Make surnames optional.

[Dragoy]

Looks at his post... Wrote a lot again, did you not? It is intended as a reference to show the hardships that come with character naming in FINAL FANTASY XIV. Sorry for the slight off-topic nature of the first part, but I felt like telling the story, and this seems as good a place as any.

It is a background story, not something to be discussed here.


Back in Alpha, I imagined it was an error, and even reported it as such but noticed now that it still is there: I can not use the name 'Dragoy', at all.

So I decided to finally find out what is wrong with it.

I tried all kinds of letter combinations, bad words, and others, to compare the error messages and see what is allowed and what not. I quickly learned it is 'goy' that makes the name 'bad'. I was flabbergasted. Did they make a typo in the filter?

Well, a quick search provides the answer, quoting wikipedia:

Goy (Hebrew: גוי‎, regular plural goyim גוים or גויים) is a Hebrew biblical term for "nation". By Roman times it had also acquired the meaning of "non-Jew".[1] The latter is also its meaning in Yiddish.

By the Goddess, a religious reference! This does not bode well. Actually, it bodes ill. I fail to see the offensiveness of it, though, but then again, there are not many things that I do find offensive, so I guess I just don't count...

It's not like the name I am trying to use is 'Goy Whatever', either, so they are actually going the lazy route and they just filter 'goy' instead of handling names which players report to them due to being clearly offensive. No, instead, they render every name that has 'goy', or anything else that is filtered in it unusable, offensive, and derogatory.

Quite frankly I might be offended by that. =þ
It makes sense for the most common words, but for something like this? Really?


My first inquiry to the Customer Service yielded a funny answer, in short: "Names can not be used if they are already in use. Also the name of a character can not be changed after its creation."

Clearly they did not even bother reading even half of my text, but more importantly, they also wrote that: "Finally, there is no set rule against the use of the syllable 'goy'."

So okay, maybe the person was just not aware of which game we are even talking about; perhaps they were thinking of another set of filters. Mistakes happen and at least I didn't actually pay for that eMail (except with my time and the internet connection that is needed, but I digress).

So, I proceeded with a new inquiry, referring to the previous one, and this time they had found out that 'goy' is indeed illegal. Moreover, it indeed is so because of the fact that it may in some situations be considered derogatory.
Heck, even the 'Urban Dictionary', which can make nearly everything and anything offensive I might add, has this to say: "Usually neutral, despite persistent untrue rumors that it is derogatory. It should only be considered offensive when it is used in a context indicating that it's intended as an insult."

That should mean something!
I, for one, have never even heard of the word, until now.


But that is as they say, that.
Religion is a touchy subject for companies, and I understand it, but I for one am suggesting them to allow more variety by not simply blocking certain strings of letters. Instead make it easy and intuitive for players to report names that which they find offensive, and then deal with them.

So I would implore anyone that might be affected by this, and other strings of letters, to use the Suggestions & Feedback option at the Support Centre, and let them know.


Same goes for naming in general. As good Sir Yogard mentions there ~cough~ I do not see why we can't have a maximum of three parts for names, simply 1-3. Sure, it might confuddle the chat-system, but that needs to be changed anyways. The images of XIV 2.0 have a shimmer of hope when I look at the chat-window there. It might actually be possible to create channels within the window, and I would hope you could simply open channels as 'private chats' that will deliver your messages to the character without the text commands entirely.

But that again, is for another topic, even if somewhat related.


For those who do not feel like reading the above, at all: Send your Suggestions & Feedback, make use of it, so that the naming-system has more chances of becoming more versatile, and user-friendly!

I would also like to note that the replies regarding this via eMail were received very swiftly and for that I commend the Customer Service. Fastest was 20 minutes or so I think!


Okay.
Before I think of anything else to say...
Blubb!