Now, with The Sims 3 due to be released shortly, that means a whole new round of Sims characters that will need names. So, I thought I would give you a bit of insight into how I pick the names for my Sims characters.

Be careful of naming Sims characters after your family members

This is a lesson I learned way back when I started to play the original version of The Sims. The very first thing I did was name a whole bunch of my Sims characters after my family members. At first that was fun. That was until one of my Sims had a little girl and I named her Dorothy after my grandmother.

That was fine too until little Sim Dorothy bought a guinea pig in the year of the guinea pig flu epidemic. As hard as I tried to nurse Dorothy back to health my bedside manner failed and Dorothy died. Now, of course The Sims is just a game but it still was sad to have my grandmother’s namesake die. So, from then on I decided not to name my Sims characters after family members.

Look for inspiration around you

Sometimes when I am creating Sims characters I simply look around the room where I play The Sims and see what sparks my imagination. It could be a show that is on the TV or a magazine and I will pick a name from a character of even the author. Other times I will even go as basic as looking at what I am eating. You would be surprised at how this can go. I have had more than one Mr. or Mrs. Grape.

This also works for just noticing the colors around me. After all, there are so many people in the real world that have last names and even first names that come from the color charts. So, I will look at the walls in the room where I am playing The Sims and suddenly I have Miss Brown. She needs a first name too. So, I look down at my top and now Miss Violet Brown has a name.

Treat them like your Sims babies

As I said, naming a Sims character is not totally dislike naming a real baby. So, why not go where people go when they are stumped for names for their flesh and blood kids. That is right – the baby name lists!

Luckily, with the miracle of modern technology you don’t have to go out and buy and actual baby names book just to give a name to your characters in The Sims 3.

Instead you can just go to any one of the many baby name websites out thereon the internet. I picked just a few of them out of Google for you:

Find Baby Names UK – A place to find names for The Sims 3 characters with a British twist.

Think Baby Names – You will find baby names for both genders from around the world on this site. It also goes into detail about the meaning of baby names so you can give your characters in The Sims 3 a name the really fits their Sims personality.

Indian Baby Names – Find names for your Sims 3 characters that have an Indian ring to them. The Indian baby name site also tells you their meanings.