Nephilim Nomenclature

Naming the creatures in Dawn of the Monsters

One of the fun parts about writing Dawn of the Monsters was coming up with names for all the giant monsters or kaiju that we created to inhabit the game's world. This article shows what the process for naming the Nephilim was like, and what each of them means!

Be warned that this article contains SPOILERS for Dawn of the Monsters!

First of all, what about the word Nephilim itself?

We wanted a unique name for our kaiju, avoiding anything that sounded too generic, but many synonyms for “giant” or “monster” have already been used in other media. After some research, we landed on “Nephilim”. The Nephilim are mysterious, enormous beings from Biblical stories, which different sources interpret as an ancient race of giants, fallen angels, or some kind of human-divine hybrids.

We liked the proximity of “Nephilim” to the Angels from Neon Genesis Evangelion, of course; but most importantly, it’s a name that hints at the ancient and unclear origin of the monsters—and make sure to read the in-game Archives for more hints at their true nature!

With that out of the way, let’s start with our two main, playable Nephilim! We came up with these two names very early in the project.

  • Megadon
    Mega (from Greek "megas/μέγας", "large") + –don (from Latin “odṓn”, “tooth”)

  • Ganira
    Gani (from Japanese "kani/かに", "crab") + –ra (as in Gamera or Gojira)

We wanted Megadon’s name to be snappy, easy to remember, and to indicate his size—mega—and ferocity—tooth, a suffix used in the names of many dinosaurs and other prehistoric reptiles. As for Ganira, we softened the first consonant, instead of having her be called Kanira… similar to how Gamera features a softened “kame/亀” (“turtle”) in his name. Our Japanese partners seemed to get a nice chuckle out of this!

When the time came to name the rest of the Nephilim, we decided to establish a naming convention that we could follow. It had to be one that matched the names we already had, but we also tried our best to avoid calling everything “animal + la/ra”, since that’s the most popular way to name kaiju (Mothra, Gamera, Gojira, Gabara, etc.).

We came up with a simple formula:

"([Variant word]) [Root word]+[Kaiju suffix]"

  • [Variant word]: A descriptive word that serves to differentiate similar Nephilim with different qualities. It can appear either before or after the base name.

  • [Root word]: A base word related to the Nephilim's nature.

  • [Kaiju suffix]: An extra syllable or two is added to the root word, to make it sound more like the kaiju names we all know and love.

Additionally, we decided we wanted to use a variety of languages when naming the Nephilim—some better known, some more obscure—in order to better reflect the international nature of both the Nephilim and DAWN. But at the same time, we made sure not to pick words that would be too difficult to pronounce in English or other languages!

The Makairus "family" is a fine example of this convention put to effect. We picked a fitting Latin word as the root, we gave them a –us borrowed from Anguirus of Godzilla Raids Again fame, and each of the variants has a descriptive variant word.

  • Makairus
    (development name: Knifehead)

    Makai (from Greek "makhaira/μάχαιρα", a large knife or short sword) + -rus

  • Infra Makairus
    (development name: Knifehead Weak)

    Infra (Latin "infra", "below") + Makairus

  • Alpha Makairus
    (development name: Knifehead Strong)

    Alpha (Greek "alpha/ἄλφα", first letter of the alphabet; from Phoenician "aleph/𐤀𐤋𐤐") + Makairus

  • Electro Makairus
    (development name: Knifehead Self-Destruct)

    Electro (from Greek "elektron/ἤλεκτρον", "amber", later used in relation to electricity) + Makairus

  • Hydro Makairus
    (development name: Knifehead Drench)

    Hydro (form Greek "hudor/ὕδωρ", "water") + Makairus

  • Pyro Makairus
    (development name: Knifehead Lava)

    Pyro (from Greek "pyr/πῦρ", "fire") + Makairus

For the Sumstro family, we wondered, what language would match a ranged attacker? We checked a few, but ended up liking the Mongolian "sum" best, after remembering their famed mounted archers of old.

  • Sumstro
    (development name: Ranged Lob)

    Sum (Mongolian "sum/сум", "arrow") + -tro

  • Dain Sumstro
    (development name: Ranged Shoot)

    Dain (Mongolian "dain/дайн", "war") + Sumstro

  • Galt Sumstro
    (development name: Ranged Beam)

    Galt (Mongolian "galt/галт", "fiery") + Sumstro

For Aggrox, we chose the –ox suffix because of the animal, wanting to give players the feeling that they’re about to fight something stronger than an ox! As a little piece of trivia, notice that Tidal Aggrox’s development name, “Lugoon”, was a mix of the words “lagoon”, “lug” and “goon”.

  • Aggrox
    (development name: Bruiser)

    Aggro (from English "aggresive") + -ox

  • Tidal Aggrox
    (development name: Lugoon)

    Tidal (English "tidal") + Aggrox

A favorite in our company, Taurodon is internally known as "Onion" (from Japanse "oni/おに", "evil spirit"… or because it's shaped kinda like an onion). For the final name, we went with Latin for “bull” to give players a hint that something dangerous is about to charge straight at them!

  • Taurodon
    (development name: Onion)

    Tauro (from Latin "tauros", "bull") + -don

  • Voltio Taurodon
    (development name: Onion Shock)

    Voltio (Spanish "voltio", "volt"; from Italian physicist Alessandro Volta) + Taurodon

  • Abyss Taurodon
    (development name: Onion Dive)

    Abyss (English "abyss") + Taurodon

I’m happy that I found a spot to include my native tongue, Basque, on some of the Nephilim names.

  • Sortugor
    (development name: Summoner)

    Sortu (Basque "sortu", "create") + -gor

  • Sortugor Lur
    (development name: Summoner Erode)

    Sortugor + Lur (Basque "lur", "earth, dirt")

  • Indargor
    (development name: Buffer)

    Indar (Basque "indar", "strength") + -gor

Gigarok's design is based on Megadon's, and for the longest time it actually was just an alternate-palette Megadon in-engine. They don’t share a connection in-universe, but it seemed like it made sense for “Rock Monster” to have a similar name to the Living Volcano’s.

  • Gigarok
    (development name: Rock Monster)

    Giga (Greek "gigas/γίγας", "giant") + -rok (also from English "rock")

Escugon’s –gon is borrowed from kaiju such as Baragon and Namegon, who in turn got the suffix from “dragon”.

  • Escugon
    (development name: Guarder)

    Escu (from Spanish "escudo", "shield") + -gon

Virecloss was called Kunaira for some time, based on the Japanese ninja weapon "kunai/苦無", but not everyone liked the name, which can be difficult to pronounce in English. As someone with a similar-sounding name, I can attest to that!

  • Virecloss
    (development name: Ninja)

    Vire (from French "virer", "to turn", which additionally sounds like English “vile”) + -closs (which sounds like English "claws")

Even if Inazudon and Bakudon are clearly different from each other, they were designed together and often show up as a pair in-game, and we thought it made sense to name them in a similar fashion.

  • Inazudon
    (development name: Shock)

    Inazu (from Japanese "inazuma/いなずま/電", "lightning") + -don

  • Bakudon
    (development name: Awe)

    Baku (Japanese "baku/ばく/爆", "explosion") + -don

King Molokor's name is exceptional, to denote its exceptional power; it's not exactly a Monarch, but, as the name suggests, it's close to their power-level. The name is also a homage to King Ghidorah, King Kong, King Caesar, etc.

  • King Molokor
    (development name: Tyrant)

    King (from English "king") + Molok (from Moloch, מֹלֶךְ, an Ammonite god who required child sacrifices according to the Bible) + -or

Next, the bosses. These two should be quite obvious:

  • Negadon

    Nega (from English "negative") + -gadon (from Megadon)

  • Neganira

    Nega (from English "negative") + -ganira (from Ganira)

Monarch names are a bit special in that their root words are all based on deities from different cultures.

  • Torgahra

    Tor (from Thor, Þórr, Norse god of thunder) + -gahra

  • Sednagon
    (development name: Leviathan)

    Sedna (Sedna, ᓴᓐᓇ, Inuit goddess of the sea) + -gon

  • Gaiacras
    (development name: Geos)

    Gaia (Gaia, Γαῖα, Greek goddess of the earth) + -cras

  • Agnitor
    (development name: Kerberos)

    Agni (Agni, अग्नि, Hindu god of fire) + -tor

Torgahra’s name was established quite early on, so she didn’t have a different development name. I’ve been asked to point out that her suffix comes specifically from the monster Dagahra from Rebirth of Mothra 2.

As for a certain primordial being that might not even be a Nephilim but something different altogether, Azrael was named after the angel of death in Abrahamic religions (עֲזַרְאֵל).

And what about the game’s non-Kaiju warriors?

As for the ATOMs (Atomic Telepathically Operated Mechas), it’s worth mentioning that the name “ATOM” itself is a wink to one of the most famous Japanese robots of all time, Astro Boy, the Mighty Atom! To name them, we were inspired by the two-word names for the Jaegers in Pacific Rim. We came up with the following naming convention:

[destructive natural phenomenon] + [knight or warrior name]

The first word is shared by all ATOMs of a type or series (Storm, Tempest, Avalanche, Quake, Flare, Cyclone). The second word is a unique identifier, and all the units in a series will have names related to each other. For example, the Tempest-series units mentioned in the game are Tempest Galahad, Tempest Arthur, Tempest Lancelot, and Tempest Gawain, all from Arthurian myth.

Jamila’s ATOM is named after the pure Sir Galahad, whose quest for the Sangreal has some parallels to steadfast Jamila’s quest for the salvation of humankind. The only other fully named ATOM in Dawn of the Monsters gets quite a unique knight’s name—Don Quijote, a self-proclaimed knight often seen as delirious, but actually a visionary of sorts, someone who can open our eyes to uncomfortable truths.

  • Tempest Galahad

    Tempest (English "tempest") + Galahad (knight of Arthurian myth)

  • Quake Quixote

    Quake (English "quake") + Quixote (Spanish literary character)

Finally, Aegis's name was just “AG” for the longest time. We thought it was neat that the human Eiji (a reference to Ultraman creator Eiji Tsuburaya, of course!) was transformed into the similar-sounding superhero AG. Back then, Aegis’s main colour was red, so "AG" stood for "Akai Guardian" for some time (Japanese "akai/あかい/赤い", "red"). For a while, we even considered leaving it as "AG" and having it as a running joke that Eiji gives different answers whenever someone asks what it stands for. But eventually we agreed on giving him a full name, and chose his final name.

  • Aegis Prime
    (development name: AG)

    Aegis (Athena's shield in Greek mythology) + Prime (English "prime")

Special thanks to Creative Director Alex Rushdy for contributing a bunch of data and trivia to this article, some of which I included word-by-word.

And both to Alex and Artist Mike Lambert for sharing their immense knowledge on kaiju names throughout the whole project!

Unai Cabezón (@Basquegeek) worked as Narrative Director and Programmer in Dawn of the Monsters, and Double Cross before.

He loves running Dungeons & Dragons games, consuming media in strict chronological order, and discussing the Star Wars Expanded Universe.