We need a new naming system.

I rarely entertain the boards anymore, but I was here at the beginning … before the beginning when I was concerned with this same topic. Foreshadowing the naming system in such games as Star Wars Galaxies, and playing games such as Star Trek Online/City of Heroes, I saw ahead of what was to be. Since SWG had no @Handle naming convention and was limited to one name per platform/server, I knew this would be an issue and brought it up to Mepps and the dev team. Their response was that it would not be changed.

Hence, here we are, 9 years later, and this topic resurfaces here and again. The best option at this point would be to enable a second space with name creations but what would that solve? Instead of "Magician" now we will have "The Magician" or something similar. While I have previously advocated changing naming conventions, that is likely not going to happen at this stage in the game.

Having said that however, I think that name holdings need to be revisited. If an inactive account has a name, release it. While not ideal, it may or may not help since people like to create free accounts and horde names. If a character has not been played in an age, maybe make it eligible for release? The question though, is how do you appease everyone at this age in the game and not disrupt the paying player base? I think this would be entertained if/when XBone and Switch merge with PS4/PC

I myself have a lifetime subscription but I play some characters more than others. I have 32 names that are unique and easily coveted by others. Should I be forced to lose the names I own but don't play? I think not!

If the dev's would not entertain the @Naming Convention system prior to game launch, will they now? Doubtful, but the game is always evolving.

I really think that it's up to the player base to communicate their desires for a name they want and attempt to contact them directly regarding it. Outside that, the system currently does not allow for it.

I just do not see any way around that logic.

Given the low-to-moderate size of the game's population, the current naming system could work perfectly well if we would just, you know, do a routine name purge for any non-subscriber who hasn't logged in in over a year.

I say this despite the fact that my main character is named "Great Brit_PC1" because I lost my name while active during the PS3 merger. I took it in stride. Whatever parameters they were using at the time, I'm okay with it. But five years later, when the other Great Brit hasn't logged in in years, it would be nice to be able to reclaim the name I had previously had.

Thousands of desireable names are locked away on accounts that haven't logged in since the 30 day trial at the game's original launch. A routine freeing up of names that are not subscribed and have not been logged in in over a year would help to free up the dwindling supply of real names, and eliminate the need for all the XXXXXXXXIIIIIInameIIIIIXXXXXX.

And as for whether or not the developers can figure out who somebody is for the purpose of tickets...

IIIIllllIIIllIIIllllIIllIlIlllIIIIIllIIII

Can you tell me which letters are i's and which ones are L's in Captain Barcode's name up there? If the developers are depending upon the players as the only way to be able to decipher these player names, then that is already a problem that needs to be addressed. Way too many names already use intentionally obfuscating spellings.

There's a part of me that thinks they thought things would be fine as far as naming went. After all, they went into launch with two platforms and multiple servers on those platforms, so they may have thought that any kind of @handle system like CO wasn't necessary.

Problem was, they got hit with ALL kinds of unexpected events in that first year that fudged up things all over, with the hack being the big one. The hits the population took after the hack, the server merges, going FTP and the eventual cross-platform play between PS and PC all contributed to any naming issues we face now. I can't really call it being short-sighted or anything like that because they just got hit with a perfect storm (of sorts) of the unexpected. I really don't think anyone could have anticipated or planned for everything that happened in that first year or so.

I do agree that I don't think they'd look too closely at changing it at this point. Something like character naming is kind of a core aspect of the game and dealt with before launch, and it's all too easy to imagine a lot of unintended glitches and problems arising if they tried changing it or messing with it after all this time.