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Fun Club Great Games With Horrible Names

Dcubed said:
Now you realise that the name is actually quite brilliant ;)
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It’s neat but also misleading at the same time, since Smash for 3DS and Smash for Wii U are officially recognized as the fourth and fifth Smash games, respectively. Now the count is all messed up though ‘cause most fans refer to Ultimate as “Smash 5” and the next Smash game as “Smash 6” instead of the sixth and seventh Smash games as they should be.

Also, unlike most, I never saw a problem with the titles of Smash for 3DS / Wii U. 🤷 Straight to the point, and it helped avoid confusion with two new Smash games being released around the same time on different consoles.
 
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I wouldn’t necessarily call it great game, but having to read the phrase

ENDER LILIES: QUIETUS OF THE KNIGHTS

tore off a shred of my mind force every single time
 
Phantom Thief said:
TACTICS OGRE: LET US CLING TOGETHER

yeah ok
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I absolutely love this name. For me it's an all-timer. I haven't played the game yet but it makes me want to.

I think the only really bad names are the turgid, generic ones Like Shadow Quest - Legends: Revelations. Games with subtitles that aren't a sequel are embarrassing. Games with absurd, poorly translated names like Donkey Kong or Super Mario Bros I like.
 
Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon

I'm not a fan of when games skip numbering in a series and then return to that numbering later. In North America a good example is the Luigi's Mansion series.

The titles are:

Luigi's Mansion
Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon
Luigi's Mansion 3

Like either Dark Moon should've been called Luigi's Mansion 2 in North America like it was called in the rest of the world, or they should've given a unique sub-title for Luigi's Mansion 3 in this market. I imagine it's a little confusing to fans coming to the franchise late for following it's chronology.
 
Don't have a particular name in mind, but I don't like Japanese games that have RE: in their names. I never understand why Japanese creators like to put RE: in the titles of their works so much, be it anime or games.
 
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images
 
Jet Set Radio

It sounds like it would be a ripoff of Dance Dance Revolution, but it ends up being a skating/platforming game. And really, what the fuck is up with that. That's horrible branding. The thing that gets me, is a great name lies within it. "Jet Set" or "Jet Set Skate" would have made way more sense. It's the true reason why Sega died as a console manufacturer.

Pokken
Haha, it's a clever pun. It's Pokémon Tekken, but no one really gets the branding. Nevertheless, walk to a person across the straight and ask them what pokken is. They will assume it's some sort of growth or a new fangled drug. Meanwhile, they could have called it Pokémon Tekken or Pokémon Brawl, and saved everyone the confusion.

Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE
Everything about this game doesn't make sense. It's a crossover of fire emblem and Shin Megami Tensei that doesn't reference it in a clear way at all. It included a "sharp" in the tile in which the average person would pronounce "hashtag". It's a bloody mess.
 
Lozjam said:
Jet Set Radio

It sounds like it would be a ripoff of Dance Dance Revolution, but it ends up being a skating/platforming game. And really, what the fuck is up with that. That's horrible branding. The thing that gets me, is a great name lies within it. "Jet Set" or "Jet Set Skate" would have made way more sense. It's the true reason why Sega died as a console manufacturer.
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This reminds me of a couple of other games that sound like they should be rhythm games, but either are or aren't:

"Bust-a-Move" sounds even more like a DDR rip off. It's a color-matching puzzle game that's a spin-off of Bubble Bobble. The series is known as Puzzle Bobble in Japan, but not in the west for some reason.

And then there's "Bust a Groove," which actually is a rhythm game in line PaRappa (but about dancing), but because of how similar it sounds to Bust-a-Move, every time I hear about it I forget it's not related.
 
bellydrum said:
How has nobody said

TRIANGLE STRATEGY
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I made the joke before that the title sounds like a geometry textbook...but it's actually a corporate philosophy book.

It's one of my favorite games on the Switch, but it has one of the worst names on the system.

Edit: I couldn't get the link to work, but there's a book titled The Triangle Strategy: How to Create an Engaged, Execution-Focused Workplace, by Michael Tull that's available on Amazon.
 
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Street Fighter III 2nd Impact: Giant Attack

I wouldn’t say it’s a horrible name since I personally like the long and elaborate SF titles with their supers and turbos. But the “Giant Attack” part is quite unexpected. It references Hugo’s first appearance in the series, but sounds more like something out of Dungeons and Dragons.
 
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Pathologic 2 makes people think it's a sequel, when even the original russian name is just "Мор" - the same name the original 2005 game had, just shortened.
 
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Phantom Thief said:
Much like Octopath, it's a name that sort of settles in and start to make sense and "belong" to its game the more time you spend with it (and the game). I do think it is undeniably a worse name than Octopath, and bordering on being incoherent and gibberish, but it's not quite there yet; it sort of makes sense for what it is.

I have a second submission for this thread: Super Smash Bros. for 3DS and Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, I mean what the fuck, at least try
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Mario Kart DS and Mario Kart Wii as well, so boring.
 
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My top 3

1) Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days
2) UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH Exe:Late[cl-r]
3) Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha vs the Soulless Army


Shout out to:
  • "Infinite Undiscovery" (no idea what undiscovery means)
  • "Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue" (is it the final chapter or a prologue?)
  • "Is it wrong to pick up girls in a dungeon?" (the title kinda makes me cringe)

bellydrum said:
How has nobody said
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I hate that name so much.

It makes the game so derivative and generic when it's actually a solid SRPG.
 
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Gartooth said:
Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon

I'm not a fan of when games skip numbering in a series and then return to that numbering later. In North America a good example is the Luigi's Mansion series.

The titles are:

Luigi's Mansion
Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon
Luigi's Mansion 3

Like either Dark Moon should've been called Luigi's Mansion 2 in North America like it was called in the rest of the world, or they should've given a unique sub-title for Luigi's Mansion 3 in this market. I imagine it's a little confusing to fans coming to the franchise late for following it's chronology.
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I remember when Luigi's Mansion 3 was announced, I saw many people say "I didn't even know there was a Luigi's Mansion 2"
 
My partner and I were talking about this the other day, and she thinks "The Cave" was a terrible name for the Ron Gilbert game since it's a boring name and no one knows what you're talking about if you just say "The Cave".

She thinks "Mystery Cave" or something like that would've worked better.

As for me, I think "MAX ANARCHY" was a much better name than "Anarchy Reigns".
 
Hero said:
My partner and I were talking about this the other day, and she thinks "The Cave" was a terrible name for the Ron Gilbert game since it's a boring name and no one knows what you're talking about if you just say "The Cave".

She thinks "Mystery Cave" or something like that would've worked better.

As for me, I think "MAX ANARCHY" was a much better name than "Anarchy Reigns".
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I agree with "The Cave" being a great game with a horrible name. I loved that game.
 
Kingdom Hearts outside of the mainline games, except most of the other games are mainline as well just with terribly confusing names.
 
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Lozjam said:
Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE
Everything about this game doesn't make sense. It's a crossover of fire emblem and Shin Megami Tensei that doesn't reference it in a clear way at all. It included a "sharp" in the tile in which the average person would pronounce "hashtag". It's a bloody mess.
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TMS is SMT in reverse!

Still pretty convoluted though.
 
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juuso said:
Super Mario Bros.
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Completely dependent on whether one pronounces it the correct way ("brothers") or the wack way ("bros"). I mean, that period is there for a reason. It denotes an abbr. not a full stop.

I'll throw Dragon Quest XI S: Echoes of An Elusive Age - Definitive Edition into the ring of great game/shite name shame.
 
Vampire Survivor

Amazing game but the name is meaningless. How can I be a Vampire that survives if they automatically kill you after a certain amount of time in a run passes?!
 
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My vote goes to Octopath Traveller and Triangle Strategy. I get the implication, but still. Good games, bad names.
 
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Maybe not a great game (I'd say it's at least good) but Advance Wars: Dark Conflict. And if that name makes you go 'huh?', that's because America got the infinitely better title of Days of Ruin.
 
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Horizon Chase: Turbo

the best 16bit-inspired arcade racing game on current platforms deserved a better name.
 
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I feel like some things just get lost in translation since alot of these titles are from Japanese developers. At least, that's what I tell myself lol.
 
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Not an egregious example, but I think Rayman Origins is a pretty poor name since, as far as I know, there's nothing in the game that fits the "Origins" subtitle.

Similarly, Rayman 3D is a pretty poor name as it doesn't describe what the game is either (a port of Rayman 2). It's like if the port of MGS3 for 3DS was just called Metal Gear Solid 3D.
 
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Not just games, but I've always been annoyed by anime and other properties that have titles with colons and other random punctuation in them, and especially using "re" all over the place.

Fate/Stay Night
Re:Zero
Kingdom Hearts Re:Coded
Hyperdimension Neptunia Re:Birth

Rebirth is a perfectly good word already! It doesn't need a colon and another capital letter! Just... why? Is there some deeper meaning there that I don't know about?
 
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