ninjabee.com

How do you guys go about coming up with a name for a game that you make?

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ninjabee.com

I Was thinking of this.

A City Of Keflings

A Kingdom For Keflings

A World Of Keflings

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Maybe 1 is round the corner

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Actually, it takes us forever to name a game.

First, we have a code name of some kind, without even trying to really decide a final name. Some example code names:

Outpost Kaloki: Worm
Band of Bugs: Swat
A Kingdom for Keflings: Giant

Then, when we start to get close to announcing the game, we start brainstorming names. We usually come up with 100 or so, and argue for days about the subtle distinctions between one word and another. Seriously. Days. For instance, you'll notice with A World of Keflings that it's "A World of Keflings" instead of "A World for Keflings". I swear that "of" vs. "for" argument went on for weeks.

Eventually somebody has to make the final call. Sometimes that's me, but it really depends on who's in charge of design for the game, and how much we agree on the various options.

Then we sit back and prepare to defend our decision to the world of developers, who can get pretty opinionated about names. We took a lot of flak for both Outpost Kaloki and A Kingdom for Keflings.

So how did you decide on "of" rather than "for"

Must have been some epic turf fighting. I can see it now:

Everyone for "of" on one side of the parking lot and for "for" on the other. Then the groups link arms and start calling the others over one at a time red rover style.

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YO 2012, IMMA LET YOU FINISH, BUT Y2K HAD ONEO' BEST END OF THE WORLD OF ALL TIME

Haha, that's *exactly* how it went down. And then we had punch and cookies! Yay!

A few of the factors on the of/for issue:

* Do we want to make it different from the previous game? On the one hand, different helps emphasize that this is a new game. On the other hand, is it confusing?
* Will people say "for" anyway, even though it's really "of"? (answer: yes. )
* "of" gives a sense of a world "full of" keflings, which is good, 'cause it is!
* And you're not really creating a world for them, you're creating individual kingdoms, but within a world that already exists...
* "for" lends itself to people saying "fer", which is not ideal. "of" has a more classical story tone. "Once upon a time, in a far off magical land of keflings..."
* Does it sound right? "a world of" just has a different tone to it, you know?

I know, it's obsessive...