Abbreviations

Dosed

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Mar 26, 2008
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I've recently joined the Escapist forums after frequently viewing ZP. I love the community however one thing that gets right up my jacksy, the amount of abbreviations used.

Now don't get me wrong i'm all for them but when I don't know what they stand for it annoys me a bit.. especially when someone's whole post is about the abbreviation for the game. So I decided that maybe it would be a good idea to get an abbreviation list up. If you guys think this is a good idea then say so and maybe, just maybe we could get it stickied. :)

I know a few of you guys are hardcore veterans knowing every short-hand name for every game, genre, character etc but some of us don't especially newbies to games and this forum. I don't know if this has been done before and if it has smack me in the face. If this all goes well i'll get off my fat arse and try to categorise them into genres etc. Obvisouly try to list some of the more popularly discussed games on the site, otherwise it'll just turn into a list of endlessness.

So to get the ball rolling i'll try to think of a few.

HL - Half Life
GTA - Grand Theft Auto
AoE - Age of Empires
WoW - World of Warcraft
RS - RuneScape
TS - TimeSplitters
CS:S - Counter-Strike: Source
CoD - Call of Duty
GH - Guitar Hero
NFS - Need For Speed
PoP - Prince of Persia
DoW - Dawn of War

EDIT: And now for the ones you guys have come up with (thanks to all)

Pkmn - Pokemon
D2 - Diablo 2
LoD - Diablo 2: Lord of Destruction
AoM - Age of Mythology
RO - Ragnarok Online
WC1/2/3 - WarCraft
FT - Warcraft: Frozen Throne
EVE - EVE Online
NWN - Neverwinter Nights
KoL - Kingdom of Loathing
TF - Team Fortress
UT - Unreal Tournament
FF - Final Fantasy
KH - Kingdom of Hearts
DQ - Dragon Quest
DBZ - Dragon Ball Z
BG - Baldur's Gate
LOTR - Lord of the Rings
ToP - Tales of Phantasia
"S - Tales of Symphonia
CT - Chrono Trigger
CC - Chrono Cross
CS - Counter Strike
BoF - Breath of Fire
PS - Phantasy Star
CoN - Champions of Norrath
C&C - Command & Conquer
EE - Empire Earth
WiC - World in Conflict
AC - Assassin's Creed
GoW - God of War
GeoW - Gears of War
TLoZ - The Legend of Zelda


I did that just by looking/thinking of the games i've got/played. Any criticisms are welcomed and if enough people think this is stupid/sucks then i'll get rid of it :)
 

Zemalac

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Apr 22, 2008
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I'd say that Half-Life, GTA, CS, and WoW are the only ones that consistently get mentioned as abbriviations without first refering to them by their full title.
However, if you're wanting more acronyms...
C&C-Command & Conquer
EE-Empire Earth
WiC-World in Conflict
etc-everything else
 

stompy

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Jan 21, 2008
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SSBB- Super Smash Brother Brawl

And good idea OP...

OP- Opening poster (also known as TC- Topic starter)
 

Minic

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Dec 18, 2007
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MK = Mario Kart. That can be followed with 64, SC (Super Circuit, the GBA title), DD, DS or Wii, or preceded by S, depending on which installment is being discussed.
 

Mstrswrd

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Mar 2, 2008
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Games that Yahtzee has already done and/or made a reference to. AC is "Assassin's Creed." "GoW" is God of War, while "GeoW" is Gears of War. TLoZ is "The Legend of Zelda" (I'm not going into all of the specifics).

For future reference (because he's probably going to have to review these) "The World Ends With You" is TWEWY (or with lowercase letters, doesn't matter), ToS is Tales of Symphonia (and, more specifically, it's sequel), and I don't want to think of any more... and since we all know how much Yahtzee hates JRPG's, prepare for much hatred in the future(in a hilarious way).
 

qbert4ever

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Dec 14, 2007
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Minic said:
MK = Mario Kart.
The problem with that is that MK also can stand for Mortal Kombat. I would say if you use an abbreviation that can have more then one well known meaning, you should, as you mentioned, follow it up with something to define it, such as MK: Deception or MK: SS. Same problem with God of War and Gears of War. In that case I would just try to make it very clear which one you are talking about.

On to the list!

LoZ - Legend of Zelda
LoTR - Lord of The Rings
RB - Rock Band

(I never said it would be a long list...)
 

flamedance58

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May 2, 2008
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Pkmn - Pokemon
D2 - Diablo 2
LoD - Diablo 2: Lord of Destruction
AoM - Age of Mythology
RO - Ragnarok Online
WC1/2/3 - WarCraft
FT - Warcraft: Frozen Throne
EVE - EVE Online
NWN - Neverwinter Nights
KoL - Kingdom of Loathing
TF - Team Fortress
UT - Unreal Tournament
FF - Final Fantasy
KH - Kingdom of Hearts
DQ - Dragon Quest
DBZ - Dragon Ball Z
BG - Baldur's Gate
LOTR - Lord of the Rings
ToP - Tales of Phantasia
"S - Tales of Symphonia
CT - Chrono Trigger
CC - Chrono Cross
CS - Counter Strike
BoF - Breath of Fire
PS - Phantasy Star
CoN - Champions of Norrath
 

Lightbulb

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Oct 28, 2007
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SMAC Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri (a personal favourite acronym)

Heres where it starts to get confusing:

AC Alpha Centauri
AC Asheron's Call
AC Assassins Creed

AoC Age of Camelot
AoC Age of Conan


I hate acronyms.
 

JakubK666

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Jan 1, 2008
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DoW:DC / DC - Dark Crusade
WoW:TBB / TBB - Burning Crusade
WoW:WoLK / WoLK - Wrath of Lich King
L2 - Linage 2
EQ2 - Everquest 2
ZP - Zero Punctuation
RP - Roleplay(A 30 page thread full of zombies/aliens and people writing in a retarded manner. j/k)
W40K - Warhammer 40,000
Atm - At the moment
Imo - In my opinion
Joe - RUN!

PS: This should be stickied.
 

Saskwach

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Nov 4, 2007
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I'm against using an abbreviation unless the elongated version has already been mentioned quite clearly in the thread. For example, if I'm about to bring up Assassin's Creed I would start out by saying Assassin's Creed and then move onto AC for sloth's sake. However, if the thread were obviously about AC or I was quoting a post using it's full name abbreviation from the beginning would be alright. I like the idea behind this thread but my guidelines would probably make things easier than a giant reference list (if only we could get an entire forum-worth of people to abide by them. Curse you all and your diversity!).
 

Dosed

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Mar 26, 2008
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Saskwach said:
I'm against using an abbreviation unless the elongated version has already been mentioned quite clearly in the thread. For example, if I'm about to bring up Assassin's Creed I would start out by saying Assassin's Creed and then move onto AC for sloth's sake. However, if the thread were obviously about AC or I was quoting a post using it's full name abbreviation from the beginning would be alright.
I agree but some people just jump right in with the abbreviations even if the topic is not about that specific game or they nor has anyone else mentioned the game and abbreviated it afterwards.
 

neems

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Jan 4, 2008
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TS for TimeSplitters?

I've always used TS to stand for Team Speak, although I guess context would make it fairly self explanatory which was intended. Of course, I've never actually seen anyone talking about Time Splitters on a forum.

I've seen SotC used a few times (Shadow of The Colossus).
KOTOR - Knights of the Old Republic
GW - Guild Wars
CoD - Call of Duty
DoD - Day Of Defeat

Practically every game that has 2 or more words in the title has been shortened to an acronym at some point.
 

josh797

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Nov 20, 2007
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Saskwach said:
I'm against using an abbreviation unless the elongated version has already been mentioned quite clearly in the thread. For example, if I'm about to bring up Assassin's Creed I would start out by saying Assassin's Creed and then move onto AC for sloth's sake. However, if the thread were obviously about AC or I was quoting a post using it's full name abbreviation from the beginning would be alright. I like the idea behind this thread but my guidelines would probably make things easier than a giant reference list (if only we could get an entire forum-worth of people to abide by them. Curse you all and your diversity!).

this is exactly what i do, and agree with sasquatch that we should make it a forum wide rule. all in favor post aye!

aye!
 

Dosed

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Mar 26, 2008
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Aye! Although I don't really understand what Saskwach is trying to get across (no offence) do you mean if everyone abided to specific rules? Just a question :)
 

Saskwach

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Dosed said:
Aye! Although I don't really understand what Saskwach is trying to get across (no offence) do you mean if everyone abided to specific rules? Just a question :)
Two simple rules:
1.Proper name first in every post, then go wild with the abbreviations.
2.If the thread is about what you're abbreviating, or you're quoting someone who has clearly used the proper name, ignore rule 1 and go crazy.
And also:
3. In those rare cases where you or other posters are alternating between two names with the same abbreviation don't abbreviate at all, or find a more unique abbreviation if you can't be bothered.
 

Dosed

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Judging by the interest in this thread i'd pretty much say you guys weren't interested? I'm not trying to sound like an ass... just a statement :)