Why You Should Nickname Your Pokémon
Scott Charboneau December 18, 2012Why You Should Nickname Your Pokémon,
Art by SpunkFromPunk @ DeviantArt
Juliet:
“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.”
Me:
“Yeah, but I really want to name my Bidoof Steve.”
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I spent all week attempting to find a good analogy for nicknaming Pokémon using Romeo and Juliet, but the best I could do was make another Bidoof joke, so there ya go.
Nicknaming has been around since Gen I, but I never really did it. I figured, there’s a reason these critters have their own names, so why would I want to change it? This held true until Gen III, when I got a copy of Sapphire. My buddies and I would stay up all night, trying to complete our Pokédex, hunting for shinies, and duking it out in some intense double battles. We were always trying to one-up each other with progressively funnier and funnier names. I don’t know why, but for some reason, we thought my friend’s Lotad had the best name: Latod (pronounced Luh-Toad). Don’t ask me why, but it was awesome.
Anyways, there are many reasons to nickname your Pokémon, but here are some of the best.
Reason 1 – Bonding
By naming something, you embed a piece of yourself into the object. Part of your personality, maybe even part of your soul, is transferred over, and it creates a special bond between you and the object.
Remember when you got that cute little puppy under the Christmas tree? The one with the sleepy eyes and cute little brown spots? Patches, that’s right. You named it Patches. Aren’t you glad you didn’t name it “Dog”?
So why would you name your Pikachu “Pikachu”? If you can’t think of anything clever, just call it Sparky and get it over with.
Speaking of being clever…
Reason 2 – It’s Fun
Thinking of a name is one of my favorite parts of the game. Some people name their team after their friends, some name them after the first thing that pops in their head, and some people take a moment to ponder something clever.
Personally, I usually go with whatever jumps in my head, but sometimes I really think about it. It took me no more than two seconds to name my Tepig “Porky”, but it took a couple minutes of thinking to name my Gliscor “Aero”.
Names can also be hilarious. On episode 58 of It’s Super Effective, the guys officially appointed Wumple as “Buttface”. Now, it’s not wholey original, but it is extremely funny because Wurmple’s face actually looks like, well, a butt. This is definitely something my friends and I would have done.
Then there’s the whole inappropriate naming thing. I won’t say any of the names here, but I’m sure if my mother saw some of the names I came up with, I’d be getting my mouth washed out with soap. (Don’t act like you’ve never done it!)
Reason 3 –Identification
This is a functional reason. When I breed Pokémon for IVs, I wind up with dozens of the same Pokémon, and after a while, it’s hard to keep track of things. In the first breeding session, I name the critters A1, A2, A3, etc. Then, if I switch out one or two of the parents, I name the next batch B1, B2, B3, etc. This allows me to keep track of which offspring came from which group of parents. Keep using this method until you get the Pokémon you’re after.
And once you finally get that Adamant Growlithe with Intimidate, perfect Attack IVs, Close Combat, and Flare Blitz, you can go to the Name Rater and change its name from “E7” to “McBawse”. (True story)
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I’ll end the article with a quick story about my favorite nicknaming experience. It happened quite recently, actually. I was hanging out with my son, playing videogames together. He was playing Little Big Planet 2, and I was playing Black 2. I was fishing, and managed to catch a Seaking, so I asked my 3 year old son what I should name it. He instantly replied “A Bunny”. So, now I have a level 44 Seaking named “A Bunny”. How cute is that!? It’s crazy to think that a special moment like this would have been missed if I didn’t nickname my Pokémon.
So, nickname your Pokémon. You never know what you could miss.
What are the best nicknames you’ve come up with? Have you ever had an experience like mine?
Written by Scott
@scottcharboneau
Proofed by Greg
@gdavidson79
Comments (11)
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I always tell myself I’ll nickname my Pokémon, and then I never follow through. I’m too particular, I like to follow a theme. I’ll start out OK and then will lose interest or run out of cool names.
I think the other reason I don’t is because of the animé. All the episodes I’ve watched, which is not a lot mind you, I don’t think I have heard any of the trainers refer to their Pokémon by nicknames.
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I remember only one instance in the animé where a Pokémon was referred to by a nickname: Beans the Politoed.
I’m one of those “clever perfectionist” type nicknamers. I often look up actual foreign (usually Latin or Japanese) names which carry meanings similar to the elements, traits, and personalities of my Pokémon.
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There have been a couple. I think Richie named his Pokemon, although I don’t remember what. (I think the Butterfree was called Happy, or something)
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I nicknamed my Emboar “Ganon” & I got an Emolga named “Rocky”.
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I’ve always been a huge advocate of nicknames. I used to be none-to-clever with my names(Kipper the Mudkip, Sparky the Luxray, ect.), but more recently I’ve started theming my nicknames, starting in White. This coincided with my getting more into anime at the time, so I decided to name all of my team members after my favorite anime villains. Orochimaru the Serperior, oh how I love you. Similarly, I had just started re-watching Soul Eater when I started White 2, so I named my team after characters from that.
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For a long time I did not nickname my pokemon.Hell, I sometimes named them their actual name (i.e. I nicknamed my torchic :”Torchic”). Then ,right after I finished soulsilver, I began a nuzlocke on my old emerald game. I thought maybe naming my pokemon would be better and I tried it.It did make the expirience much more personal, and I have been nicknaming my pokemon ever sience.
As for my favorite nicknames, I always try to make my nickname into obscure refrences, and my best are: My reuniclus “Ubar” and my heracross “Mr.Satan”.
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Nuzlocke is so awesome. Evil Tooth and Bone Sauce were both actually on my Ruby Nuzlocke team when I beat the Elite Four. You can see the rest of the team here: http://www.scottcharboneau.com/hiatus-and-other-news/
My personal savior was Olimar, the Lanturn. Haha.
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I always nickname my Pokemon. It’s a major part of the experience for me, to the point where I think I would enjoy the game a lot less if they didn’t have that option. I won’t use a Pokemon if it doesn’t have a nickname, because to me it feels like having a pet cat named “cat”, I dunno, just feels strange. I respect the people that don’t but nicknaming for me is just so much fun and more personal.
I don’t nickname every single Pokemon I catch though. If it’s just going to my box for the sake of Pokedex data, and nothing clever pops to mind, I won’t bother. But all the ones I ever use on my team definitely get nicknames.
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The only pokemon i ever nicknamed was my pikachu in yellow. Elvis was one of the strongest electric pokemon i ever had.
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Oh Wow, great article! I perhaps almost always nearly nickname mine.
I like to think of Pokémon as a journal of sorts,when I was travelling around Australia & Asia a while back I used to catch a few ‘mon for each phase of the trip. Not necessarily to max out to lvl 100 but for me to reflect upon when I revisit the games. I never trade in many games, but especially not Pokémon games.
Now with the advent of generation six when the fancy takes me I’ll revisit my paks and cards & even my Wii Ranch & see who is hanging out there waiting to join me in a new region.
I’m a firm believer in Bonding is solidified with nicknaming. Triumphs and tragedies in our Lives reflected in these animals that are with Us constantly.
It’s just natural.
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