Honestly, at the time it was a premium domain that I liked. I originally owned a gaming community called "Gaming Section". Which in turn, is now "Game Rebels". When I wanted to revamp Gaming Section, I brought on a couple people who I was hoping would be able to help run the community, while I could be more of the one funding everything from behind the scenes so I could focus on other projects. Unfortunately, the two people ended up not working out.
Anyways, we went on a brainstorm listing a million names. None of them really stuck out. Game Rebels at the time was an already registered "premium" domain. So I registered the .net version (Which now redirects to the .com) until my offer was accepted for the .com. I ended up paying $150 for the GameRebels.com domain
I even own the domain "GameMinds.net" which also redirects to Game Rebels. The domain was originally for a popular youtube channel of the same name. However, when they let it expire I was able to grab it.
The name at the time had nothing to do with any of our servers as our star wars servers came years after.
Honestly, there really is no real answer as to why we went with Game Rebels. Just was the best name we came up with at the time. I guess I also thought I could really brand it as well. I am all about branding. It was important that we stuck to this brand and really pushed it. We call the users of our forums fellow "Rebels". Our forum currency is called "Rebellions". I worked hard on getting a mascot made, a custom unique design for our website, and custom software and addons created. All to push the "brand name". Although I can admit now, our logo and mascot seem to be a bit "old".
This brand has caused me a lot of pain though. For example, the Facebook page was already taken. (Facebook.com/GameRebels). I was able to contact the owner of the page successfully and was able to acquire ownership of the page for only $100. When it comes to brand names I like to own all intellectual property for them. Unfortunately, I still am unable to get the Twitter handle