- As mentioned before, when I think of a science fiction or fantasy name, I go with my favourite technique of flipping a word in reverse and adding in punctuation. Example: "E-man ret'carahc". Easy, huh?
- Alliteration. When I want a fun sounding name, I make two names with the same letter. Example: "Lloyd Lightspeed".
- Adding a title before an unusual noun/verb/adjective. This is a fun way of making silly sounding characters! This can be combined with the alliteration for extra fun. Example: "Colonel Cola".
- Descriptive names. Got a character with a certain personality trait? Name them after it! Example: "Thrifty Keith".
- Asking a friend. Sometimes a bit of outside thinking can come up with something much quicker than you can. "Man Boy", for example, was named by my friend Dan when I couldn't think of a name for him.
Got any ideas to add? I'd love to hear them! Let's make the naming process easy for ourselves :). (Ie, Myself. Yes, I'm selfish ;))
4 comments:
My character names almost always bear references to pop or everyday culture. I abstract one character trait and then think of a person, a machine, a car, a place, a city or whatever I know that could possibly be connected with that character trait.
Although I have not finished one game, yet, I have named so many NPCs and I love every single one of them like my own child. Roland Tosh, the Hawaiian hotdog man, Tony Handsworth, the stubborn unemployed former police officer, Hawkins, the daft bouncer, Porter, the crazed Vietnam veteran.
The list goes on and on, and every single name, even if they are not very spectacular, goes along well with the personality and the appearance of the character, I think.
And I also like a certain kind of spam-email-names. Like "Honeywight Blair" or "Suncube Clappington". If you are completely out of ideas, look at the names of the senders of your favourite spam emails, inspiration will strike immediately.
This is my spam loot of today: Louisa Salgado, Gerri Rivera, Pilar von Oldenburg, Lovie Ragland, Wallace Sniffert and Cleveland Figuera.
That's a whole Whodunnit in there, completely staffed and named!
You can google "random name generator", most of these make pretty awful names but can be helpful.
My approach to making up good fantasy / alien names is using the right sound:
Using the i sound make a name sound fitting for a small / weak character: Pirinni wouldn't fit big muscular guys
Using the long o sound evokes muscular barbarians: Conan is a good example, but also: Borgon, Pok'an, Kolon, Gomu.
Long names imply high standing: 'Sandranova Talpaninka Tong' sounds like royalty, because it's long.
It also rolls easy off your tongue because of the syllable emphasize:
Sandra Nova Talpaninka Tong
It has a constant pattern of emphasize - not emphasized, if you understand what I'm saying.
And that's about all I know about naming people.
I like the bundeskanzlers idea of using spam names: make some use of them!
Here's what I do to name the characters in my/our (my and Ben's) games.
I have a book that contains a list of boys' and girls' names, and I browse through it, much like future parents do to choose names for their children. When I see a name that I like and that I think fits the character, that's the name I choose. I could just as easily use one of the many websites there are around that give lists of names for babies.
Of course, this only works for first names and names of "real" characters. It won't give you fancy names of aliens, monsters, science-fiction characters, etc, but if you have everyday characters in your game, this works just fine.
Sebastian - I really, really like the idea of using the spam names! Sadly, I never, ever ever get any spam email, and have not been sad about this until now. Perhaps there is a secret to receiving spam mails that I am unaware of - I'd love to try this idea.
TwinMoon - Very interesting analysis of the 'feel' of words and I can see where it comes from. I do tend to do this sort of thing myself, but I believe it's been more of a subconscious thing (until now :P). Thanks for sharing your thought.
Paolo - Ah, I think my parents had one of those around somewhere. I can see how it's a handy book for reference. Sadly, I sometimes forget that there are occasions when strange fictional names aren't called for. I'll let you pick the names from now on, hey? ;)
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