Simsworthy Names in Real Life

I know I have done this in the past when I can't think of a fresh name, I use to open up the phone book and looks for interesting-sounding names. I don't do that anymore, simply because I no longer have any phonebooks.

On a side note, though I have had sims show up in the game with names of people I know, myself included. Those would always make me take a step back or a double take.

My daughter bought a book "The Best Baby Name Book" and it has over 13,000 names. When I first started playing and making sims with Sims 2, she gave me the book to make finding names easier. I use it often, though I also will search for specific names online if playing someone from a different country, an occult, a pirate, etc.

"LaBlue0314;c-18165224" wrote:
I use to open up the phone book and looks for interesting-sounding names. I don't do that anymore, simply because I no longer have any phonebooks.

I have old phonebooks I still do this with. Edit: I have a habit of giving my sims last names for their first, or something like Zucchini. Right now my sim's son is named Monk after Adrian Monk.

idk i tend to gravitate towards long common names and names with some type of suitable meaning

although I never give my sims finnish names despite being finnish because that just immediately feels off :sweat_smile:

and long names... mostly cause i have short myself and dislike it :lol:

and I also feel kinda iffy about names with religious meaning where i can spot it too easily because well I should be the sim god how would my sims know about other religions to have??? huh???? traitors. whole bunch.

I don't often run into names i like for my sims without googlin' but when i do its probably some tv show or something

also sometimes i do like translation of finnish name i like meaning of or if it sounds like there could be english version look for that and use that instead

Real life names, not so much. Although I might subconsciously do it, I run into so many names during work.
I often use fiction as a reference. Specifically for Sims Medieval, I've had a Harry Potter themed kingdom, a Ranger's Apprentice themed kingdom, plans for a Riyria themed kingdom, etc.
For sims 4, I either browse behindthename, or use the randomizer.
I do occasionally write down names I want to use, regardless of where I heard them. But I have separate lists for first names and surnames so my sims end up having a different combination.

I usually give my sims names that would generally be considered unusual or special in real life. My real life children have common regular names because I don't want them to constantly have to spell their names or explain them. The extraordinary names are reserved for my sims. my sims have names based on stars and constellation, book characters, mythology,... You name it.

When I don't have inspiration, I use name generators online, especially fantasy name generators. Or I end up on sites for baby names and select the more special ones from there.

I'm certainly guilty of having used people's names as Sim names - never the whole thing though, just the first name or an interesting surname. Recently I wanted a few more silly names, so the last few Sims I've named have been "Instant Karma", Razor Blade" and "Sourdough Loaf".

I also have a massive spreadsheet with about 44k firstname / lastname combinations that I've used too. It's basically a list of first names and last names, and the spreadsheet just randomly picks one of each and uses the concatenate function to smoosh them together. It was based an an older name generator for fantasy characters. Example output below:
https://i.imgur.com/8B7fQsv.jpg

I’ve got one save with a Greek mythology theme going on. Well, there are a couple of Sims in that save who don’t have names that are directly taken from the myths, but their names are taken from Ancient Greek words so they fit with the overall theme anyway. There are more names I could use for the next generation, too.
I tend to like using name themes. The only issue is that whenever I pick a theme, I end up liking the girls’ names more than the boys’ ones.
Aside from Greek mythology, I mostly use different nationalities (eg Irish, German, Japanese and so on). Sometimes I don’t have a particular theme.

Sometimes I take from certain people, but more their characteristics rather than their name. Sometimes I want to make certain sims with a particular ancestry, and I will look up names on the internet for that. Once I did use a last name of a doctor I had because it just seemed to fit.

Short answer: Yes.

Longer answer, because it's much more fun: Creating Sims and naming them might be the part of the game my daughter and I enjoy most.

We saw a name on a list of donors to a theater renovation, and we looked at each other. "She's about to become a Sim," Z declared, and I nodded.

As the credits rolled by, I spotted the name of someone who worked on a movie. I recited the name. "That's a good one," I observed. Z nodded. We've also added a few fictional characters to our saves, but not too many.

We're constantly using a variety of fantasy name generators to help us name our Sim creations. We'll choose an ethnicity, and off we'll go.

I've played other games that need to generate lots of character names. Football Manager populates the world with the names of "newgen" teenagers who join football (soccer) clubs all over the world as the years roll by. Some of these fictional footballers have lent their names to Sims. Z is putting the finishing touches on James James, who first appeared on my laptop screen as a goalkeeper for Plymouth Argyle.

Perhaps the nerdiest Sim-naming trend we've adopted is giving a few Sims the names of people who were caught in the Johnstown Flood, which wrecked a Pennsylvania city in 1889. One of the heroes of that story earned a place in our Gallery. Two or three others, who lost their lives in the Flood, live their best lives in our Simworld.