GDC 2025 Session Viewer
Game Narrative Summit: By Any Other Name: A Linguist's Approach to Namecraft
Gerben Grave (Narrative Designer, Multiverse Narratives)
Pass Type: All Access Pass, Summits Pass - Get your pass now!
Track: Game Narrative
Format: Lecture
Vault Recording: TBD
Audience Level: All
Whether you're trying to come up with that one perfect name for your game's main character, or needing to create lists of thousands of names for fictional factions, finding or making names can be a daunting task.
Narrative Designer and Game Writer Gerben Grave is passionate about names. He has had to come up with countless names for games such as Age of Wonders 4 and We Were Here Forever. In this talk, he eagerly offers two perspectives on finding and creating better names for your game characters.
He details how names can perform functionally by covering the domains of User Experience, Technical Limitations, and Immersion.
Then, he demonstrates how to manipulate the principles of linguistics by teaching writers about the effects of phonetics, semantics, and culture.
Combined, they provide a reliable approach for endless creative name giving and crafting.
Takeaway
Need to come up with 200 names for space marines? Or is the team dangerously close to locking in your main character's placeholder name? This talk offers practical approaches and practices for finding and creating better names with purpose and intent, rooted in linguistic theory.
Intended Audience
This talk helps novice writers get started on their name crafting journeys. It should equally appeal to narrative designers and game writers who've successfully come up with dozens of character names, but are looking to use more structure in their approach.
