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Fun Club Favourite development studio names?

big lantern ghost

big lantern ghost

cantstandya
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Was shuffling in some new games to replay on Switch, Moon among them. It occurred to me that Love-de-Lic is perhaps my favourite ever name for a game developer. The name is so good, a bunch of studios its talent moved on to afterward also had/have great names. Skip. Vanpool. Onion Games.

What game dev names have stuck with you?
 
I always thought Arc System Works just sounded cool.

Vanillaware is another of my favorites since I also love vanilla ice cream.
 
With some help from Wikipedia, because I had time in my hands.

BioWare
Blizzard
Insomniac
Monolith Soft
Obsidian
Rare
Retro Studios
Rockstar
Silicon Knights
Team Ninja
Valve
Vanillaware
 
Can I switch it up and give you some of my least favorite development studio names instead? I've noticed some pretty worrisome ones that could stand to be updated for the year 2024.

Let's start with Naughty Dog. Being naughty shouldn't be a mark of pride, and if their dogs aren't being properly trained, they're clearly irresponsible owners.

Then there's Insomniac. As someone who's struggled with insomnia myself, I find this insensitive. Don't make light of my sleep difficulties.

And finally, Sucker Punch. Being named after a violent act is already tasteless enough on its own, but these cowards won't even fight you fairly? Then they have the audacity to make a game about "honorable" samurai? The hypocrisy is astounding.

And keep in mind, many would consider these studios Sony's "Big Three"! Just how deep is the rot?
 
Earthbounder said:
With some help from Wikipedia, because I had time in my hands.

Insomniac
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Aurc said:
Then there's Insomniac. As someone who's struggled with insomnia myself, I find this insensitive. Don't make fun of my sleep difficulties.
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Please don't ban me, Mr. Admin.

If we are also talking about names that suck, I love FromSoftware as a studio, but their name is just terrible.
 
Dardan Sandiego said:
Shoutout to Nintendo Entertainment Analysis & Development (EAD) for having the most trite name that always makes me laugh because I imagine something like this

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Nintendo R&D was even worse in this regard. But, hey, maybe that's their secret to being the very best. They don't just develop games: they do science. And, as we all know, science is the best.
 
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Earthbounder said:
Nintendo R&D was even worse in this regard. But, hey, maybe that's their secret to the being the very best. They don't just develop games: they do science. And, as we all know, science is the best.
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We also know that science can be a liar sometimes which is how we get games like... I better stop here.

Irene said:
Absolutely nothing beats Creative Business Unit III.
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"they're creative... they get down to business... they're a unit... and there's at least two more!?"
 
Earthbounder said:
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Please don't ban me, Mr. Admin.

If we are also talking about names that suck, I love FromSoftware as a studio, but their name is just terrible.
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See you on the banned users list.

FromSoftware is a great mention, as far as devs with underwhelming names go. They've made some of the greatest games of the past decade, yet their name is so unassuming. It's like finding out there's a god, but his real name is Jim Bob.
Dardan Sandiego said:
Shoutout to Nintendo Entertainment Analysis & Development (EAD) for having the most trite name that always makes me laugh because I imagine something like this

PY8YHiv.png
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You are a child who thinks video games are art. They are adults who believe video games are a mathematical equation. That's the difference.
 
Not fully related but Supermassive Games and Supergiant Games need to grow up and come to some sort of agreement. Unacceptable for this to go on any longer.
 
If you ignore the fact that they're a completely odious studio, a terrible company, a despicable team, Bloober Team has a pretty funny name
 
Metroid said:
If you ignore the fact that they're a completely odious studio, a terrible company, a despicable team, Bloober Team has a pretty funny name
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Against all good sense, I'm choosing to Trust Their Process for the Silent Hill 2 remake. It's up to them or... NeoBards, to give us a good Silent Hill game.

Being a Silent Hill fan is hard...
 
Tokyo RPG Factory is both the funniest and most accurate name ever given to a developer.
 
The Good:
Nintendo - It's got a nice flow, and "leave luck to heaven" sounds cool.
Good Feel - I like things that feel good!
girl software - The lack of capitalization adds style, and the mundanity is funny.
HAL Laboratory - It sounds cool and futuristic.
Insomniac - The health implications are concerning, but the word sounds cool.
Sucker Punch - Their name should probably be in the bad section, but it makes me think of lollies and punch, so I like it anyway.
Obsidian - This is a cool word too!
Rare - Lends itself well to puns. The logo is doing a lot of heavy lifting here though.
Silicon Knights - That's like, robot knights or something! Way past cool!
Treasure - Everyone wants to find treasure! But the real treasure was the good video games they made along the way!
Team Meat - This is almost an anagram but English just had to be like that.
Smoking WOLF - I don't think smoking is cool but if a wolf wants to smoke I think that's okay I'm not a vegan or a furry or anything.
Valve - If I encountered a valve in a video game, I would turn it. I think that says something.
Bar Holographic Otaku - No idea what the fuck this means, but it's very cyberpunk.

The Bad:
Microsoft - Too clinical, sounds like a cleaning product.
Monolith - Cool word, but there are two of them, which is confusing.
Retro Studios - Non-descript, and also a lie, when have they ever made anything retro?
PixelHive - Vaguely threatening. Would want to stay away from a hive inhabited by pixels.
Pixelnest - Fuck there are two of them!
Naughty Dog - Sounds like a 2000's porn site that just leads to a chain of five other similar porn sites when you try to click on something.
Game Freak - Has the aura of a porn site reviewer, but for video games. I wonder what they think of Naughty Dog.
Team Ninja - I would not trust a group called "Team Ninja" to do anything, except for maybe navigate obstacle courses on a game show of some sort.
FromSoftware - Abbott and Costello-ass name.
Vanillaware - Might as well call yourself Basic Bitch Games.
Rockstar - Trying too hard.
CAVE - How are you supposed to make the video games in a cave? With a box of scraps?
DONTNOD - Fuck you I won't do what you tell me!
Mossmouth - Gross.

The Bob:
Toys for Bob - Inscrutable. Who is Bob?
 
Aurc said:
Against all good sense, I'm choosing to Trust Their Process for the Silent Hill 2 remake. It's up to them or... NeoBards, to give us a good Silent Hill game.

Being a Silent Hill fan is hard...
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It's a terrible thing, trusting the process
 
I wouldn’t count this as a favorite, but you did also ask which names stuck with us, and this one certainly did that:

Realtime Associates.

Of all the studio names that have that kind of business-y sound, I find Realtime Associates to be the weirdest.

The developer of EGG for Dreamcast is just called Birthday. That’s a great one.
 
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Stilt Village said:
The Good:
Nintendo - It's got a nice flow, and "leave luck to heaven" sounds cool.
Good Feel - I like things that feel good!
girl software - The lack of capitalization adds style, and the mundanity is funny.
HAL Laboratory - It sounds cool and futuristic.
Insomniac - The health implications are concerning, but the word sounds cool.
Sucker Punch - Their name should probably be in the bad section, but it makes me think of lollies and punch, so I like it anyway.
Obsidian - This is a cool word too!
Rare - Lends itself well to puns. The logo is doing a lot of heavy lifting here though.
Silicon Knights - That's like, robot knights or something! Way past cool!
Treasure - Everyone wants to find treasure! But the real treasure was the good video games they made along the way!
Team Meat - This is almost an anagram but English just had to be like that.
Smoking WOLF - I don't think smoking is cool but if a wolf wants to smoke I think that's okay I'm not a vegan or a furry or anything.
Valve - If I encountered a valve in a video game, I would turn it. I think that says something.
Bar Holographic Otaku - No idea what the fuck this means, but it's very cyberpunk.

The Bad:
Microsoft - Too clinical, sounds like a cleaning product.
Monolith - Cool word, but there are two of them, which is confusing.
Retro Studios - Non-descript, and also a lie, when have they ever made anything retro?
PixelHive - Vaguely threatening. Would want to stay away from a hive inhabited by pixels.
Pixelnest - Fuck there are two of them!
Naughty Dog - Sounds like a 2000's porn site that just leads to a chain of five other similar porn sites when you try to click on something.
Game Freak - Has the aura of a porn site reviewer, but for video games. I wonder what they think of Naughty Dog.
Team Ninja - I would not trust a group called "Team Ninja" to do anything, except for maybe navigate obstacle courses on a game show of some sort.
FromSoftware - Abbott and Costello-ass name.
Vanillaware - Might as well call yourself Basic Bitch Games.
Rockstar - Trying too hard.
CAVE - How are you supposed to make the video games in a cave? With a box of scraps?
DONTNOD - Fuck you I won't do what you tell me!
Mossmouth - Gross.

The Bob:
Toys for Bob - Inscrutable. Who is Bob?
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Very entertaining read. Consider this a super Yeah! 🙌 🌈 Ending on Toys for Bob was a stroke of brilliance.
 
You know, for some reason Japan Studio's teams have always had cool codenames to me with Team ICO and Project Siren, obviously being named after your name isn't super creative but it sounds cool, I also like how Japan Studio sounds in general.
 
I have a soft spot for Media Molecule. It’s the kind of name you’d expct for a studio that makes creative sandboxes.

Nintendo is badass too. “Leave luck to heaven”, while they flex all their skills to deliver bangers.

For terrible ones: thatgamecompany. Not that one, that one. Sheesh it’s like if you’d called Famiboards thatvideogameforum.
 
Psyonix
Pax Softnica (this is just such a fun nonsense set of syllables)
Flagship
Vertex Pop
Wayforward Technologies (and kinda the same energy: Next Level Games)
Splash Damage
Free Radical
HAL Laboratory (I mostly love how HAL is just one better than IBM; feels amusingly petty for such a cute company)

e: NERD (Nintendo European Research and Development) is also an absolute masterclass in acronymsmanship
 
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Grezzo, if you're italian it's just funny since it's also a common way of saying someone is not a really smart or well studied person.
 
I always really liked Namco as a name! But Bandai Namco doesn’t have the same ring to it for me… Isn’t it weird how the brain does that?
 
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Sonic Team is a name that makes you go “yep, they make Sonic games”

Also Rareware > Rare
 
Tanukii Studios has always been a brilliant name to me. Though I’m biased as a Nintendo-loving tanuki furry/therian, lol.
 
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Ed Lolesco said:
I always liked Bullfrog Productions when I was a kid.
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lol same

I also loved Iguana Entertainment for similar being a kid reasons

thinking about it, Acclaim was a pretty cool name too

EDIT: thought of another one that I loved back in the day: Traveller's Tales

2v0x0bxpeq781.jpg

It was probably the old logo doing most the work here, I thought it was so cool and mysterious
 
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Next Level Games has always been a favorite, though it probably has less to do with the name itself and more that seeing it any any context just immediately makes me think of Daisy (specifically) shouting it when you boot up Mario Strikers.

Camelot was another one that popped into my head, basically for the same reason lol. Whenever I read it my mind just conjures the voice clip of Waluigi saying “Caamelooot, hehehe” from Power Tennis
 
Dardan Sandiego said:
Shoutout to Nintendo Entertainment Analysis & Development (EAD) for having the most trite name that always makes me laugh because I imagine something like this

PY8YHiv.png
Click to expand...
Yeah but it gave us Mr EAD, and that's worth it. It's really funny that he only appears in one game developed by EAD.
 
I can't hear "Grezzo" without thinking of "Grizzco." I guess it makes sense for Mr Grizz to have a side hustle!
 
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Amusement Vision will always be a better name than Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio. It makes it a little strange when they don't work on Like A Dragon, just like Sonic Team.
 
E.Gadd said:
lol same

I also loved Iguana Entertainment for similar being a kid reasons

thinking about it, Acclaim was a pretty cool name too

EDIT: thought of another one that I loved back in the day: Traveller's Tales

2v0x0bxpeq781.jpg

It was probably the old logo doing most the work here, I thought it was so cool and mysterious
Click to expand...
As a kid I remember thinking that logo must be based on some Traveler's Tales games that I just couldn't find and I spent so much time imagining what it was like
 
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