Nominal Importance: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

[[File:Nominal Importance.gif|link=The Order of the Stick|frame|Okay, Mom Appearing In This One Panel.]]

 

{{quote|'''Jason:''' You're not gonna die on the planet, Guy.

 

This is the naming equivalent of [[You All Look Familiar]], and it is caused by [[The Law of Conservation of Detail]]. If the names are given posthumously, it is [[The Dead Have Names]].

 

* Averted in ''[[The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker|The Legend of Zelda the Wind Waker]]'' and some of the ''Tales'' games, where almost every single character in the game has a name, even random, minor [[NPC]]s.

** Taken a step further in ''[[Breath of Fire]] 2'', where the endgame sequence gives every character a name, first and last (and a few middle) on the other hand, the credits are obtained through a [[Guide Dang It]].

 

 

* Even in the character-based ''[[Ace Attorney]]'' series, there are some characters who do have sprites, but no known names, most obviously the Judge. Of course, any character with a sprite will end up being relevant to a case eventually - even the unnamed Bellboy in the series' second case. There are also characters who are rarely referred to by their names, but have them nonetheless (such as Penny Nichols from the first game's third case), but even they tend to have a piece of information you'll need to know.

* ''[[Hype The Time Quest]]'' averts this by going out of its way to name almost all the [[NPC]]s, down to Maliq, a one-off thug who attacks you. Though there is the exception of a few guards and an executioner.

 

 

* Averted in ''[[Soul Series|Soul Calibur 3]]'''s "Chronicles of the Sword" mode. A lot of [[Elite Mooks]] on the field are named, but all that comes of the names is a strength boost. Regular soldiers just go by the name of their banner.

 

 

* In the expansion to ''[[Star Trek: Voyager]] [[Star Trek Elite Force|Elite Force]]'' the player expands his/her arsenal with a tricorder, which can, among other things, be used to scan various [[NPC]]s. In keeping with the series' [[Red Shirt]] tradition, important NPCs appear with their name intact, while others are simply called "crewman" by the device.

* Every single friendly soldier in the ''[[Call of Duty]]'' series has a name. Characters [[Redshirt Army|not important to the plot]] have randomly generated names, but they're names nonetheless.

 

 

* ''[[World of Warcraft]]'' manages to avert this trope with most [[NPC]]s (except town guards), but there is no risk that you might mistake a NPC as more important: Those that have a quest for you have a golden "!" floating above them, and NPCs with important services have a subtitle such as <Flightmaster> or <Innkeeper>. Some minor NPCs don't even have any dialogue.

** There's extra aversion in the ''Wrath of the Lich King'' expansion. In Dalaran, the Town Guards placed specifically to tell people where the Inn/Flightmaster/Trainers are are replaced by named archmages.

* ''[[Star Wars Galaxies]]'' initially averted this trope, in a sense, by having every single NPC in the game given a randomly generated name, for example, names would be like "Luke Skywalker (a farmboy)". However, not long after release, this feature was disabled as it made server start up after maintenance take too long.

* Averted in ''[[Guild Wars]]'': Although there are a few exceptions, almost all NPCs have names, even if they're simply merchants or there to provide services.

 

 

* ''[[Dungeon Keeper]]'' gives each creature an unique random name.

* ''Myth: The Fallen Lords'' and its sequels likewise avert this to give every living creature (i.e. excluding the undead and such who you wouldn't expect to have names at all) a unique name, and even allows you to rename the units under your command yourself; e.g. that warrior Malory with the 300 kills may just deserve to be called Malory the Great, a title he will carry down the levels for as long as he lives.

 

 

* In ''[[ADOM]]'', if you meet an otherwise normal monster or [[NPC]] with a name,they're either important to your quest, or a stronger-than-normal artifact guardian. Have fun figuring out which is which.

* Averted in ''[[Dwarf Fortress]]''. All the dwarves have names, as do any visiting humans and elves. Even the monsters have names, provided they slaughter enough dwarves to become important.

 

 

* Most games in the ''[[Final Fantasy]]'' series.

** ''[[Final Fantasy VI]]'' was especially bad, as the naming screen for every character you eventually got was distinct, meaning there were a couple characters you encountered early on, but didn't use till a while later, [[Interface Spoiler|that you nonetheless knew would eventually be team members]].

 

 

* ''[[Touhou]]'' has several midboss characters who are never named in-game. They tend to be "named" by fans whatever their race is. The most famous [[Ensemble Darkhorse|and popular]] of these are "Koakuma" (literally "little demon"), and "Daiyousei" (literally "big fairy"). Koakuma, presumably a familiar of the wizard Patchouli, was seized upon as a [[Dojikko]] [[Moe Moe]] character who fawned over Patchouli by fans, while the [[Word of God]], once it finally got around to [[Ascended Extra|acknowledging her existence]] wrote her as a mischievous imp, instead. The end result was a blend of dojikko love with a slight mischievous, sadistic streak in the eyes of the fans. The fan-given names eventually became the apparent [[Sure Why Not|official names]].

** Another example is Daiyousei ("Great Fairy") who is Cirno's stage [[Mini Boss|midboss]] in ''Embodiment of Scarlet Devil''. No name until ZUN was pressed. For the longest time she was considered just Cirno's tag-along who often provided good contrast for her "the strongest" partner; in recent years, the Fandom has begun fleshing out her character in one or two ways. Unlike Koakuma, she's had stealth cameos since her first appearance.

 

 

* In the ''[[Fire Emblem]]'' series, any named character appearing on the battle field is either an ally, a boss, recruitable, or vital to the plot in some other way. Everyone else is generic.

** Then again, this is the only way the games ever attempt to avoid a [[Guide Dang It]], which is a good thing.

 

 

* ''[[STALKER]]'' averts this as well, thanks to the fact that just about everyone in the game- friend or foe, and even dead bodies you come across that were planted specifically by the developers, rather than being killed by rival factions or hostile mutants- have first and last names. Most of these names in the U.S. version at least follow a strange convention, however- while the first name is usually something common to the region, such as Sergei or Vasilya, the last names are usually straight from the dictionary. Which is why it's always hilarious to see a guy named [[Awesome McCoolname|Max Dinosaur]].

** It is because stalkers are given the first name and a nickname, not the last name. This is most likely a reference to the custom of organized criminals in Russia. On the other hand, soldiers in the Zone are referred to by their rank and last name.

 

 

* In the PC game ''[[Pathologic]]'', all of the main characters and important side characters are given names, while minor characters are named [[Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep"|by their description]]. In addition, when you talk to any of the characters, an icon with a black-and-white photo appears in the corner of the screen. With storyline characters, it's a person resembling the model. With random people, [[Lampshade Hanging|it's a creepy ragdoll]].

* ''[[Portal (series)|Portal]]'': Even though it's easy to miss her name, as the [[Player Character]] Chell survives (and beats) GLaDOS twice, has several depictions of her appearance and has the [[Canon]] character traits of being [[Determinator|insanely tenacious]] and a [[Heroic Mime]] by choice. At the end of the co-operative campaign, Atlas and P-Body discover {{spoiler|a vault containing ten thousand more human subjects in suspended animation}}. But in the "Peer Review" DLC {{spoiler|[[G La DOS]] says she killed them all trying to make them as indestructible as Chell. Clearly, they weren't important to the plot.}}

 

 

* ''[[Simoun]]'' averts the voiceover corollary in its first episode, which is narrated by a nameless [[Red Shirt]] pilot who dies (playing the main trope straight) in the episode's climax.

* ''[[Project A-ko]]'' parodies this by naming the three main characters like extras (at least, if you ignore their surnames).

 

 

* In ''[[The Secret of NIMH]]'', Jenner's henchman {{spoiler|who has a [[Heel Face Turn]] at the last minute}} is named Sullivan, although it's only visible in the credits. This is the name of director [[Don Bluth]]'s business partner in making the film.

** Brutus, however, doesn't actually serve much plot purpose, and fades into obscurity almost immediately after being given a name, save for a single shout-out towards the end that you will barely notice due to it being a muffled background noise.

 

 

* In a Russian pulp-fiction novel, the villain holds the hero at a blank point. He's not a cold blooded killer though and even confesses how relieved he is to know almost nothing about his victim, as killing someone you know even slightly is so much harder. The hero hastens to provide his comprehensive credentials, much to the villain's chagrin from such selfish indiscretion.

* Count Olaf's henchmen in ''[[A Series of Unfortunate Events]]'' are usually referred to with descriptive terms like "the white-faced women" and "the bald man"(they sometimes use pseudonyms derived from [[Significant Anagram|anagrams of "Count Olaf"]], though). However, at the time the hook-handed man gets some [[Character Development]] and a backstory in Book the Eleventh, we learn that his name is Fernald.

 

 

* The [[Fridge Brilliance]] section has a reference to the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' episode "Midnight"—where a monster controls people by forcibly repeating their dialogue and mentally turning them against one another. Nobody ''believes'' the Doctor when he tells them his usually fake name "John Smith". In the end the person who actually beats the villain of the week is the Hostess of the trio - and the cast realise, in the aftermath, that they never ''knew'' her name.

** ''[[Doctor Who]]'' writer and ''[[Being Human (UK)]]'' creator Toby Whitehouse has said in a ''[[Doctor Who Magazine]]'' interview that he always gives the [[Red Shirt]]s and minor characters names, simply because it looks better on the actors' CVs.

 

 

* In ''[[Feng Shui]]'', this is an explicit game mechanic—important characters have names, while others are labeled [[Mooks]] and use different combat rules to enforce their scrub status.

* In the RPG of ''[[The Dresden Files (game)|The Dresden Files]]'', the section on creating NPC's references this, sparking a margin discussion between Dresden and Billy. Dresden comments that the random people do, in fact, have a name, to which Billy asks why Harry never writes them down in his case files. Dresden answers that he usually doesn't have time to ask, on account of many of them trying to kill him at the time.

 

 

* This is a common trope, where typically a character is only named if they're important to the plot, or if their name is spoken at some point.

** This is averted in ''[[Urinetown]]'' the musical, where every single member character has a name, even though only 10 of the names are actually spoken (the rest are [[All There in the Manual|only written in the program]]).

 

 

* Played straight in ''[[Bionicle]]''. In-universe, only the Elite- and Leader-Class Skrall are allowed to have names, whereas the Warrior class Skrall are nameless.

** A real-world example: if a character gets named, it ''has'' to be an important player, considering clearing names through legal is a pretttty pricey deal. Which means every name that makes it through the process has to be put to good use.

 

 

* Lampshaded in ''[[Schlock Mercenary]]'', where two grunts laugh about it, but are careful to give their names.

* [[Lampshade Hanging]] in [http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0472.html this] episode of ''[[The Order of the Stick|Order of the Stick]]'', where the [[Genre Savvy]] Elan explains that not having a name means you're just a [[Red Shirt]] whose sole purpose is to say "[[You Shall Not Pass|I'll hold them off]]!" and then get killed. As if to demonstrate, two [[Red Shirt|red shirts]] manage to survive a battle by revealing that they ''do'' have names, with one surviving a near-fatal injury by revealing his first name, and stating that he is saving his last name just in case he gets injured again. {{spoiler|This particular [[Chekhov's Gun]] is later subverted. He attempts to [[Invoked Trope]] Nominal Importance by shouting his last name, but only gets to "Daigo Da-" before being hit in the face with a door.}}

 

 

* Inverted in ''[[The Venture Brothers]]'' with the Monarch's henchmen. #21 and #24 are recurring characters, while the two henchmen who receive names, Speedy and Scott Hall (Henchman #1), are killed in their first episode.

** We ''do'' eventually learn that 21's name is Gary. {{spoiler|24 however dies without us ever learning his, although his reappearance as a ghost means there is still hope}}