Pokemon Nicknames

[Roni]

do you have a preferred way to nickname pokemon? do you follow a theme of sorts? do you just pick a random name that you think fits them? or do you not bother at all?

me personally, regardless of whether i'm playing vanilla or nuzlocke, i nickname every single guy i catch to feel more connected to them. i love giving them the most mundane human names often like steve, sherman, phyllis, etc. just based on how they look like. it's how i came up with Edna for my female crobat, and how she's sorta become a staple in all my playthroughs if i have the chance to catch her.

 

[Sydian]

i nickname everything lol my go-to names are usually food related. like my crystal team is udon, mango, habanera, etc. i try to make it relevant to the pokemon somehow (like fire pokemon are usually named after something spicy or best served hot) but sometimes it's just whatever i'm thinking about when i catch it. but i use all sorts of names, i just usually like to have a theme with them. other name schemes i've used are songs (either off the album or just by one artist), juptier's moons, cities in video games, cities in the Real World.

 

[Zeostar]

My main team gets nicknamed.

HM slaves are named "Cut" or "Rock Smash". (Whatever HM I need them for).

I also had a level 8 Paris that I named "Sacrifice" and I kept it on my team the entire game. I threw it out to take a hit whenever I needed to heal another pokemon.

 

[Duck]

I only started to bother with nicknames relatively recent, and then I try to make a theme out of each run.

The last few themes were soda brand, liquor and fruits. I prefer having a theme to make it feel a bit more cohesive, I guess, not to mention that it makes naming things a bit easier and it's widely known that there are only two hard things in Pokémon: picking the version and naming things.

 

[Palamon]

I pick a theme, usually. I've done poisonous plants, musical notations, German/Russian words and Jupiter's moons once. Whatever is the first theme that pops into my head, I do. I've done mythological gods like Greek gods before, so I wanna do Norse gods someday and other gods from other mythologies as well. I also kinda wanna do types of cheese as nicknames at least once, since there's over 300 of them.

 

[faf]

For the most part, names from other RPGs I've played so Dragon Quest, Final Fantasy, and Octopath Traveler. Sometimes I try to think of a fire name that suits a Pokemon outside that theme.

 

[Figure]

Sometimes I'll do a theme (if I do it is either food or Norse Mythology) and there are a few Pokemon with permanent nicknames. I always name Pidgey, Zephyr, it is a solid name plus, I believe, Falkner gives the Zephyr badge. I didn't know that when I started using the nickname but it works really well! The Zephyr Song is also a really good Red Hot Chili Peppers song.

 

[Roni]

i nickname everything lol my go-to names are usually food related. like my crystal team is udon, mango, habanera, etc. i try to make it relevant to the pokemon somehow (like fire pokemon are usually named after something spicy or best served hot) but sometimes it's just whatever i'm thinking about when i catch it. but i use all sorts of names, i just usually like to have a theme with them. other name schemes i've used are songs (either off the album or just by one artist), juptier's moons, cities in video games, cities in the Real World.

yo Moons of Jupiter is a sick theme to follow i'mma have to try that myself sometime soon.

My main team gets nicknamed.

HM slaves are named "Cut" or "Rock Smash". (Whatever HM I need them for).

I also had a level 8 Paris that I named "Sacrifice" and I kept it on my team the entire game. I threw it out to take a hit whenever I needed to heal another pokemon.

what if the slaves are used for more than one HM tho?

your paras also reminded me of my Bidoof i called Fodder. always thought that was a cool name for an HM slave.

 

[SawkTheWarrior]

I Always nickname pokemon. In pokemon XD, i have a Houndoom named Shibe, A Mewtwo named Stonks in pokemon blue, and stuff like that. Memes are the theme for me! But i alwats name Sawk that i catch "blackbelt"and throh's, ""redbelt". Oh, and Hitmonlees are always named bruce.

 

[Sheep]

I used to go with foods/sweets mostly! Nicknames like Lemon, Blueberry, and Cookie were my ideal lol. Nowadays I am a lot lazier and don't nickname as much. Got a few cool shinies from my secret santa gifter recently though with some super cute nicknames, so that's making me really inspired to try again. For my next run I'll definitely go full nicknames!!

 

[icycatelf]

If I use it, it has to be nicknamed. I usually try to pick a name that connects to the Pokémon somehow (often referring to name meaning websites), like Tahki (cold) for my Shiny Alolan Sandslash and Jasper (a red stone) for one of my Shiny Persian. It usually has to be a "people-sounding" name, but there have been some exceptions (like Chipotle for my Shiny Flareon and Seaglass for my Shiny Corsola).

In my recent Yellow playthough, I named everyone off the top of my head:

Spoiler:

Oz the Sandslash (because Sandshrew looks like it's made of yellow bricks)
Rob the Magneton (from "robot")
Calyptra the Venomoth (a genus of blood-sucking moths)
Siren the Seadra (its mouth is shaped like an alarm siren, plus it's aquatic like mythical sirens)
Hikari the Ninetales (light)
Comet the Tauros (because comets have tails)

 

[Sydian]

yo Moons of Jupiter is a sick theme to follow i'mma have to try that myself sometime soon.

you should! there are some very cool names. it's actually one of my oldest staples aha. i used that name scheme a lot as a kid. io, callisto, and lysithea are some of my favorites. it's even more fitting for pokemon that are based on the moon/nighttime (lunatone, umbreon, lunala).

 

[Figure]

My current SS team is more random though and doesn't really fit a theme.
Quilava - Ragnarok
Pidgeotto - Zephyr
Red Gyarados - Mushu
Ampharos - Ewe
Tentacruel - Metcalf (Seahawks wide receiver becasue he has so many hands 😛)
Eevee - Collider (Particle accelerator and Eevee has unstable molecules? Idk kind of cool)

 

[Davideomosessuale]

Yeah I always name them no matter what. I have a pre-sets of names for some species (es. Kotori or Skyla for flying-types), I name them with puns (es. Milk for poison-types bc I'm lactose intolerant) or alternatively I merge my nickname with their original name (es. my nickname is Jesa so Mismajesas).

 

[Sheep]

or alternatively I merge my nickname with their original name (es. my nickname is Jesa so Mismajesas).

that is really cute and I don't think I've seen anyone else do that in recent memory! may take a page from your book 👍

 

[Sydian]

Red Gyarados - Mushu

is this a vietnamese crystal reference

 

[Figure]

is this a vietnamese crystal reference

Mulan actually!

 

[Kyatra]

I alwyas name my mons, although most of the times my naming patterns are somewhat random,, and it never really stays in one place
Most times I'd just name them based on their japanese name (or french in XY) or just give them really basic names from the top of my head (Luna the Lucario, Rod the Magnezone, Hikari the Serperior)

Sometimes I'd named them based on the naming pattern of dexholder (Like on my Black 2 nuzlocke I named all of my mons based on Lack-Two's pattern and currently on my Platinum randomized run, I name them all based on Diamond's)

And then sometimes I just give up and like on my current Black run, just name them protagonist names, but in different languages (Nanci, Yuuri, Warren, Tony, etc)

 

[Sydian]

Mulan actually!

omg i'm so dumb that one was obvious lol i feel like there was a pokemon that was mushu in vietnamese crystal but it's been so long since i watched any videos about it lmfao i think i'm thinking of hushu...i swear something was hushu...oh well

 

[Brendino]

I always have some sort of theme for my Pokemon's nicknames in each game. I've named them after planets/moons, hockey teams, given them French names (Kalos), names using the Hawaiian alphabet (Alola), and after British towns/cities (Galar).

My go-to for non-specific runs though is anagrammed names- taking some or all of the letters of one of the names in a Pokemon's evolutionary line, and turning that into a new name.