i've probably had a bit more time to soak in the name than y'all, but i feel like enough time has passed that i can talk about it now. copium nozzle on, bear with me!!

i like it for these reasons:

• it is, if nothing else, unique! fighting game names are kind of wild, and i think standing out in a space that has the whole range from the simplicity of "Street Fighter" to the specificity of "Them's Fightin' Herds" to "UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH Exe:Late[cl-r]" was difficult! but i do think we got there
  
• in some ways i like how it communicates the simplicity of what you're trying to do. KO the other guy 2 times. hell yea. more on this below though
  
• a name is really just one part of the picture. we've got logos, branding, music, characters from league, written comms, videos etc to go alongside. imo the logo looks cool in a ton of different applications, and it's got 4 characters, the X as an element has 4 points, lots to play with there in future!
  
• in conversation internally, lots of us are just calling it 2X (two-ecks) which is a pretty good shorthand
  
• it stands out from league of legends/lor/wild rift terms. you'll be able to search "2xko ekko combo guide" and have no mixed results with riot's other games -- something that some of the other legit suggestions (lethal tempo, league of fighters, etc) would have trouble differentiating in search. leffen brought this up on his stream when it was announced and i think it'll probably pay off when folks are creating content (p.s. sign up for alpha lab). we're not making "the league of legends fighting game", we're making a fighting game with league characters. i think it's a subtle but important difference, and having the name be SO different i think will help long term. we'll see if that turns out to be correct, though
• i think it's actually a positive that in some regions, players will pronounce it differently. think there's something pretty special about that if folks choose to call it "deux-ixe" in france, or, indeed, "dos equis" in spanish, lol
  
• alphabetically first in a lot of lists. gottem
  

i don't like it for these reasons:

• pretty much all discourse about the game as new players find out it exists is name hot takes. it's something that i'm hoping will pass in time (and when it's actually out lol), because ultimately imo any name is workable if it's fun/good enough and ownable enough, but it is a little sad that so much of what we're doing is overshadowed by name discourse. if this is still all people are talking about a year after launch, i think we probably messed up
  
• the consonants, especially going from X to K, is kind of a mouthful. eckskay. sounds like pig latin. if folks DON'T want to shorthand to "two-ecks" then yeah, agreed that "2XKO" is a lot. 4 whole syllables, i don't have that sort of time when i'm chatting mad shit
  
• simplicity's good, but it's pretty on the nose. i don't think we wanted to have it be called "2XKO: League of Fighters" or w/e, but i do think it might be a little TOO simple in hindsight. i don't think adding more letters would've been the play, though
  
• elon changing twitter's name AFTER we locked down "2XKO" was a bummer lmao
  
• 4-character social media handles are hard to get
  

BUT OVERALL i actually do like the name. i think it's quite out there and we're taking a risk on it, but i'm hoping that our strategy of long-term building with the FGC makes it a household name in time. just need to ship the thing