Ironic character names

[Cherie]

Something kind of interesting I noticed when playing ffxi and now ffxiv is that there are lots of anime theme character names. I mean, really it's not that interesting because a game made in Japan and anime which is also made in Japan have that opportunity to appear to the same audience that likes the medium. I get some of the names, I mean, I saw a Kurosaki Ichigo... pretty obvious what anime that they are fond of. Or I saw a Naruto Uzumaki. I even saw a Sasuke Uzumaki. Which for that to happen, would those two characters that those names come from would to have had a child together or maybe marry?...but, well they...um... ok, not going into that one. :P

But what is actually more interesting, many of the people with anime theme named characters are often not Japanese. I mean, sure the amount of Japanese people in a large world is not very high considering billions of people in the world, so this is natural right? I guess what I'm getting at is many of the players I have gotten know in those games that are actually Japanese have English themed names.

Maybe those of you that never played FFXI where there were lots of mixed language groups won't understand what I'm talking about as much. But for those of you that didn't play it. If you saw someone named "Tasty Apple" or "Friendly Cloud" odds are, they could have been a non English speaking player. At the same time, if you saw a Ranma Saotome, they were probably not Japanese.

Am I just making a Generalization here or did some of you experience this as well in FFXI? I guess if it happened as much as I thought, I would suggest it was just more or less someone thinking exotic sounding names(IE from a language other than what you speak) sound cooler. Just like how in the past in America, people used to study french to make them seem more romantic when wooing someone they liked. While perhaps the French might look at us silly Americans and wonder what we are doing...

[Enkidoh]

There's an old joke about FFXI, in that there seemed to be more Sephiroth-clones in FFXI than there was in FFVII.

Luckily though that seems to be changing - although instead I see a lot of characters named either after celebrities or characters from Twilight/Game of Thrones/Harry Potter/<insert movie/tv show/novel flavour of the month here>.

It should also be noted that to do so is technically a violation of the Terms of Service, where it states your character name 'must not be taken from another intellectual property', but I don't think SE is particularly strict on enforcing that.

[Alistaire]

There's an old joke about FFXI, in that there seemed to be more Sephiroth-clones in FFXI than there was in FFVII.

Luckily though that seems to be changing - although instead I see a lot of characters named either after celebrities or characters from Twilight/Game of Thrones/Harry Potter/<insert movie/tv show/novel flavour of the month here>.

It should also be noted that to do so is technically a violation of the Terms of Service, where it states your character name 'must not be taken from another intellectual property', but I don't think SE is particularly strict on enforcing that.

They've also not been strict about celebrity names being against ToS. I remember seeing several like that in ffxi (Johnnydepp etc) and here as well, saw an Ellen Page a while ago, like the week after she came out of the closet.

[Slatervonjager]

It should also be noted that to do so is technically a violation of the Terms of Service, where it states your character name 'must not be taken from another intellectual property', but I don't think SE is particularly strict on enforcing that.

If you report it, they will do something about it. However do be noted, that if the names aren't correct, meaning they've been spelled different, then they can't/wont do anything about it. Also, it should be noted that you shouldn't just go and report someone for their name, because that Phillip Fry you reported may actually be named Phillip Fry in real life and just wanted to use his real name(if you have no clue who Phillip Fry is, then go watch Futurama, but not the crappy Comedy Central seasons).

[OnyxStrife]

There's an old joke about FFXI, in that there seemed to be more Sephiroth-clones in FFXI than there was in FFVII.

Luckily though that seems to be changing - although instead I see a lot of characters named either after celebrities or characters from Twilight/Game of Thrones/Harry Potter/<insert movie/tv show/novel flavour of the month here>.

It should also be noted that to do so is technically a violation of the Terms of Service, where it states your character name 'must not be taken from another intellectual property', but I don't think SE is particularly strict on enforcing that.

Yeah I had myself named Onyx Strife originally, but I received so much anger and hate on it that I eventually ended up changing it

[Mcshiggs]

Just like how in the past in America, people used to study french to make them seem more romantic when wooing someone they liked.

American's need not study French to woo the ladies, you just need a classy pick up line like: "Excuse me pretty lady, can I buy you a fish sandwich?"

[Swagcity]

American's need not study French to woo the ladies, you just need a classy pick up line like: "Excuse me pretty lady, can I buy you a fish sandwich?"

swag does it for me^^

[whoopeeragon]

It works both ways, IMO - Japanese players like to pick popular/well known 'Western' names, while the Western crowd likes, as you said, anime/manga popular names.

[Cherie]

It works both ways, IMO - Japanese players like to pick popular/well known 'Western' names, while the Western crowd likes, as you said, anime/manga popular names.

Yup, and it doesn't have to be just Westerners and Easterners. I mean, I had thought about making a character named "Drop Bear" and I'm not Australian!

[Fantasy9]

My former FC leader had a miqote alt with the name Kitty Purry.