The Japanese have always had a skewed take on all things Western -- though, to be fair, America's seen its share of cultural bastardization.
Even so, it's hard to avoid a unique feeling of disappointment when you stop to think that, maybe, if they'd taken a minute to ask a few well-meaning non-Japanese jerks about the authenticity of their creative properties, Japanese videogame companies -- famous for their unabashed attempts at cosmopolitanism -- wouldn't suffer such a high rate of crippling embarrassment. This is where we come in.

5. Genis Sage (Tales of Symphonia)
A victim of a Japanese-to-English dictionary and a three-minute brainstorming process, Genis Sage is -- you guessed it -- summed up by the adjective-noun pairing that is his name. Though, to their credit, the Namco localization team realized the ridiculousness of "Genius Sage" and dropped the "u" from his name for the game's Stateside release, eliminating most of the aggressive stupidity. Genius' older sister received the most benevolent stay of execution from Namco's American branch when her name was changed from the baffling, beverage-policy-inspired "Refill" to the more fantasy-ish "Raine." It's easy to imagine Namco picking up, say, the Lord of the Rings license and naming the protagonist "Adventure Shortman."