Naming My Cities

In Civ IV, part of the game is building new cities. After all, you want your empire to expand - and to do it, you need to build cities. The game will auto-name cities for you, depending on what civilization you're playing as. For example, if you're playing as the Americans, your cities will be named Washington, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, etc. If you play as the Romans, your cities will be named Rome, Cumae, Pisae, Antium, etc.

After a while, I started getting bored with the regular city names - so I started coming up with my own. In one game, I named them after parts of the San Fernando Valley - my cities were named Van Nuys, North Hollywood, Encino, Northridge, Burbank, etc. Another time, I named my cities after nicknames for bad parts of town - my capitol city was named the Ghetto, and my cities were named the Crack District, the Trailer Park, Brothel Street, etc. In my most recent game, I named my cities after young female celebrities - my capitol city was named Paris Hilton, and my cities were named Lindsey Lohan, Britney Spears, Hilary Duff, etc.

The fun starts to happen when you get in-game events from the computer about things that affect your civilization. And when it tells you that a new religion has spread, or a "Great Person" has been born, or a new building has been built - it lets you know... and it tells you in what city this event happened in. This leads to such in-game events as-

Christianity has been founded in the Ghetto.
The Temple of Solomon has been built in North Hollywood.
The borders of Britney Spears have expanded.
Buddhism has spread in Paris Hilton.
Confucianism has spread in the Trailer Park.
Christianity has spread in Brothel Street.
Ben Franklin has been born in Paris Hilton.
You have captured Northridge!
The Sistine Chapel has been built in Hilary Duff.

Now that I think about it - "Paris Hilton" is just a great punchline to any joke. Watch -

"Knock knock."
"Who's there?"
"Paris Hilton!"

See? The comedy writes itself. Now a normal person would just leave the game alone and let it auto-name cities. Me? I prefer it when the borders of the Crack District expand...