of the times. Heroes and Villains created in the Silver Age would almost undoubtably fit into it’s prior age, just because the mechanics of naming were still very similar.

Jumping to the “Modern Age”, which we enjoy now. Created names more often are very versatile, some overly complicated and some yet so basic you could plug them into a comic book from yesteryear. It’s as if the comic creators have taken the best of all the combined comics canon, and learned what is just best for the current character created and used it. I see it as a wide open area of creativity, and we have had many names along the lines that are possibly, instantly recognizable. Some Modern Agers include ones like Deadpool, Longshot, Sunspot, Mighty Man, Booster Gold, Venom, Prime and so on. As I said, many names could easily be plugged into any era. Some names like the villain ‘Trevor Fitzroy’, may not. It’s all about the style and panache’ of the creator. Truly a sign of the current times.


Part 2: Your new character!


This can be extremely difficult, and often leading to frustration! Maybe with this guide, I can help ease the burden a bit. We play in a closed MMO that has a remembrance of a name database that every subscriber uses. It’s common in almost every game developed online. You just cannot have two people with the same name. You can vary your names, but I’ll get to that a wee bit later! First, I propose you simply start one of two ways:

A.) Come up with a name first, before costume and power selection begins. Or..

B.) Create your costume, select your powers. Based on those two factors, try to come up with a fitting name.

Now.. Before I go any further, there are many, many gamers who really don’t give a hoot about what their name is, they just want to play the content and explore the game. Most of these don’t care about costumes either. It’s all about the gaming. Now, there is absolutely nothing wrong with that at all. Say your name is Johnny Ray Bumplestien. Now making an Energy Blaster and calling his new guy “JRBPower” is just fine with me. It’s your money paying to play, do whatever floats your boat! But for a lot of gamers here in CoH/V, the right name and look is just as important to them as the gaming itself. It identifies you, gives you a voice and a stigma about your character. Just a quick note, I have encountered some who’s names are like they smashed their head on the keyboard. Just remember, if your not feeling very creative, that is a perfectly honest way to get a name! AND it’s almost guaranteed not to be taken! But do you want to play an avenging mutant hawk theme character with a sweet costume? Then read on!


Focusing on my two methods listed above, I’ll try to help you decide. There is nothing better than having a really cool name and costume to match.

Okay, so lets break it down.. What do you like? What are you hobbies? What kind of work do you do? Are you a bird lover? Have a weird fixation with sea life or snakes? Do you read every book you can about vampires or werewolves or even the occult? Are you a self proclaimed nerd who works on computers all day? Maybe a construction worker? Many questions right? That’s the point, the way to having a great name for your digital persona can be staring you right in the face. And the possibilities can be endless.

Take for example the line I just wrote about a construction worker. In just the minute I was writing, I thought of a few. Like say, ‘High Steel’ or even “Concrete Pete’. (Okay, those may be lame, but you follow my way of thinking!) Can’t get ‘Concrete Pete’ on your server because it’s taken? Try mixing it up a little. Replacing a letter or two. ‘Koncrete’ or even ‘Konkrete’ will still be just as good, and maybe gives you style points!

Remember that the possibilities are virtually endless. It all depends on your imagination. Really want to create a Fire Blaster or a Fire Tank but everything that may even contain the words ‘fire’ seem to be taken? Use words that are similar to fire. Like Ashes, Charbroiled, Heat, Singe, Roast and so on. All that it takes is a few minutes to think about the word in question. Don’t feel particularly imaginative? Are you as dumb as a box of doorknobs? Then I can steer you to the wonderful world of the internet. There are many ways using the tools provided by the thing sitting on your desk to help you. Using an encyclopedia, a dictionary, or just typing a word into a search engine on the internet can help you decide! Knowledge is power my friends, and if taking a few extra minutes to find that right name will increase your enjoyment of your playtime then do it, it’s so simple it hurts!


Now, your just about there right? You have a concept in mind, a general name in your head. That perfect name is only a step away. But it’s taken! Don’t give up! As I said before, I’ll retouch again. Just swap a letter or two. Maybe using an adjective before or after your needed name. ‘Konkrete’ taken? Try ‘Super’ or ‘Grey’ or heck even ‘Quick’, or ‘Kwick’. “Kwick Konkrete” !! Booya! (For anyone in construction, you know what I mean!)

Also another proven method I often use myself is word merging. You take two words and make one coherent one. Take my namesake, Tyrantula. I simply combined the two words ‘Tyrant’ and ‘Tarantula’ to make a unique hero. (See my sig link if you want to see the guy, he’s an homage to the heroes in the past like the Shadow and the Spirit from pulp-type fiction) Another good example of word merging is my Ice/Ice Blaster. My son and I had just come from a trip from Dairy Queen and had gotten some ice cream. He ate his too fast, giving himself a funny case of ‘brain freeze” (when you get that skull killing headache!) I said that was a cool name for a super hero. His reply was that it was so common it was probably taken, so I dropped the ‘B’smushed the words and ‘Rainfreeze’ was born! For his villain counterpart, all I did was use a word similar to ‘rain’, sounding evil and came up with “Reignfreeze”.

Another great way to quickly ease the naming blues is using a common first name, with something exaggerated as a last name. Many heroes and villains in the comics canon has used this method. Real ones like Jonny Thunder for example. The possibilities are endless here as well. And sometimes they sound pretty darned good. Want the name ‘Roadkill’? Besides being a violation in terms of service, you can quickly change that by calling him ‘Randy Roadkill’ This type of naming system works well, and virtually guarantees you a name. Most one word names are hard to come by, but anything split like that has a better chance to be available.

Names are all around you, it’s a matter of adjusting the english language. Have fun with it and I promise you won’t be dissapointed!



Part 3: Violations, “leet” speak and Links.

Okay. If your playing our wonderful game Cryptic and NCSoft has so graciously provided us, chances are you have some type of understanding of heroes and villains, and possibly even comic book knowledge. Are you an obsessive Superman fan? Maybe Spidey? That’s great! But here in the City of Paragon and the Rogue Isles they cannot exist. No matter how much you love them, do not try to copy their names and appearances. It’s a violation of the terms of service and usage of previously copyrighted material. I suggest any new player bone up and read the terms of service. You can find it right on your ‘City Of’ updater when you go to log in your game. Believe me, I am one of the most biggest X-Men fans around, but me making a Wolverine clone and trying to get away with it in game is a serious violation! You could have your character wiped out, genericed without a real name and costume or account suspension. Please read your terms of service!

The name violations segue’ into my next subject. The use of ‘Leet” speak. While I won’t get into the history of it, it is a viable way of naming your characters. Transposing a letter with a number, like ‘3' for ‘E’. Or using a combination of various letters or punctuation to make one letter. Like using forward and backward slashes to make a “W”. Like this: \/\/. Now that’s nifty and all, but overall it is generally frowned upon by various reasons by the community which I won’t touch upon here. People use it to try to get away from having a violation type name. My biggest pet peeve about this is that it’s mind numbingly difficult to invite people like this to teams when typing it out. I suggest you try more traditional types of methods before resorting to this. Please!


Okay, lastly, here are two links that have ‘name generators’ to help you in your ultimate search for that great name:

Super Villain Name Generator

Seventh Sanctum


Remember to enjoy yourself, and maybe one day your new character will be remembered with the likes of Paragons best, and The Rogue Isles worst!



{Disclaimer: If I accidentally used anyones character names in here as examples, it is most definitely not intentional! Oh, and "assassin" is spelled like that <-----, Okay? }

Cool Misspellings vs Dumb-looking Misspellings

There is no real guide to this, as it's all in the perception, but there are a few rules I'd like to share with you.

The most typical cool misspellings are:

1. replacing a C with a K or S (whichever it sounds like in that circumstance) or even a Q - or an X for ks or cs or cks

2. replacing a vowel with a Y in the middle of a word - or replacing a Y at the end of a word with a different vowel

3. replacing an ending with "gh" in it with one that's pronounced the same but has no "gh"

Also, you can do the same one twice in the same name, but it's better not to do two of the above rules in the same name. So, 'Brite lite' is doing number 3 twice, but 'Lite Kyss' would not be recommended. 'Misteri Girl' would be ok because you're changing 2 Y's to I's and one of the Y's is at the end of the word.

Let me give you some examples of these 3 ways to do Cool Misspellings

1. C -> K or S or even Q
Konkrete (see above)
Mirakle Maid
Sellophane
Qute Qorruption
Sharp Stix

2. Y -> vowel or vowel -> Y
Enemee One
Icie Blast
Myldew
Concryte
Kyss or Kyll

3. gh -> no gh
Brite Lite
Tuff Tank
Thru Train
Enuf

Note: It is still possible to make not very cool misspellings using these rules. There's an additional rule - the word still has to be recognizably what it originally was. You can't change "Recent" to "Resent", that's a new word; similarly you can't change "Beeline" to "Byline", also a new word. Also, advertisers know these rules and sometimes the new word is associated with a brand that is not particularly cool ("Tuff" or "Icee" or "Lite Brite" might already be examples of this, depending on your perception of what makes for coolness).

Dumb misspellings: That's the ones where it looked like you just didn't know how to spell the word right. Prime examples are misspellings of words like "Assassin" or "Arctic" to name two commonly misspelled words found in CoH or CoV names. L33t also looks dumb to me, though many people like it, I would not recommend using it unless it's part of your character concept (Freakshow or hacker backgrounds, for example).

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Dumb misspellings: That's the ones where it looked like you just didn't know how to spell the word right. Prime examples are misspellings of words like "Assassin" or "Arctic" to name two commonly misspelled words found in CoH or CoV names.

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And 'Rogue'. You can't forget that one.

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Dumb misspellings: That's the ones where it looked like you just didn't know how to spell the word right. Prime examples are misspellings of words like "Assassin" or "Arctic" to name two commonly misspelled words found in CoH or CoV names.

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And 'Rogue'. You can't forget that one.

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What are you talking about?! Roge Agente is a perfect spelling!

I think the reference was for the proliferation of "rouge" types. Not exactly the most villainous or heroic of things to call yourself, I have to say.

Bingo!

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And 'Rogue'. You can't forget that one.

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See what happens when you fail spelling?

great guide, I'm just not sure people that would benefit the most from it will ever read it.

I'm not a big fan of creative spelling but the rules given above are good ones.

Along the lines of "it makes it hard to invite", avoid names that start with a dot, use a capital i instead of a lower case L, etc...

Also many people insist on using names that spell out your power sets, I've fallen into that trap myself, but if you can't find a "good" name, realize that it's not the only way to name a character.

Great guide! But, there's one thing I might add about Super Hero/Villain names... How it sounds.

1. Alliteration is often used in comic books and movies for names. Victory Vixen, to use a name of one of my toons, is a good example of alliteration.

2. Rhyming, or names where the words at least end on a similar note. Kung Fu Sue, for example, for a martial arts toon, or The Thriller Chiller for one with ice abilities. (Heh, it's late... I'm pulling these out of my... um... hat at the moment. But you get the idea.)

Great guide, only problem is you mixed and mashed the eras of comics, Golden Age is pre-1960 (roughly, I think the actual cutoff year is 1958 or something). Stuff like Spiderman, Dr. Doom, are Silver Age. All the examples you give as "Silver Age" were actually "Bronze Age". Bronze age is generally considered the 1970s. Not a big deal, but in a post about naming, it's probably best to strive to be as accurate as possible about terms.

Couple things to add back on the subject. As someone else already mentioned, alliteration is a great way to get a very comic-booky sounding name. And a thesaurus is your friend. I wanted to make a tank named Lava Lass, but it was taken. Finally decided on "Volcanic Vixen", which I thought was better for a brute than a tank. But there are tons of names if you use a thesaurus.

Homophones are also your friend and can help you find clever misspellings and give you a start towards a bio. F'rinstance, use Air instead of Heir for a stormie defender and get Air Apparent. (Oh alliterative too!) The wordplay suggests the hero is from a wealthy or royal background. Maybe he was usurped, or cheated out of his fortune, or maybe he's a rich playboy. A good name will almost always suggest a background.

Foreign names. This is a great way to get some good names and again it suggests a background. I wanted a dominator who disguised herself as a nun, and wanted to name her "Mother Superior". It was taken (naturally), so I turned it into Latin, and the Latin connection further suggested an ancient entity who was around when Latin was the common language.

Sort of a variation on your "common 1st name" motif, is naming a toon after a geographical locale: City, State, towns or even neighborhoods famous for some historical reason. Again it gives you a beginning on your background. Let's see, a stalker from London....or Whitechapel specifically....the Whitechapel One...mysterious, and dangerous-sounding. With the number used, it could change your whole concept, I started the stalker thinking of someone possessed by Jack the Ripper, but the "One" suggests a robot, or the 1st of many. So now, I've just changed my concept and changed the whole history of Jack the Ripper. This stalker is a now robot that was built over 100 years, it went rogue, killed its creator and now preys on mankind from the shadows.

Finally, on the same idea as word merging, but more like Jeopardy's "Before and After" category where you use a 3-word phrase, where the 2nd word is shared by two 2-word phrases. You can make some fun pop culture references like this. Unfortunately you can run the risk of making it fairly obscure. I have a brute named "Blood Simple Simon". I thought everyone knew the term "Blood Simple" - its the name of the 1st Coen Bros. movie, and was coined by Dashiel Hammett as the confused state of mind after a murder is committed. But few people seem to get it. *sigh*

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Great guide, only problem is you mixed and mashed the eras of comics, Golden Age is pre-1960 (roughly, I think the actual cutoff year is 1958 or something). Stuff like Spiderman, Dr. Doom, are Silver Age. All the examples you give as "Silver Age" were actually "Bronze Age". Bronze age is generally considered the 1970s. Not a big deal, but in a post about naming, it's probably best to strive to be as accurate as possible about terms.

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Aye, I knew I was blurring a few lines when I was picking names from various ages. I'm usually a fountain of comic book history but I was writing off the top of my head and hadn't crunched the whole thing into hard facts. I think I wanted to use some names people might be familiar with today, in describing a short history. My writing a guide combined with a hella hectic work schedule.. makes me wonder how it came out coherant to begin with!


I guess I want to help as many people as I can come up with something relatively unique. I'm sure many a casual gamer will never see this, but if I can inspire one or two people to avoid making "Dark.Assisn-" clone #3877 then I did okay!

Oh yeah! Another addition to my guide is that I was rummaging through the local mall's record store in the heavy metal section. It got me to thinking that there can be many song/band name inspirational type names there too. Not clear rip-offs, but inspirations.

Thanks people for adding to my guide, much apprciated.

Another thing to mention is combining words. Combining similar words can save room on the name bar and may make a better name

Lucicle- We know she's named Lucy. We know she has ice powers.

Nun-Chuck- We know she probably has Martial arts or katana

that's all I can think of at the moment.

Combining several naming tactics.

Konkreation Krusher. Intentional misspelling, alliteration, combining