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Do you nickname your Pokémon?

Do you nickname your Pokémon?


  • Total voters
    61
When I first started out in Gen 1, no, I didn't. Mostly because I had the naming creativity of a brick back then. But from Gen 2 onward I would always nickname my Mons. I feel it adds more personal flair to them and makes them seem more unique. While some names I come up with are pretty obvious/to-the-point others can be a bit more interesting and/or meaningful. It helps that over the years I was exposed to more games and anime which opened up my creativity to more fun and desirable levels, as I often suffered from limited exposure due to where I lived (I didn't get an genuine game store opened up until I was 17, otherwise the closest thing I had was Blockbuster and FYE, and their selection was... meh... no surprise they went out of business). But, anyway, I love nicknaming my Mons for the extra flair and makes them feel more like companions over mindless attack drones like earlier games made them feel like.
 
No. I don't think I've ever done that. and if I did it was once or twice. No reason really, guess I just prefer to read the Pokemon's original name instead of a nickname when I battle.
Well, back in Gen II, I had a friend on my former Condominium who'd put actual people's names on his Pokemon... I don't remember most of them, but I do remember he had a Yadoran nicknamed "Mauro".
 
Gen III is when I started to occasionally give nicknames to my Pokemon. When I do give them nicknames it's generally names of former (or current) pets, or names of my favorite characters in other series.
 
I nickname all my team members. I'm rather picky with what nicknames I assign, and with so many pokemon in my team, some of them go quite a while without one. During this stage, they feel....naked. Incomplete. Bleh.
 
Honestly, no. I never manage to pick and name I actually like, so I just never bother.

I think the only time I did named one of my Pokémon was an male Ralts I got in ORAS, and traded an Dawn Stone over from XY to have an Gallade. Named him ''Baby Boy'' cuz I love that Pokémon and I will protect him with my LIFE.
 
Absolutely not. I don't see the point of it because I always think of Pokemon by their species names and nicknames just annoy the heck out of me.
 
I used to nickname every Pokemon I caught - or at the very least, all my important ones. The only exception was in Yellow, where I liked to re-create Ash's team, so it felt more natural to keep my Pokemon's species names.

This all changed, however, when I started making Living Dexes. Thinking up names for every Pokemon in a Living Dex wasn't really practical, so I preferred not to nickname any of them, to make the Dex seem more neat and uniform.

At first, I still had a few boxes of nicknamed Pokemon, with the Living Dex following afterwards. But this never felt quite right to me, because it was like I was favouring some Pokemon over others.

So I ended up having a few save files where I didn't nickname any of my Pokemon. The Pokemon in my Living Dex became my important Pokemon. If I wanted to take a Pokemon out of my party, I'd actually scroll through my Living Dex and put it back in its correct spot in the Dex. I really enjoyed playing the game this way, it made me feel as if the entire Pokedex was my team!

Lately, though, I've been focusing on casual playthroughs again, and have been having trouble deciding whether to nickname my Pokemon or not. I like the added personalisation that nicknames bring, but during my time as a Living Dexer I grew to like the simplicity of un-nicknamed Pokemon too.

Nicknames sometimes cause problems for me when it comes to using the same Pokemon in multiple games. To give an example, I have a tradition of naming Typhlosion "Bill", and can't imagine ever using a different nickname for it. If I want to use a Typhlosion in both Crystal and SoulSilver, naming both of them Bill doesn't feel right, because it's like having two copies of the same Pokemon. Calling them both by their species name solves this problem immediately, but then I'm missing out on the personalisation. Maybe I'll end up using nicknames in some games but not others.

TL;DR - I used to nickname my Pokemon, and then didn't, and now I can't decide whether to or not. I voted "Sometimes; it depends", because that best describes my current relationship with nicknames.
 
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I always nickname my pokemon. Makes them feel more personalized and unique and helps me feel bonded with them. I was surprised when it was a required rule for Nuzlockes because I assumed everyone did anyways. Though oddly I can't remember if I was smart enough to nickname my pokemon when I originally played Blue and Silver as a kid. But for sure after I got back into the series for Soul Silver's release I have always named my pokemon. Now whether those names are any good is something else entirely...

(I mean I've even nicknamed some of my pikachu plushies. Got a witch hat wearin one named Mischief, a Valentine's day one holding a cupcake named Muffin, and the other one I have with a nickname is named Giggles because it looks like its laughing. I.. I am not always the best with nicknames. And then sometimes I name a Fennekin Oracle, a Litten Neon, or a Snubbul Bitsy.)
 
I never nickname my Pokémon and I never will. Whereas many people would feel weird not giving their Pokémon a nickname, for me it's the complete opposite. Nicknaming my Pokémon just feels really weird and unnatural for some reason. I'm just more used to the species names, and I'm not very good at coming up with fitting names I like anyway.

It's not that I don't care about the Pokémon I raise in my games. On the contrary, I've carefully preserved all the teams I've made in many games throughout the years. I'm just not fond of nicknaming whatsoever.
 
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