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Can we talk about Bad Videogame Titles?

B

Barkley's Justice

Member
Horizon: Zero Dawn? Really? Dis you pay a marketing team for that?

Rise of the Tomb Raider? Watch enough movies recently?

Hellblade? Is that the opposite of the Heavenly Sword? Did no one peep that?

*slams head on desk*

It's obvious videogame developers are a creative bunch. What other titles are flat-out horrible?
 
23s21.jpg
 
I've always thought The Last Story was a dumb name. Like I get the FF parallel. It just seems dumb.
 
Me: "Resonance of Fate", that's the most generic nonsense JRPG fantasy title, what's it about?

Internet: Guns, Steampunk and Acrobatics.

Me: Oh.
 
I think about this more than I should and have developed a criteria.

A good videogame title should be:

Memorable enough to be easily searchable.
Differentiable enough to not be confused with other games.
And able to give consumers an idea of what the game is about.

This is really hard to do I think.
 
Shutokou Battle localizations, the thread

Japan: Shutokou Battle
NA/EU: Tokyo Xtreme Racer

Japan: Shutokou Battle X
NA/EU: Import Tuner Challenge

Talk about bargain bin sounding titles. Sheesh.
 
Outside the usual, already mentionned suspects, Tri-Ace's new game's name is all kinds of bad.

Exist Archive: The Other Side of the Sky
 
HiroTSK5 said:
Me: "Resonance of Fate", that's the most generic nonsense JRPG fantasy title, what's it about?

Internet: Guns, Steampunk and Acrobatics.

Me: Oh.
Click to expand...

I'm amazed how tri-ace's "Infinite Undiscovery" got an overseas pass but "End of Eternity" didn't. But that might have something to do with Isaac Asimov and not touching his copyright. And generic or not, Resonance of Fate kinda works for the game where people
dodge death thanks to a machine
. It's not MUCH better, but...*shrug*. I dunno, i don't care either. #avatarquote

It's funny to see all the "EoE" clothes in the game though. :P
 
Metroid: Other M is the most Engrish gibberish bullshit and I can't believe Nintendo let Sakamoto title the game like that.
 
GUN -- What the fuck. And it's all caps, huh?

Killzone -- This is literally the generic "bang bang kill 'em up" name you would give a game in a terrible movie or something, right after the main character makes a withering joke about the loser that plays it

Destiny -- Ultra generic. Doesn't even imply a setting, game style, anything.

Too Many JRPGs -- You know the ones. Infinite Undiscovery. 358/2 Days. Final Fantasy-related Latin Jumble Subtitle.

Metroid: Other M -- Sigh

Ys -- WHYS ;) (I know it's not pronounced that way)
 
Not sure if it entirely counts, but I find the 'Guardians' subtitle for Halo 5 pretty funny. The Destiny/Bungie jokes write themselves really. It's such a weird choice, why add a subtitle in the first place?
 
aGuyInaBearSuit said:
Words cannot describe how much I hate the title "Rise of the Tomb Raider."

I mean, good lord. That is atrocious.
Click to expand...
I have to agree on this one. I prefer simple generic titles than abominations like this one.

I also hate how companies take perfectly fine titles and ruin them by sticking "Revelations" or "Origins" to them. Names like Infinite Undiscovery or Bravely Default sound stupid, but at least they are unique.
 
The world ends with you

I mean, I love that Game, and the Name does definitely make a lot of sense in the context of the Game, but damn, sometimes it's hard to sell people on a Game with such a Name
 
Video games have some pretty bad and generic titles out there, but "Killzone" and virtually any Tales game just feel like fake names you'd hear in movies or TV-shows that instantly make you cringe. There's also the game that takes bad names to an Olympic level, which is of course "Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days".

A-One said:
Bravely Default is by far the worst one.
Click to expand...
It sounds weird, but I think it works. It's a direct reference to the mechanics. Defaulting is basically defending and skipping a turn in turn-based combat. You can then use those stored up extra turns using the Brave command. Perhaps not the best terms for the mechanic, but I deem it acceptable. Its subtitle is also pretty darn interesting as well.

(Spoilers for pretty much the entire game)
After a few chapters into the game, the subtitle on the title screen "Where the Fairy Flies" will erode into red, leaving just the phrase "Airy Lies". This is even better done in the Japanese version, where the subtitle was "Flying Fairy". They'd only have to drop two F's to create "Lying Airy", and the scrapped letters "F F" reference to the Final Fantasy series which it is clearly heavily inspired by. Really interesting type of foreshadowing.
 
________ OF ________. League OF Legends, Heroes OF the Storm, Clash OF Clans, Game OF War, Resonance OF Fate. I don't know why but I almost always dislike titles with the word "of" . There are some good ones though, like Scholar of the First Sin is fine.

Edit: Also warface... Like come on.
 
Destiny - I find it funny because it's like all the fps games and all the halos over the decade led up to a bland, boring, and exclusionary game.
Prinny 2: Dawn of Operation Panties, Dood! - Oddly long title.
 
Ein Bear said:
Not sure if it entirely counts, but I find the 'Guardians' subtitle for Halo 5 pretty funny. The Destiny/Bungie jokes write themselves really. It's such a weird choice, why add a subtitle in the first place?
Click to expand...
You have to be on "Title: Subtitle" with no number by the 6th entry (pretty sure there's a law about it somewhere). They're just transitioning to it slowly to make the lack of consistency across the 2nd trilogy even worse. In the end it's going to be

Halo 4
Halo 5: Guardians
Halo: Resurrection (probably)

105.Will said:
________ OF ________. League OF Legends, Heroes OF the Storm, Clash OF Clans, Game OF War, Resonance OF Fate. I don't know why but I almost always dislike titles with the word "of" . There are some good ones though, like Scholar of the First Sin is fine.
Click to expand...
Sins of a Solar Empire is another one
 
Reveirg said:
Outside the usual, already mentionned suspects, Tri-Ace's new game's name is all kinds of bad.

Exist Archive: The Other Side of the Sky
Click to expand...

tri-Ace in general seems to have a hard time coming up with names. They had Valkyrie Profile and Star Ocean in the 90s, which are cool, then they were all tapped out or something.

Infinite Undiscovery
Resonance of Fate
Exist Archive

What the shit do any of these mean? And then there's the subtitles.

Star Ocean: The Second Story (because a "2" was too basic)
Star Ocean: Til the End of Time (
moar liek Beyond the End of Space
)
Star Ocean: The Last Hope (here was your chance to call it The First Story)
Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness (what?!)
 
Already posted but I don't care. I think definitely more people would play this wonderful game if it weren't for its atrocious title:

81CMfuRqIHL._SL1500_.jpg
Click to expand...
 
The Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle Earth II: Rise of the Witch King

Subtitles for subtitles

Granted it was an expansion pack.
 
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