Name matters

In general, a product name is one of the most important aspects of a brand. In effect, a name is a brand's banner, or headline, and it needs to quickly convey a compelling, meaningful message about the product itself -- the Die Hard Battery is one of the all-time best names in this regard. And given the high importance of product names, it's somewhat surprising that they are so often botched, blundered and bankrupt. Especially in the game industry. A bad name can weigh a game down like a two-ton anchor, or it can act like a booster rocket that helps propels the brand to stardom. There's a lot of psychology at play with product names, and it's smart to use every trick in the book to help your game reach its full potential. A name is most often your potential customer's first contact with your game, and forms that always critical first impression.

Since the early 90's, my partner, George Broussard, and I have researched the qualities that help make for a successful game name. Over time we've created a list of guidelines:

o Short names are better than long names. All other things being equal, if you can come up with a great short name for your game, do it. Doom, Diablo, Quake, Zelda, Halo, Mafia, The Sims, Fable, etc. The problem with longer names is that they are too often reduced to a short-hand version, or reduced to initials (GTA:VC and FFX for example). Both of these work against the brand building process. Names begin to get to unwieldy when they're longer than two or three words -- this should be avoided if at all possible, and in most cases it is possible. (BTW, the full name for Halo is Halo: Combat Evolved, but generally players haven't used the meaningless "Combat Evolved" portion, so the de facto name, and the one the marketing people should have stuck with, is just "Halo." Very short and simple. In this case, even the marketing people couldn't ruin a good name, as players have fixed their error.)

o Avoid punctuation in the game title. If your title has a colon, a dash, periods (Contract J.A.C.K.), or other punctuation, you're just asking for trouble. One of my favorite out-of-control game titles is Descent: Freespace 2 - The Great War. A more recent bad title is True Crime: Streets of LA. Why not just "True Crime"? What does "Streets of LA" add that will increase sales? Absolutely nothing of value. The addition of that colon and the subtitle just screws up a good short name. The same marketing person would have likely named Id's famous shooter something along the lines of, Doom: Hell Breaks Loose on Mars. In short, stay away from punctuation, and the cumbersome titles that usually results from this mistake.

o Avoid sequel numbers. This is the one I expect to hear the most controversy over. People who name their games just love to use sequel numbers, possibly thinking that their customer base is too stupid to figure out if the game is, in fact, a sequel. The problem is that sequel numbers, like Final Fantasy 2 through 10, make each succeeding game look more and more ridiculous, and more and more like a rehash rather than an original experience. Even though, let's say, Half-Life 2 doesn't sound that bad, when does it cross the line into clear absurdity? Half-Life 5? Half-Life 10? Why even start if you know at some point you'll cross that line?

With the Duke Nukem games, we mistakenly named the second one Duke Nukem 2, released in 1993 before we knew any better, but since then we've not used a sequel number, at least not a blatant one. Sure, the next game was Duke Nukem 3D, but that's a slightly more clever way of using "3" in the games title. The coming Duke Nukem Forever follows this same half-stealth tactic, as "Forever" implies the fourth episode.

And that's the key for us: we look at each succeeding game as a new episode, not a sequel. The episode model is the one we see used by television networks and comic books. Take Star Trek, for example: Is each new episode named something like "Star Trek 31: City on the Edge of Forever"? Nope. What about movies? Many movie series wisely avoid sequel numbers, such as the Alien series (except Alien 3), the Indiana Jones series, the Batman series, and the best example of all, the James Bond series. How completely and utterly silly would it be to have those 007 movies named, "James Bond 22: Die Another Day"?! Luckily, this series never got off on the wrong foot by using sequel numbers. It's really only been in Hollywood's recent history that they've fallen into the dark pit of using sequel numbers with exuberant glee. For example, all of those early Frankenstein and Dracula sequels avoided them, and same with the perfectly named Planet of the Ape series, and Bob Hope's many Road to Wherever movies. Does anyone ever have trouble knowing what the name of the current Bond film is? Of course not. Sequel numbers are not only unnecessary, they cheapen the brand in the long term. Get smart, stop using them.

Two more examples of out-of-control names: Age of Empires 2: Age of Kings, Star Wars: Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast.

Oh, and before people ask me, the original name for the Max Payne sequel was going to be simply, The Fall of Max Payne. But, after we sold the brand to Rockstar, they decided to change the name to Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne. A silly mistake, IMO. But hey, they paid us the big bucks to name the game whatever they thought worked best. But, I see this akin to changing the well named "The Mummy Returns" to the unnecessarily burdened "The Mummy 2: The Mummy Returns." See how titles can so quickly go from cool to crap!

o Have a meaningful title. Avoid titles that have practically no meaning, like Zone of the Enders, Allegiance, Far Cry, Syphon Filter and XIII. As one developer friend recently remarked, "I thought a 'syphon filter' might be something used to change a car's oil." Sure, these titles might mean something to players of the game, but they mean nothing to potential buyers, and those are the people you should care about most -- assuming you care about your game being a success.

This is one of the reasons I think Doom is a great name, while Quake is merely average. Yes, they're both short, which is good, but Doom communicates the frightful, nightmarish nature of the game, while Quake is quite meaningless as a name. Even after playing all of the Quake games, I'm still not sure what connection this name has to the games.

o Avoid generic titles. Examples include: Universal Combat, Brute Force, Dungeon Siege, and Eternal Darkness. In short, these names are banal and forgettable. They do practically no work in selling the game within the box. Their generic quality makes them more difficult to standout from the pack, and more difficult to remember. These names also show a lack of creativity. With permission from developer friend Rich Carlson, I'm including his recently updated list of generic words, all of which should be avoided if at all possible. He breaks them down into three categories of avoidance (and quite honestly, I'd group them ALL under the "Felony" heading, as I have no mercy for generic game titles):

-- Felony: Alien, Dark, Darkness, Extreme, Quest, Shadow.

-- Misdemeanor: Awakening, Brood, Chosen, Dawn, Death, Destiny, Doom, Evil, Fallen, Legacy, Legend, Mandate, Prophecy, Prophet, Rebirth, Redemption, Resurrection, Revelation, Rising, Vendetta.

-- Light Slap on the Wrist: Age, Arena, Black, Blood, Chaos, City, Command, Commander, Commando, Commandos, Conquest, Dragon, Elite, Empire, Empires, Encounter, Faction, Force, Forces, Forever, Forgotten, Gate, Imperium, Key, Knight, Knights, Last, Legion, Legions, Lord, Lords, Magic, Master, Metal, Myth, Ops, Power, Return, Revenge, Silent, Soul, Space, Star, Steel, Storm, Strike, Total, Vengeance, War, Warlord, Warlords, Warrior, Warriors, Wars.

Just this morning I happened to read about a coming game from Activision, Tenchu: Return from Darkness. Hmmm, about as generic as a subtitle can get. BTW, check out Rich's Feb. 4th blog entry, "Steel Dawn: Forgotten Rebirth II Gold Edition," for another take on generic words.

Bottom-line, do not use these words! To do so positions your game as ordinary right from the start. And is that what you want for your pride and joy? I didn't think so.

o Beware of names that leave you open for easy criticism. In the February 2004 issue of PC Gamer, I saw this headline for a review of Ubisoft's FPS, XIII: "It's called XIII because there are XII better shooters." You have to laugh! And even though you cannot protect against this sort of wordplay attack in all cases, it's still something to consider when you're formulating a game name. For example, I wouldn't use a game title like The Bad and the Beastly, as I can just see people twisting those words against you if they don't like your game.

And there you have it. Remember, none of these are hardened, immutable rules. However, I try to use all of them in my favor for each and every game, because in today's competitive environment, every little thing you do right only helps.

Comments

[jason]

Some recent terrible names:

Beyond Good & Evil (could there possibly be a less appropriate title for this game?) and the twin titles from the already-terribly-named-Planet Moon Studios: Armed & Dangerous and Giants: Citizen Kabuto.

[benjamin graner]

I've always felt that you could tell a lot about a creative work by how creative the name is...

If the person who comes up with the name can be interesting and creative in 3-4 words, chances are they'll do much more with 300-400 pages of words.

[Dan MacDonald]

" Beware of names that leave you open for easy criticism."

Man, if i could only count the DukeNukem -"Forever" jokes I've herd... ;)

[Brian S.]

The consensus game of the year: Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic violate your first, second, and fifth principle. All sports titles like Madden are sequels. And as for sequel numbers, it did not seem to hurt Nintendo with its Mario Bros. titles. It's not the name that counts, it's the gameplay.

[RodeoClown]

I think technically the latest Jedi Knight game should have been named
"Star Wars:Dark Forces 4: Jedi Knight 3: Jedi Academy" or something ridiculous like that, I'm kind of glad they dropped the Dark Forces through Jedi Knight.(although I kinda liked it - but it IS generic)

[Scott Miller]

Brian, to be certain, a bad name will not sink a good game. Though, a bad name, like Deus Ex, can chop away a not insignificant percentage of sales. A better name for that game could have garnered it a lot more interest.

Deus Ex violates another guideline I forgot to mention in my article: Make sure people can pronounce your game name. Anachronox is another bad name, in this respect.

[Collo]

Star Wars Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader

so.... bad.....

[Mirik]

Somehow I think it's kinda hypocritical to comment on XIII's name, since Duke Nuke 'em Forever is without a doubt the most misused name evar! :) :)

Same names are plain wrong though, spot on.

[Toby Hede]

The Star Wars names are a bit like James Bond, in that they establish the brand upfront. "James Bond: Die Another Day" serves to establish that this is a Bond film, in the same way that "Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic" brands the game as a Star Wars game. In both cases, the name is effectively shortened to "Die Another Day" and "Knights of the Old Republic", which although long have a certain poetic quality to them that I think can work when used well.

That said, the Jedi Knight names are still pretty bad.

[Jeff Lindsay]

Scott, didn't you mention once that 3 syllable names are ideal for short names? Why wasn't that mentioned in your first principle?

[Daryl Pitts]

"The Star Wars names are a bit like James Bond, in that they establish the brand upfront."

I agree with this statement, and it's these circumstances where a long name is acceptable. For example, I think "True Crime: Streets of LA" is going for the same thing. You can bet Activision is hard at work now on Streets of Chicago, Streets of Paris, Streets of Yokohama, etc. True Crime is the brand, and "Streets of XXX", is the title. It's kinda like EA Sports: Madden NFL 2004.

[Scott Miller]

-- "Scott, didn't you mention once that 3 syllable names are ideal for short names? Why wasn't that mentioned in your first principle?"

Jeff, that refers to character names, which has its own set guidelines.

-- "Duke Nuke 'em Forever is without a doubt the most misused name evar!"

True, but this isn't an inherent problem with the name, just a side-effect of us taking so damn long to finish the game! We could have avoided the misuse of the name by having released it several years ago.

-- "Beyond Good & Evil"

Truly one of the all-time most generic names. It's also absolutely meaningless. The marketing buffoon whom thought of this name (or let the game go out with this name) should be fired. Generic names imply generic games, and I'm positive that this lousy name has cut deeply into the sales potential of this game. Is it any wonder that it so quickly went into the bargain bin, even with the mostly positive reviews it got.

Never underestimate the self-destructive potential of a terrible name.

As for the James Bond movies, none of them are named anything other than their unique names. However, it doesn't surprise me that the game industry, still several notches lower in marketing intelligence than our Hollywood friends, can't quite figure out that "James Bond" and "Star Wars" are unnecessary clutter that confuse the issue more than they make it clear.

Even the first three Star Wars movies had 100% unique names. It wasn't until the remakes that George Lucas stated calling them "Star Wars: Episode 4 -- A New Hope," or some such craziness. Still, most people rise above this horrible naming convention and still use the unique names alone.

[Jeffool]

>Brian S.
>It's not the name that counts, it's the gameplay.

I'd like to agree, and I'm an idealist. But as video games become more accepted they slowly become like music and movies. And you can't convince me that music only sells because it's good, sorry. As Scott said (at least I think it was you, right?), he views himself as someone in the 'entertainment business'? That's probably the right business approach to take, even if I am someone who wants to make 'art'.

>Scott Miller
>Even the first three Star Wars movies had 100% unique names. It wasn't until the remakes that George Lucas stated calling them "Star Wars: Episode 4 -- A New Hope," or some such craziness.
>Still, most people rise above this horrible naming convention and still use the unique names alone.

Yeah, he did officially change them after he decided to make a 'brand' out of it. And while I've no business knowledge, as a consumer, I can see the sense behind it to a point. But in video games as the millions for pushing the products aren't always there, sometimes the only way to get 'brands' across are either sequential numbers or a branding title.

Or am I missing something and you're saying that it's simply lazy and/or misplaced advertising that these flags are relied upon?

[Alan De S.et]

Beyond Good and Evil. A great game, but a terrible, terrible name. Needless to say, it has nothing to do with the book Beyond Good and Evil. It's not entirely clear what the name is supposed to refer to (and I've played the game). The name certainly doesn't suggest any of the good points of the game (it's a adventure platformer that blend humor with a moderately dark if derivative storyline). The name actually suggests something pretentious that I've avoid.

[Greg Findlay]

I think mentioning a games brand in the title is a good thing provided that you have established your brand and it is proven to provide quality. Sounds obvious enough. But that is were True Crime falls apart. It doesn't have a brand yet, so saying that it's Streets of LA is trivial. Now you might be saying it establishes a setting. Why should the title establish setting? The biggest thing a title can do for you is to get someone to pick up the box. I don't think the title will sell your game, but it should interest the player enough that they will pick up the box. I doubt adding "Streets of LA" got many extra people to pick up the box. However, adding Star Wars to anything will get someone to pick it up.

Scott, I'd agree with about Deus Ex only to the extent that it wasn't a good name for that particular game. Specifically because there is sex in the title, albeit with a space inbetween. Sex will always catch peoples eyes. If there lead character had have been an attractive female that game probably would have sold unbelievably well.

[Walter]

Yeah, I have to admit, I have no idea why BG&E was called BG&E, if not for some tie to Nietzsche's book. Best connection I can come up with is from the book's first line: "Suppose truth is a woman...."

[Greg Findlay]

By the way, just to clarify. I agree that having the brand included in the title makes for a less interesting title, but I still think it will get people to pick up the box.

Once I pick up the box the branded game would have a tougher time selling me then the unbranded one. But you have to pick up the box to buy it.

[John]

With regards to BG&E, it specifically relates to the plot in the latter half of the game. Not that it makes it a better title, but it's not as bad as others and at least it does apply to the game.

I think you make some good points Scott, but you contradicted yourself by saying that the titles ought to be simple but make sense. The Sims makes about as much sense to someone who's never played The Sims as Syphon Filter does. Halo could very well have been limited to Photoshop Phriday mockups on Something Awful of Hello Kitty in a combat suit. I mean what the hell is either Mario or Zelda when you take away the cultural foreknowledge of the characters? Mario sounds like a pizza game, and Zelda sounds like a Scandinavian sim-prog rock band game.

REZ and Ico had about as simple names as you can get, and that didn't do them much good. Typing of the Dead is about as interesting a name as you can get, but do *you* own a copy? Anachronox failed financially because it came out four years too late, not because it had a crappy title that no one was smart enough to understand (myself included, until I played the game).

My point is that while titles might have something to do with it, I think you're overextending their impact. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic isn't much better than the horrendous Jedi Outcast 2, and as your theory predicts, it's been shortened to Kow-thar (phonetically). But the game still sold. You're linguistically right as far as cultural dialect goes, but I'm not sure I would necessarily apply that same theory apply to sales.

I'm with Brian here.What matters much, much, much more is how great your game is plus some other mystical magical quality that ICO and REZ didn't have. But I doubt it had anything to do with their titles.

So, what would you say are the top 5 video game names of all time?

[Cristopher Boyer]

I think my personal nominations for the worst titles in recent history is Xenosaga Chapter One: Der Wille Zur Macht and its upcoming sequel Xenosaga Chapter Two: (Beyond Good and Evil). (I noted BG&E in parentheses because I've forgotten the actual title, which is "Beyond Good & Evil" in German.)

Not everybody speaks German, and even those who do, I don't know what giant robots in space have to do with The Will of God or being Beyond Good and Evil. It just kind of makes me roll my eyes.

[Mark Ventura]

I think you're overestimating the importance of the title. If your game is good, and you market it properly, I don't think it matters all that much.

I think it's important to include a number in the title only if it's a direct continuation of the story, so it's easy to establish the chronology. I can list most of the Bond movies, but not in order.

Silent Hill 2: Restless Dreams should've been Silent Hill: Restless Dreams because it's important to let the consumer know that it's a Silent Hill game, but no 2 because it has nothing to do with the original. Silent Hill 3 should've been Silent Hill 2.

Duke Nukem Forever is not a good name, IMO, because it seems to have a connotation of finality (and also because there is a slight connection with Batman Forever).

[Talon]

I'm going to have to agree. Names are important, but there are plenty of titles that have terrible names but are amazing games. Ico isn't a great name, but it's argueably one of the best games this generation.

[Shahar Eldar]

I would see the name as being the marketing equivilant of a "foot in the door" it makes it easier for the brand to spread, and be remembered, however a catchy name, will not save a bad game, but it will catch you some suckers
At the same time, a bad name with a good game, will probably end up losing you an audience you could have gotten if they just could remember the name of that awesome game they heard about.

I allso think a name should immidiately let you picture a piece of the game you are getting yourself into. unfortunately when it comes to names... I dont remember them very well regardless :) I'm more of a faces person... things that immidiately come to mind as good names though are games like Magic Carpet, and Jagged Alliance (although the latter might just be an association with the great gameplay) personally I think this is an important issue, my programmer friend now however believes it's a critical issue and wont stop bugging me about coming up with names for his new game :) (thanks scott, he reads this site too)

as for Duke Forever... I'll remember the name much more fondly once I play it probably, so get back to work guys, you've got a great deal to prove

on a side note... I've been having E-mail trouble, any word if you got my mail Scott?

[Factory]

I'd add that sometimes generic names can be good, if you are belting out a game that wants to be a budget game for example, you want something that screams out what genre you are in, and you don't care too much about sequels. Just don't call your sci-fi shooter 'Sword of the Dragon', or your medieval RPG 'Alien Invasion'. :)

Hmm I think that if one was to put a disclaimer at the start of every article 'This topic I am going to write about will have an affect on the sales of a game, but it is not the sole ingredient that will make a game sell', it would prolly cut down on a few posts. :)

[Walter]

Agreed on that, Factory. (Not that I actually think Scott should do that, of course. That's just something the readers here should internalize.)

I think Scott's advice is basically sound. There's no getting around the fact that any number of other factors can make or break a game's success, regardless of name. The point here is, as a developer, you're not likely to know how all those other factors are likely to play out, and given that we do know that some games suffer very badly from a lame name despite genuine merits, it would simply be stupid not to spend the five minutes to an hour it would take to come up with a decent string of words that potentially millions are going to identify and refer to your product by.

(Incidentally, I can't express how lame the title "Broken Sword" is, even if there's a relatively competent series of graphic adventure named that.)

[Scott Miller]

-- "The Sims makes about as much sense to someone who's never played The Sims as Syphon Filter does...My point is that while titles might have something to do with it, I think you're overextending their impact."

I've noted several times that these are guidelines, not hard line rules. It's very hard to have a name that follows all of these guidelines. In some cases you sacrifice some rules, perhaps length or obvious meaning, to excel with the other guidelines. Mario originally had no meaning to players, but it's a short, unique, non-generic name, and that's good enough in most cases -- especially back when the brand was first created when competition was much weaker.

-- "Silent Hill 2: Restless Dreams should've been Silent Hill: Restless Dreams because it's important to let the consumer know that it's a Silent Hill game, but no 2 because it has nothing to do with the original. Silent Hill 3 should've been Silent Hill 2."

Mark, again I say, why is it that there are numerous successful movie series' that do not need sequel numbers? What makes the game industry different?

-- "There's no getting around the fact that any number of other factors can make or break a game's success, regardless of name."

Exactly, a name is one part of the overall puzzle. It can hurt or help a game, but it can't make or break a game.