When playing most games, you have to decide on a character name. But rather than put your actual name, you would rather come up with an original name. This way you can protect your identity while playing online. Or feel even more immersed with a fantasy game with a suitable name. Here are some ideas on how to generate a great character name. (This can be used for characters in a book you are writing or even a game.)
Character Name Generators
The easiest method of getting a name is by using a name generator. There must be at least hundreds if not thousands of these name generators. These generate a name from a library of names. Below are some examples that you can use to generate your own character name:
You don’t have to use the combinations that are provided. Write down a list of all the first names and last names generated. Then from that list pick a name that sounds right for the character.
The only downside to this method is the name won’t have any hidden meanings. Also, there is always a chance that someone else has already used the same generator to generate the name you want. Let’s move on to the next method of picking a Character Name.
Name Meaning Method
Another method for generating a character name is to decide on their personality traits. Once you have this all planned out you can use a website like behindthename.com/ clicking Names>Advanced Search:
Then click on Meaning and Keywords. In the meaning section enter a personality trait:
Click search at the bottom of the page.
A new page will appear with a list of all names that have either the meaning of the personality trait or the personality treat is a keyword for that name. You can then do the same for the last name.
Popular Names from the Year They Were Born
If you are creating a character either in the past, present, or the not-too-distant future, you could use census data to determine the most popular names for the year the character is born. This is only useful if the characters are dwelling in our world or a fantasy world that has the same technology and experiences that we did, at that time period.
A useful website for this is ssa.gov, which shows popular baby names for each decade from the 1880s onwards. The link goes straight to the page which shows each decade. If you are playing a character from the future, names come back into style every few decades so it can be useful to look at this resource to pick up a new name.
Pay Homage to Your Favourite People
This method can pose a bit of a minefield if you are letting the name you use to go into the public domain. But for most single-player games it shouldn’t pose too much of a hassle. If there is someone you idolize or that your character idolizes (or their parents) then using their name in some form can really show the dedication that they or you have.
This can work for either first names or last names. For example, if someone idolizes Bill Gates, they could create a character called Charlie Gates. As you can tell my names aren’t very imaginative but it would work. Or if there are two people you idolize, you can use persona a’s first name and person b’s last name. it can make for some odd names.
Have fun coming up with your own names, I’d love to hear if you have any other methods of coming up with names for characters. This should help with Final Fantasy or other RPG games. Let me know on here or on Twitter.