After Shigeru Miyamoto admitted his ticket to the good life was nearly called Mr Video, it struck me that getting that most basic of first impressions - someone's name - nailed is massively important to how they fare in time.
There are plenty of videogame icons who perhaps might not be so iconic today if they were given a duff moniker. We know this because there are plenty of great games featuring characters with forgettable, or worse, ridiculous names for some of their important characters. Just take Sonic's Big The Cat, or Waluigi. Lame or what.
Mr Video was Miyamoto's original name for Mario, before someone at Nintendo Of America wisely pointed out it was a bit rubbish, and perhaps he should be called something more everyday, more Average Joe - or average Mario. In his very first appearance he was Jumpman of course, the carpenter battling it out with an angry ape in Donkey Kong.
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At rivals Sega, Yuji Naka was readying the replacement for company mascot Alex Kidd. A fang-toothed, leather jacket-wearing rock 'n' roller went by the name of Mr Needlemouse, and he even had a girlfriend called Madonna. Sega wasn't all that chuffed with this grimy newcomer, and softened him up by turning him blue and calling Sonic
With a hungry yellow blob, a name change was needed to prevent embarrassment. Puckman could easily have been the victim of cheeky vandals, Namco thought, so his name was changed to 'Pac' before marker pens replaced the original name's 'P' with 'F'.
And Lara Croft was orinally an Amazonian beauty called Lara Cruz. To be honest she probably would have been a hit even if she'd been called Esmeralda Grimwold.
Would any of these names affect how you feel about their games?
