Holy cow! I haven't thought about Pickle Wars in a decade. That game was totally awesome. Thanks, donotcare95!
Glad to be of service.
5th grade is serious business. If you don't like games about shootin' hos, you're just not cool.
When I was in fifth grade, everybody played Pokémon.
Back on topic: Life Force. Salamander. Scramble. Darius. All of these fall under the category of "shmup". Does "Scramble" sound to you like it would be a space game, or a stupid little puzzle? Obviously, shmups and other arcade titles didn't need names that described the game, because you could just watch the demo onscreen and decide if it looked like something you wanted to play. However, when they got ported to home consoles, people who had never experienced them in an arcade (myself included) probably wouldn't know what to think of them from the title alone. Not only this, but the console versions of many arcade games are considerably lacking compared to the original version, and even if someone had loved a game in the arcade, they might still dislike the home version because it was too easy/too hard/looked like crap. In other words, companies had to be careful about what they ported, and also about what they named a game (especially if they changed the name in the conversion). Same thing goes for when weird games like Katamari Damacy are localized - they have to pick a good name, especially if it's a crazy game like that.
Now, let's switch from arcade and console games to PC games. Ever heard of a game called "Alien Carnage"? It was previously called "Halloween Harry" once. Which sounds better for a sidescroller about destroying invaders and rescuing hostages? If you're like me, you'd probably say the first one. Well, so did Apogee, and they changed the name. Not only did some PC games change title, but many of Apogee's games were episodic in nature, and each episode's title reflected that game (see Commander Keen), rather than one name having to fit multiple games. Nowadays, we have what are known as "expansion packs", some of which might as well be called episodes, while others only add some new features (such as new units or play modes, or, in the case of an MMORPG, new areas, quests, and character classes) to a game. However, they oftentimes have their own name, and the name usually describes the new content in some way.
The name is a hugely important part of a game, and can determine if a game sells at all, though it's not odd if a game with an awful title that would cause it not to sell turns out to be great, while games with utterly awesome titles (or games based on a hit anime or movie) are lackluster, but still sell huge amounts.