First-Name Basis/Video Game

Examples of First-Name Basis in VideoGames.

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• In the ero-game Heart de Roommate, the Genki Girl of the True Companions bestows nicknames on those she feels sufficiently close to. The male protagonist is upgraded from "parasite" to his actual name, and one of the other girls is actually nicknamed "Moe Moe".
• Since Commander Shepard of Mass Effect has a Hello, Insert Name Here first name, if the player chooses to make Shepard female and to pursue a flirtation with Lt. Kaidan Alenko, their growing intimacy is indicated by Kaidan switching from "Commander" to Last-Name Basis, and Shepard can comment on the increased familiarity. Shepard, meanwhile, starts calling Kaidan by his first name.
  • Male Shepard starts out calling Ashley either "Chief" (her rank) or "Williams" (her surname), but by the end of the game he has taken to calling her "Ash".
  • It's averted with the other squad members, probably because unlike Kaidan and Ashley, none of them are members of the same military as Shepard, and therefore there are no concerns of rank versus familiarity to worry about and Shepard is free to call all of them by their given names.
• In Mass Effect 2, Joker and EDI (the pilot and shipboard computer, respectively) spend most of the game sniping at one another. At the very end, after Joker risks his life to put EDI in charge of the entire ship, their relationship changes to the point where she starts calling him "Jeff." Aww...
  • Also, Joker originally always referred to EDI as "it," to indicate his contempt for the machine, After the above event, he starts referring to EDI as a "she," in much the same manner as her calling him "Jeff" instead of "Mr. Moreau."
  • Inverted with Miranda and Tali, the only time Shepard doesn't refer to either by their first name is during their respective romance arcs.
• In the second episode of ~Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People~, "Strongbadia the Free," Strong Bad denies The King of Town's authority after being put under house arrest for not paying the new and retroactive e-mail tax he hadn't found out about yet, and declares he will simply call him "The of Town" from now on.
• In Persona 3's english version, Mitsuru Kirijo will always use the last names when addressing or referring to anyone else in SEES, contrasting everyone else who uses first names instead. The only people she refers to on First-Name Basis is Akihiko (whom she's known for years), and the protagonist if you advance her Social Link sufficiently. In the latter case, she even Lampshades the switch.
  • Another interesting case in the same game is Junpei, who addresses all of his female classmates (but especially Yukari) by their first names with "-chan" or the playful and quite familiar suffix "-cchi" appended. Since this doesn't translate so well into English (where using first names with your classmates is normal even if you don't know them personally), a Woolseyism changed it into having him call Yukari "Yuka-tan", an extremely familiar manner of address that carries over the mocking tone of the original (and which only people already well-acquainted with Japanese culture would know, but then again most of the game is like that).
    • Of course, what makes "Yuka-tan" a Woolseyism is that, even if the audience is unfamiliar with Japanese Honorifics, having a classmate mock your first name by associating it with "Yucatán" is funny in and of itself (and quite in character for Junpei.)
    • Another change is that the upperclassmen are referred to as [given name]-senpai in the English version as opposed to [family name]-senpai in the Japanese.
    • In the Playstation Portable re-release of Persona 3, at the last stage of Akihiko's romantic Social Link with the female protagonist, he asks her to call him by his given name. The English translation preserves the intimacy implied in his request by having him ask her to call him "Aki," a nickname previously only used by his best friend.
    • Also in Portable is Ken's romantic social link. Ken refers to all his teammates in the proper -san honorific. Promise to stay with him on the last social rank and he drops the -san when referring to you. (At least in private)
• In Persona 4 in both English and Japanese Rise oddly insists on calling Kanji by his first name without honorific (which he's taken aback by) for no explained reason. They are the same age but so is Naoto who at least gets a Kun suffix and they only just met. The upperclassmen (Protagonist, Yosuke, Chie and Yukiko) get a sempai suffix from her.
  • In the anime series, the protagonist (called Yu Narukami here), eventually gets on First-Name Basis with Yosuke and Rise about halfway through the series.
• Gary Smith from Bully seems to have trouble getting through his sentences without using the name of whoever he's talking to.
  • Actually, he refers to his most hated opponents by petnames such as Little Petey or Jimmy Boy.
• Most of the girls in Fate Stay Night call Shirou by his first name. Saber does it without much prompting, and Rin just starts calling him that for no particular reason. Ilyasviel von Einzbern prefers that everybody she meets or murders call her Ilya, and she calls Shirou by his first name whenever she isn't calling him onii-chan. (In Rin's case, this actually grates on Shirou, and he unhappily compares himself to an adopted stray cat in his head, though he is also too scared of Rin to complain.) The only close girlfriend of Shirou that doesn't initially call him by his first name is Sakura, who prefers to be formal to her sempai.
  • In Sakura's case, it's clearly more than just formality, because in the HF true end she continues doing it even when he's not even her sempai any more (Taiga calls her out on this). Most likely, it was originally formality (when she first came over, she didn't know him that well), but she kept doing it long after it would still be appropriate because she lacked the confidence to ask if she could address him by his name, and in the end it evolved into a kind of pet name for him. It's notable that she always calls him Sempai, never "Emiya-sempai" or "Shirou-sempai", even in the presence of other people who she would also address as "Sempai" (most notably Rin, until Shirou convinces Sakura to call her Nee-san to her face halfway through HF).
• Almost all of the characters in the Pokémon games are known by either their first or their last names, with only certain exceptions:
  • Green/Blue Oak and his older sister Daisy/May.
  • The alternate player character in R/S/E, who is the child of Professor Birch.
  • Steven Stone.
  • Ghetsis and N Harmonia.
• Reinforced in the ending sequence of The World Ends With You, showing a clip (with voice acting) of Shiki saying "Neku, that's the first time you've used my name." Until then he had used such nicknames as 'Stalker'.
  • Well, that sequence has a number of voice-acted lines, most of which were just text to the player when they were actually said; this particular line was from near the end of the first week. (Why is this an exception, anyway? I thought it aptly showed the progression of their relationship over the week.)
  • Beat initially refers to Neku as "Phones", a nickname derived from his constantly wearing headphones. Later on in the week in which Neku partners with him, around the time Neku finds out how he and Rhyme died, he calls Neku by name.
• At the end of Metal Gear Solid, Snake invites Meryl or Otacon (whichever one is on the back of his snowmobile) to address him by his real first name -- David. For some reason they rarely do.
  • Probably justified, in that Snake continues to call Otacon by his nickname, and by the time we see Meryl speak to Snake again in Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, they've grown farther apart.
• In Discworld Noir, Lewton tells his friend Samael (a vampiric pianist/Casablanca reference) that they've known each other long enough, that Samael shouldn't call him by his last name. Samael retorts that they've known each other long enough, that he's earned the right to call Lewton whatever he wants, and prefers the last name.
• Bayonetta usually refers to her stalker Luka (yes he has a crush, but that's not why he's stalking her) as "Cheshire" after her old stuffed cat, and yes this is spoiler-worthy so DO NOT QUESTION ME. Later, after he cheats death and Bayonetta gets her memories back, she gets some more respect for him and calls him by his real name.
• Used for drama in Shin Megami Tensei Strange Journey: during the Neutral Ending, the Artificial Intelligence Arthur, who has been nothing if not professional and measured (though never cold or detached) when communicating with the crew, decides to sacrifice himself to seal the Schwarzwelt. When he confesses fear about it, he addresses you, the Protagonist --but not as Crewman [[[Hello, Insert Name Here]]] as he always does, but by your first name. And then Arthur asks you to give him the strength to overcome that fear so he can carry out his mission.
• In The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess, Midna only starts calling Link by his name after he saves her life after their run-in with Zant. Before that, she called him things like "you" and "hero", if she called him anything at all.
• Maji De Watashi Ni Koi Shinasai: Like everybody else in the family, Yamato calls Kazuko "Wanko" and Yukie "Mayucchi", but in their respective routes he takes to calling them by their first name post-Relationship Upgrade.