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July 17, 2009

Playing the Game Naming Game

The news that the longest game name ever is out has made it necessary for me to think hard about the ridiculous world of naming games (excise the pun).

This one uses the following for short: "HIOPB!WDIDTDT?" and the full title is "Holy Invasion of Privacy, Badman! What Did I Do To Deserve This?"

This is 64 characters long - almost half a tweet. To the uninitiated it seems freakishly bad, but the same company also offers us "Prinny: Can I Really Be The Hero?" and Spectral Souls - Resurrection of the Ethereal Empires. Editors? Who needs 'em!"

Yahoo Buzz Up! notes that "HIOPB!WDIDTDT?" isn't even the longest name. There's also "GOLF Magazine Presents 36 Great Holes Starring Fred Couples" and "Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People: Episode 4: Dangeresque 3: The Criminal Projective", which is a ridiculous 95 characters long.

These names aren't even the silliest, of course. There's also "Plant vs. Zombie", "Little Red Riding Hood's Zombie Barbecue" and "Tongue of the Fat Man." . How about "Supermarket Mania" or ""Major League Eating: The Game" and "Imagine Party Babyz" ? IPhone Apps are almost as bad, with names like "iNap@Work" and "Hair Clinic: For Man and Woman" (don't ask). The last one probably doesn't really work....

Indeed, casual gaming/app developers have made weird naming almost a point of pride.

There seems to be a hot list of 20 words that infest weird game names. "Age, blade, command, and darkness" start off the group.

Kataku suggests you pile up a bunch of thee words and see how effective they are, asking us "Who wouldn't want to play World War Dawn of the Dead: Red Blade of Eternal Super Star Mario"? Who indeed?

Technorati Tags: Gaming , Video Game Naming, Silly Game Names, Long Game Names

Posted by William Lozito at July 17, 2009 9:01 AM
Posted to Brand Naming | Branding | Consumer Electronics | Media and Entertainment | Product Naming | Technology

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