Characters With Anime Names

[Kosmos992k]

Why not instead talk about why someone is using the name they have? One of those Kirito's may have chosen that name because the show meant a lot to them in some deep way. Who knows.

Indeed. Whether jaded, salty people believe it or not, there are a lot of people for whom some story elements in SAO really touch them. Actually SAO has several elements that hit me, not least of which is Kirito and Asuna sitting together at the end of the Ancrad arc, watching Aincrad dissappear, as they also disappear from that world.

For me personally, that resonates because my wife and I stayed online all night saying good by to all our guild mates & friends in White Knight Chronicles 2 when that game was sadly terminated. We sat and watched the water in a stream flowing through my wife's Georama (town), listening to the birdsong that was part of the environment, and watching the cherry blossom fall; waiting for the servers to die. Sony/Level5/D3 had decided in their wisdom to quite abruptly kill the game after less than 2 years of life. We'd invested so much time and effort into our guild and playing that game with our friends, that when it was suddenly taken away, it was a real sense of loss and pain. Watching Kirito and Asuna struggle with the end of Aincrad, knowing that it meant the end of the world they'd lived in together, for years, just brings it all back to me - as does writing this.

For that matter, there are many who find the back stories in other shows/games moving too. For example, KOS-MOS & Shion from Xenosaga - I could write an entire dissertation on what those characters mean to me, and how they illuminate my life.

Another good example would be Idom@ster, a game/Anime no one would ever believe could have real emotion or meaning. Watch it, pay attention to Chihaya's story. Every person I know who's watched the IdolM@ster anime is moved by her story, most to tears or at least damp eyes...

The point is that Anime (and other media) characters have special meaning to individual people, they resonate with something in that person's experience. So Why does anyone feel a need to critique a character name chosen by another player?

If anything, understanding where a player's name comes from, gives us some insight into their personality.

Kosmos was my character in White Knight Chronicles 1 & 2 and was clearly and intentionally a tribute to KOS-MOS from Xenosaga. I always have an Alt character called Shion Uzuki as well. When WKC2 was taken from us myself, my wife and our friends made Eorzea our new home, and after playing Kosmos for so many hours in WKC, I simply couldn't bear to let Kosmos die with WKC. So, Kosmos was reborn in Eorzea, as was Shion. ...and now you know the rest of the story.