It's mostly just people not doing it right (including me) in their articles because of muscle memory. Per this 2016 conversation right here in WT:VG, any website that produces content (e.g. IGN, GameSpot, or Polygon) should *all* be italicized. If it's just a service like YouTube or an aggregator like MetaCritic, it shouldn't be (but the citation template will do it anyways and we shouldn't worry about it). Nomader (talk) 06:08, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
To reaffirm Dissident's answer, websites like GameSpot and IGN are "creative works" in their own right and should indeed be rendered using italics. GameRankings and Metacritic are "services" first and foremost and should not be rendered in italics. Of course, this difference can be a bit confusing and hard to define at times, but if you would call something a "publication", then it should probably be rendered in italics. ~Mable (chat) 21:30, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
@Maplestrip: So in other words if I see a whole bunch of text, then I italicize it, but if the site have only videos or rakings such as Metacritic, GameRankings and YouTube, then I don't. On the other hand all three are websites...--Biografer (talk) 22:34, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
Sites like IGN, GameSpot, etc. provide editorial content (reviews, news, etc.), so should be treated as a magazine or newspaper. On the other hand, Metacritic, etc only provide factual information, so they are just publishers, so should not be italicized. --Masem (t) 22:53, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
Might be more of a discussion at WT:VG/RS, and if so, happy to move it over there instead.
I'm moving this out from the Essay section of WT:VG by @TheJoebro64:. One thing that he mentioned in his essay was that GameSpot was a reliable source for release dates, but if I remember correctly, there was a huge change where GameFAQs merged with GameSpot for release date information and it made it unreliable for sources. Just a note that WP:VG/RS says the following: "Their database is shared by GameFAQs which is unreliable", but it doesn't actually come out and say we shouldn't use it for release dates.
On the reliable sources noticeboard, Jinnai brought up in 2011 that the GameFAQs database was shared with GameSpot and was therefore unreliable. (Discussion here). He also brought it up on WT:VG back in 2011 and there didn't seem to be much consensus except "it's probably not right" (Discussion here).
I looked for GameSpot's release date guidelines but couldn't seem to find anything-- I imagine someone else might have better luck than me. Nomader (talk) 01:37, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
Weird. I've never noticed that at VG/S. I put the part about GameSpot having accurate release dates in the essay because WP:VG/DATE says they do (I'll remove it though). I'm guessing that part of the policy hasn't been updated in a while? JOEBRO6401:49, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
I think the real problem is that all of these discussions happened way back in 2011 and I have no idea if it's changed since then or not. I remember there being a discussion about using archive links from right around those comments, but I can't seem to find that for the life of me either. It's all just from one user so I think it would be good to open it up to further debate and discussion. Nomader (talk) 02:07, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
Their database, along with IGN's and Metacritic's (and many other websites) is full of errors. Only cite articles for release dates. --The1337gamer (talk) 07:16, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
I created this template to put on Atari Lynx game pages, I just wanted someone to double check if it's okay, also, I wanted it collapsed when people load pages. I was also thinking maybe having the top bar of it with a black background with orange text. All comments welcome please, cheers, Govvy (talk) 20:38, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
It looks fine to me - it is using List-defined references to group them all in the reflist to avoid their "noise" in the body, which is an option editors can do per our MOS. --Masem (t) 23:43, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
List-defined refs are a minority option (though still used not infrequently), but in my opinion objectively better. That said, actually, its the other parameter that's antiquated- you don't need to state "|colwidth=30em", because the reflist template now automatically builds out columns (with a default of 30em) if you have more than 10 references. --PresN02:08, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
I use this style whenever I create a new article, usually, especially for tags that get called often. It's sometimes better for anyone doing copyedits, I feel. Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)09:14, 19 January 2018 (UTC)
As long as the ref style is uniform, many editors don't care. I, for one, am less likely to edit an article if its wikicode is a mess (read: paragraphs are two-thirds refs with little prose), hence why I prefer LDR. It's bad form, however, to drive-by convert an article's formatting (ref style or otherwise) to your preference. If you're planning to rework an article that others steward as well, almost always better to announce your upcoming change than to enter an edit war. In the case of the Lemmings article, I'd leave it alone unless you're planning to work it further. czar02:41, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
I was about to ping him. I remember the draft, there's some good sources in there. The game designer is by far more notable than the former footballer who has the main article at Michael Brough. It's somewhat different to his other games, not being a roguelike, but I highly recommend Corrypt, it's free! Sorry for not doing the work myself, I found that the more games I play, the less time I have to write about them. - hahnchen09:47, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
I'll try to organize the info a bit lower. In general I'm very sympathetic to the plight of indie devs struggling with issues in their Wikipedia coverage that that have a hard time finding a solution for. Ben · Salvidrim!✉10:03, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
A core principle I see missing in the analysis is that notability is not inherited. A developer may make a great game, but that doesn't make the developer notable for a topic. We need RSes to go in depth on the developer away from the game to be able to have a decent article. --Masem (t) 13:15, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Following this principle to the letter means our coverage is poor, it makes Wikipedia video games bad to navigate. Video games should adopt a more almanac type approach to developers, which other projects have such as Wikipedia:Notability (sports) and WP:MUSIC, whereby some notability is inherited. If a developer such as Bennett Foddy has created multiple notable works, then having a list of those works is just better for navigation than a redirect to his latest game. - hahnchen14:08, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
It's a good idea to help people fix their articles, but I don't think Wikipedia's policies are broken with regards to video games. If Bennett Foddy wasn't notable, he shouldn't be a redirect to his latest game, but a redlink so the search function could find his games. Otherwise, it would have a very basic Wikipedia article appearing on top of the search results over the dev's own website which more than likely goes into more depth.ZXCVBNM (TALK)14:58, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
A structured list of games is significantly better than the arbitrary search function ranking algorithm of existent blue links. See Zach gage for example. - hahnchen15:05, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
complaining about his article
This is a bit damned-if-you-do/damned-if-you-don't. Reminds me of
[Philip Roth] wrote a lengthy and impassioned letter to Wikipedia, for example, challenging the online encyclopedia’s preposterous contention that he was not a credible witness to his own life. (Eventually, Wikipedia backed down and redid the Roth entry in its entirety.) — McGrath, Charles (January 16, 2018). "No Longer Writing, Philip Roth Still Has Plenty to Say". The New York Times. ISSN0362-4331.
Wikipedia as some kind of monolithic arbiter rather than thankless work requiring a lifetime of volunteer maintenance (especially with indie devs who make many small games). I don't think our indie game coverage is even close to patchy—the fullness of Wikipedia's games coverage compared to our coverage of other fields is a hackneyed punchline. I'm particularly complicit in this, having written a number of articles on indie game auteurs, including the GA set for both Greg Wohlwend[1] and Tim Rogers (I had sources queued for Brough too). And while some take an article's existence as a marker of the subject's standing, you can't argue that it moved the needle on the (underrated) last games of the aformentioned creators (TumbleSeed, Videoball). As for Gage saying that biographies should be run past their subjects as the authoritative source, we already have an opaque position on original research. And even so, I have run articles past their subjects before. I'm not infallible but the source of "errors" is almost always the reliable-yet-also-fallible, secondary source itself, and Wikipedia's paraphrase just amplifies the wrong claim. (Imagine what it'd be like with original research alone...) And as for the subject's input, it's never positive enough to warrant the additional effort, as they usually don't care enough to correct the secondary source. But again, it's hard to read this exchange as concern for truth or for how a Wikipedia article changes a career in any macro sense: altogether much demoralizing, idle hand-wringing against an easy target that solves nothing until someone chooses to roll up her sleeves. So either create the injustice by writing the article with the incorrect, extant sourcing, or view the lack of that injustice as an injustice. czar18:48, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Based on luck Czar had with Foddy and free images, maybe there is something we can do, which is to have a Wikiproejct space page directed to devs/pubs/etc. in the VG industry to help them understand 1) how and when we can have articles 2) how to go about getting fixes to these articles via proper channels on WP and 3) the benefit that working with us (such as by providing free images) in that while we can't help be a promotional channel, we can at least document games /people/studio that have some coverage. --Masem (t) 23:37, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Yang said "The other day, someone wrote to me but confessed they didn't know much about me, and that they had only played my games Intimate, Infinite and The Tearoom.This felt like a really strange pairing of games to me. The Tearoom is a recent game that got a lot of press coverage, while Intimate Infinite is a much older, somewhat obscure game of mine that's mostly remembered only by some literary art game folks. What the heck is going on?My suspicions were confirmed when I found out that I had a Wikipedia page as of July 2017, and that this page highlighted those two games with their own subsections. It made me realize that (a) people google me, and that (b) Wikipedia might be their first or second impressions of me. And yet, that page is still missing so much information about me; my dabbling in level design, my love of sandwiches, and so on.Ben · Salvidrim!✉10:03, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Yang says "Bennett Foddy doesn't even have his own Wikipedia page. As of this time of writing, his name page currently redirects to the entry on Getting Over It. He's released one of the weirdest (yet commercial successful) games of 2017 and he still doesn't deserve his own profile? That coy redirect won't tell you about how he used to perform as part of the band Cut Copy, or how he was an Oxford professor of bio-ethics and argued that performance-enhancing drugs are awesome (well, I haven't read his papers, but I'm assuming he said that, I wish some sort of free online encyclopedia would tell me if it was true?), or all these other Things That Are Important To Know About Bennett Foddy." Ben · Salvidrim!✉10:03, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Yang said "I just saw that Stephen Lavelle's Wikipedia page implies that he's only made 2-3 games of note, as if that's all there is to know about Stephen Lavelle. Imagine not knowing anything about Stephen Lavelle and then reading this utterly disappointing 25 word Wikipedia page -- you'd just close the tab and shrug "oh well", instead of playing his amazing works like Slave of God, Opera Omnia, or Worst Guest." Ben · Salvidrim!✉10:03, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Raph says "My page isn’t great (tho at least it exists)" and "I’d rather my page had less inaccuracies and more of the things a researcher might want. But technically it's against Wikipedia rules to say that (it's called canvassing)... ;)" Ben · Salvidrim!✉10:03, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
The King of Fighters: Destiny
The first season of the webseries The King of Fighters: Destiny ended last week. It won an award and received a huge visits. Still, I can't find more real world information to create an article. Anybody knows of sources that could help? Cheers.Tintor2 (talk) 00:16, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
Request
Does anyone have any print resources that discuss Sonic Adventure? I'd like to try and get it to FA status before its 20th anniversary in December, but I want to make sure I'm not missing any offline sources. JOEBRO6401:08, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
Did you already use the pix'n'love The History of Sonic the Hedgehog? Also I don't think you used every mag archived on Sonic Retro, like this one where Naka says the Dreamcast hardware was not completed until two months before the game release. This was from a quick cursory glance. TarkusABtalk02:27, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
Retro Gamer #91 has a "Making of Sonic Adventure" feature. You should probably check some Dreamcast magazines and Japanese sources as well. --The1337gamer (talk) 17:45, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
I have almost the entire run of Official Dreamcast Magazine, which almost certainly has some Sonic Adventure coverage. Unfortunately I have all the issues at another house which I won't be visiting for another month or so... I'll try to remember to grab those.--Martin IIIa (talk) 01:34, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
Could I get you guys to take a look at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Portkey Games? I fail to see how the references given don't display notability independent of the games that haven't come out yet.
The nominator is stating that the sources are either routine announcements / press release material (I.e. Warner Bros. opens new studio) or are not directly about the studio, i.e. sources that are about video games and simply mention "Portkey is developing x". There are no independent secondary coverage of the studio on its own, separate from the PR announcements or in passing reference in coverage of their games. -- ferret (talk) 18:45, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
Lee Vilenski - it's okay to ask for more input, but you're not supposed to be leading people in a certain direction/stance when you do it - they call that WP:CANVASSING. You need to keep it more neutral, like a "I'm looking for more input at (insert discussion). Thank you." and that's it. Sergecross73msg me20:02, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
No problem - that's why I just mentioned it rather than making it sound like a warning or something - it didn't really seem like your intention was to CANVASS, but I wanted to make sure you knew going forward too. Sergecross73msg me21:17, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
I have news that the New York Game Awards 2018 was held yesterday in Abron's Playhouse in Manhattan to announce the winners for various awards. Do you think it's okay if I put the various winners and nominees in an Awards table? Here's the link for this story. --Angeldeb82 (talk) 03:57, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
The new "Sky Temple" disambiguation page seems to direct readers to articles in which the term "sky temple" doesn't appear. As far as I am aware, this goes against what disambiguation is for, correct? May need another set of eyes. ~Mable (chat) 16:35, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
Yeah, I don't think it's supposed to link off to these fan sites like it does either. Kinda hard to tell - it seems like every time I'm at a dab page adding an article I created, it's in pretty rough shape. They seem perpetually inmaintaoned and sloppy, so it sometimes hard to tell what's acceptable or not. Sergecross73msg me17:21, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
A personal rule-of-thumb is that I add something to a disambiguation page if it would have been reasonable as a redirect. In this case, I would only add articles to the "Sky Temple" disambiguation page if I could justify making a redirect instead, if the disambiguation page didn't exist. I think I poorly explained that, but the thing is that I don't know the actual guideline and just figured I'd post here. ~Mable (chat) 18:52, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
They are supposed to be links to subsections of articles at least. If they aren't even mentioned on the articles (they aren't), then they shouldn't be included in a disambiguation page. ~ Dissident93(talk)19:00, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
DABifying was the consensus at RfD. It used to redirect to Metroid Prime 2. The DAB is an improvement. Feel free to comment out those instances which are not mentioned in-article and I'Ll work on improving the dab page. Ben · Salvidrim!✉22:13, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
Plus it's not like this is a radically new idea, we've had for a long time Fire Temple (dab), Water Temple (dab), Forest Temple (redirect), Spirit Temple (redirect), etc.; redirects or dab entries for levels/locations of a video game are commonplace. If an in-article mention is needed, then in-article mentions should be added, not the link removed. As I said, I'll work on improving this DAB since I've kind of adopted it :p There's no deadline! ^_^ Ben · Salvidrim!✉22:21, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
I misread it then, but two people (yourself included) voting for disambiguation is not a consensus either. Somebody should have linked it here to get more opinions before it closed, because I'm 100% against this idea. ~ Dissident93(talk)22:25, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
I mean it was linked here which is where I found it..... WP:VG/AA. Plus, it's rare for RfDs to get more than two or three commenters. Look, give me a week to improve it, and if you still think there's a reason to delete it, we can always discuss it more widely at AfD next weekend. Fair? :) Ben · Salvidrim!✉22:35, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
For the record, I do not oppose to the existence of this disambiguation page. It seems fitting. I just don't think it should link to articles when the target article doesn't describe the topic you may be looking for. I have hidden a few entries already, but I think more may need to be removed. The Heroes of the Storm article, for example, doesn't describe the Sky Temple. It just happens to have a screenshot of the location in the article. That does not seem like it would be enough. In contrast, linking to Ocarina of Time in the Fire Temple redirect is definitely good, because our article on Ocarina of Time mentions this location multiple times and even states facts about it specifically. ~Mable (chat) 21:41, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
FWIW, the reason I mentioned HotS is because any Google Search you do today for "Sky Temple" returns just HotS results for the first two pages or so. And I'm pretty sure if we use a screenshot of that map in-article, then it is both illustrative of the game in general and definitely counts as an "in-article mention". But yes, of course, lots of improvement to make. Ben · Salvidrim!✉00:43, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
Thank you czar! I've expanded the development section using the article. Adam9007, I'm not sure if the GamesTM article is necessary, but if it says anything the article is missing just let me know. JOEBRO6420:17, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
An IP is changing the Steam page to change OS X to macos stating that many other current actively-developed software pieces (including EA Origin) use the updated macos despite being released when the OS was called OS X. I wonder if we need to try to figure out how to align this with the software wikiproject (I didn't see any hard advice there). I thought at least for us in the VG project that we use the name of the OS when the game was released, but I can't find anything hard for that either. --Masem (t) 02:25, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
It's definitely a bit tricky, since it was mostly a ceremonial name change, unlike the "original" MacOS which really did have compatibility issues similar to the MS-DOS -> Windows transition. My two cents:
Games that are lightly updated (i.e. the occasional bugfix patch, DLC, or expansion pack) should use the term prevalent at time of release, give or take a year or so.
Games that are heavily updated over a long period of time should use the latest / most recent term, regardless of the platform's title at time of release (e.g. World of Warcraft, League of Legends, etc.). If that time period where it stopped updating was in the past, use the term at end-of-life. (If it stopped updating for Mac in 2013 but is still current, then I have no idea.)
If there are any games that, somehow, were released both for classic macOS and OS X and modern macOS, spell it out in prose. (I'm not sure anything exists that does this. Maybe if Marathon / Myth: TFL get a rerelease?!) SnowFire (talk) 02:49, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
I think Snow's suggestion make the most sense. Historical games are history, and macOS was OS X until recently, so it should be listed as such. If it's a current game that has support and runs on modern hardware, it can use macOS. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs(talk)02:52, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
To play a counter-arguement, there a a metric ton of games out there that don't work on Windows versions higher than they were released, but we always just say "Windows" in articles, not "Windows 98" (or "Windows 95 or older"), unless there's something specific about them tied to a particular version. We already have a division between "Classic Mac OS" and "macOS"; I'm not convinced that we need to make an artificial distinction between games released when macOS was called "Mac OS X" and games released/updated since the name change. --PresN03:06, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
To me, its important to make that distinction for older games to help the reader if they want to go off searching for more sources. An old game release on OS X will likely not bring up any hits if you search Google for that game and "macos" if we lede them to believe that is what the OS is. As well if they read sources at the time the game was published, they will all say "OS X" against "macos" and might be confused due to the former "MacOS" system. However, the counter argument is that a person in this field that is doing their own search should be fully aware that "OS X"="macos" for all purposes and all those distinguishing factors behind the Mac OS systems, so we could just be overprotective of this ourselves. --Masem (t) 14:53, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
Google, at least, will autosearch for "Mac OS X", "Macintosh", etc. if you search for "[game] macOS" - just verified. --PresN17:14, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
Then this makes a strong case to use SnowFire's metrics above - games that were released but not considered "games as a service" should stick to the name that the game had at release; games frequently updated should use macOS, as well as updated game-related software like Steam, etc. --Masem (t) 17:39, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
One thing to consider: there is one set of argument for games, but now we have Steam which is ongoing, updated software package. I think using the logic above, when we are talking video game software systems (not games, but software that supports it), we might want to update to macos over OS X. There still remains the question of games themselves. --Masem (t) 04:25, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
Ah sorry, slightly misinterpreted you then. Since it's currently updated, I think the Steam article (or other software frameworks that are actively updated in 2017 & beyond) should probably just say MacOS these days, yeah. SnowFire (talk) 04:49, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
I could support this, but only if its made crystal clear (to avoid edit warring) which games fall under point 2. Would a list have to be created for this? ~ Dissident93(talk)20:12, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
Since at least in the case of macOs vs. OS X, they are basically synonyms, there's no need to be crystal clear. If there's a borderline case or potential dispute over whether a game stopped updating in 2015 or 2017, I recommend immediately conceding to the other side and using their preferred term, then moving onto something more productive. I'd only want to fight it out in clear-cut cases - macOS for software released post-2016, or OS X for software released in 2000-2014 or so that clearly is more case 1 (lightly updated) than case 2 (heavily updated). SnowFire (talk) 10:15, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
Use of wikis as ELs
Is linking to unofficial wikis acceptable? I usually do it since they provide minutiae on plot, controls, and gameplay, which could interest readers but is out of Wikipedia's scope. Furthermore, a number of wikis (such as Sonic Retro and Mario Wiki) have a substantial number of editors and are stable enough to pass WP:ELNOWP:ELYES #3. Thoughts? JOEBRO6423:25, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
WP:ELYES #3 and WP:ELNO #11 need to be more clear. There are plenty of Wikis out there with that are "stable" with a large number of editors (what's stable even supposed to mean? That it doesn't have obvious false info?) The only time I'd use Wikis as an external link is if its officially endorsed by the developer/publisher, such as the Minecraft Wikia. Otherwise, if it can't be used as an inline source (which it wouldn't per WP:USERG), it shouldn't be used as an EL. ~ Dissident93(talk)04:39, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
But in the dispute at Sonic Adventure, Sonic Retro has been acknowledged by Sega. And re: "if it can't be used as a source": ELYES says to link websites that cannot be integrated into the Wikipedia and Sites that fail to meet criteria for reliable sources yet still contain information about the subject of the article from knowledgeable sources. IMDb is frequently used as an EL on film articles for those reasons. JOEBRO6412:00, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
I'm generally against it in the Sonic subject area, as places like Sonic Retro go into a ton of areas that we'd constitute as WP:GAMECRUFT and WP:OR, and Sonic Wikipedia articles are magnets for that sort of junk. I'd rather not have any extra encouragement on that front... Sergecross73msg me13:25, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
That's a weak argument. How is linking to an unofficial wiki "encouragement" of gamecruft? It provides readers with info that they could be interested in, such as plot information and controls. Many Mario and Sonic FAs passes their candidacies with Mario Wiki and Sonic Retro, and no objections to that were made. JOEBRO6414:09, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
They read it. They think "oh wow, Wikipedia doesn't mention that! I'll add that right now!". Then they scribble in some trivial nonsense about some hacker thinks he found evidence that Sonic used to have a green stripe in his shoe or something. That's the type of pointless crufty minutiae your Sega Retros write about in their Wikis. I imagine your average GA/FA reviewer doesn't know how ridiculous the fanbase is about that, and likely never will, as they don't maintain it long-term, they just spend like a week there and move on, and don't object because it doesn't violate any of the hard no-nos (WP:COPYVIOs, having malware, etc.) But as someone who's maintained much of the subject areas for coming up on a decade, you asked for input, and my stance is that its a bad idea. Sergecross73msg me14:31, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
I'm really not a fan of linking to external wikis. Personally, I thought the External Links were to works from the subject (Maybe official website, or books written by the subject. An external wiki losely tied to the game seems a bit of a stretch, to me. Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)14:29, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
I generally agree we should not link but I'd like to propose a hypothetical, would we link to Wookiepedia from any Star Wars-related video game, or Memory Alpha for a Star Trek related game? Both are recognized as generally stable external wikis (which I'm sure have a portion of editors as rabid fans, just not has much as the Sonic Retro one). Are we saying zero ELs, or only where there's clear established stability for the wiki? or some other metric? --Masem (t) 14:36, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
I feel that goes against what Wikipedia is for. I feel like a link to fan wikipedia would make sense maybe on a fan made game... Or a fansite for a game, etc. That would be my only real arguement for inclusion Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)14:40, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
Personally, I feel like it needs to be officially endorsed by the company who made the game to be really considered "stable". As stated above, this is the case for the Minecraft and Terraria Wikis, whose developers actively contribute and redirect players towards. This isn't the case for Sonic Retro, which is just run and moderated by fans. ~ Dissident93(talk)23:25, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
An issue to watch
[3]Nolan Bushnell got named for GDCA's Pioneer Award, but a number of industry ppl have spoken out about his past, some tying it to the #metoo campaign. (I've also notified that talk page). May be nothing, but to keep eyes on. --Masem (t) 03:21, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
Nomination for deletion of Template:Metacritic GOTY
I frequently monitor Category:Pages using Infobox software with unknown parameters. Recently, I have encountered a large number of video games that are using the awkward {{Infobox software}} with many incorrect parameters, such as |designer=, |image=, |engine=, etc. As the said infobox does not support said parameters, they do not appear.
The only reason I can perceive for such a perverse use of infobox is the presence of |logo= and |license= in {{Infobox software}}. (Wikipedia articles on free software are notorious for flaunting that fact, sometimes tastelessly and to the detriment of the entire article.)
@Codename Lisa: I would guess the majority of the problems you have observed are open source video games. There is at least one editor (who has edited that article) who believes that the important part of "open source video game" is not "video game" but rather "open source" and hence uses the software infobox (which contains parameters friendly to open source), rather than the video game infobox. This is most likely due to the fact that his proposed changes to infobox video game have been rejected (for being minutia, either in general or at least specifically to video games). Take that for what you will. --Izno (talk) 13:27, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
Whoa. I am shivering from seeing that. Compromise is a matter of give and take. I'd gladly give him the |license=. At the very least, popular and notable games are either commercial, freeware or free to play, if not FOSS. Maybe I just have to drop in and add it myself. I can.
Hmmms, if there's a linked discussion with a clear consensus against a field, just dropping in to add it anyway is a bit .... questionable. -- ferret (talk) 14:58, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
True. But also a lot depends on how I do it too. I can wait a bit, collect data, and make sure I have evidence of consensus through editing. And there have been a lot of cases where I (or others) did a good job and others said "okay, we didn't think you could do it that good."
I only have to bear in mind that I am here to help and make lives easier, not to lord over others, right?
I sure hope you do. You've just publicly acknowledged that you were aware of a prior consensus and aware of a warning that going against it would be considered disruptive. Proceeding to make the change without a new discussion and new consensus would almost certainly lead to a block, considering you're no newbie and understand Wikipedia protocol and policy. Sergecross73msg me21:07, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
I think I've stated this before, but I'm against the addition of |license= in the video game infobox. It would be misused more than it would be helpful, as the vast majority of games are just commercial software. ~ Dissident93(talk)20:21, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
I think pretty much everyone has said as much except the few people that haven't looked at field bloat or are proponents of free software and associated "metadata" that doesn't necessarily apply to other video games. — HELLKNOWZ ▎TALK21:57, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
Hello again
We seem to have gotten a little sidetracked. Our subject of discussion is: A number of video game articles are using {{Infobox software}} instead of {{Infobox video game}}. What you going to do about it.
This discussion is not about what has been discussed before (even if you love ad nauseam repetition and complaining about ad nauseam repetition.) Whether there was a consensus in that discussion or the old guard just ostrachized the new editors is pretty much irrelevant at this point.
Fun fact: You don't just get to declare consensus made "in the past" as irrelevant just because you don't like it, especially when people in the current discussion agree with that consensus. Also, I'm not sure how you think the "old guard" is ostracizing the "new editors" (aka you, apparently?) by pointing out that you can't just declare your intention to ignore other people without anyone caring. --PresN06:09, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
What are we going to do about it? Well, we have a single editor who makes these changes unilaterally, taking existing infobox video game templates and changing them to infobox software without doing proper cleanup of fields. Here's two options: Remove the improper fields left over from IB VG, and continue to use IB Soft, if makes sense for the article (As you did). Or, revert the edit back to IB VG. What exactly is your complaint? That some video game articles use IB Soft, or that there is an editor leaving behind invalid parameters? If its the latter, fix them. If it's the former, what is your proposal? -- ferret (talk) 13:22, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
I did just have a look at that category, and an awful lot of them simply have a {|} in an incorrect position. I've gone through a few and made the changes. I don't know if someone has already gone through the list and removed the unwarranted parameters, but I couldn't find any. However, I do find it a bit odd that someone would feel that the infobox for software would be of more benefit for a article on a video game. If it were ever a close call (Maybe only a game in name only, or a visual novel thing), it would make more sense to embed the video game infobox. I can't really forsee a point where we would wish to remove the video games infobox unless it is completely obvious it isn't a video game, so I'd be for reverting the changes, personally. I don't really see how it matters in an infobox if a game is free source or not, and if it is important, it should go in the prose. Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)14:12, 29 January 2018 (UTC)
Hello again
I have an update. I've encountered a number of articles that are using raw {{infobox}} to implement the functions of {{Infobox video game}} and its missing fields. Do you know why they exist? Because consensus means being of the same hearts and minds, and editors who write contribute to those articles are not of the same hearts and minds with you. How you are planning to deal with this schism (the anyonym of "consensus"), or whether you are planning to address it at all, does not interest me. My purpose of openning this thread was reporting what I perceived a case of consensus-violation and lending a helping hand, after you guys told me what to do. But instead, I was met by threats of being blocked from Sergecross73 (who totally misunderstood me) and various other angry or mocking comments from the rest of you. If you don't want help, I definitely don't insist giving it.
@Lee Vilenski: The category is indexed based on the first alien parameter. For example, if you are looking for articles having a |foundation= in their infobox software, you look under F. Now, you say you only found extraneous pipes. ("|") That's probably because you looked under 0-9.
WP is a volunteer thing, we can't force anyone to do anything. Consistency is nice, but there are issues with video games, mostly from the earliest days, that make them more pieces of software than what we'd normally consider a video game. Those coming from a software side want to have the ability to document interesting features of "software" like version numbers and licenses, which for "video games" makes no sense at all to include. But when you have games developed during the 1970s and 1980s on Unix platforms, those are titles that could fall into either. We let common sense and consensus determine those.
Now, for the games just doing the plain vanilla infobox template that's just poorly done; it should use one or the other but not a new version. Those we could try to fix, but recognizing it could end up still being a software or video game template. It's not a clean split. --Masem (t) 16:23, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
(edit conflict) So could you maybe supply a list of these articles use raw Infobox for participants of the discussion to evaluate? We can't address it one way or the other, even through deliberate inaction, without seeing what "missing fields" are being used. -- ferret (talk) 16:24, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
(edit conflict) If someone wants to make a change that isn't supported by the current consensus, then they need to start a new discussion to get a new discussion. Per WP:BURDEN, in this case, that would be you. Get a new consensus or drop it. If you do this, it should solve the issue of whatever "schism" you're referring to. Sergecross73msg me16:26, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
I just skimmed back through this conversation, and the only comment that I could characterize as "mocking", even at a stretch, was my own- so I apologize if you felt I was mocking you, as that was not my intention. I stand by what I said, however- you started off well, pointing out something you thought was in error and asking for a discussion about what to do about it, but as soon as you found out that there was already an agreement as to not including those parameters in IBVG that people were using IBS for, you started declaring that you were unilaterally going to override that consensus. Multiple times. And then decided to cap the discussion since you didn't like the way it was going. You've been here for 7 years- you know that's not how discussions work. Those were not the comments of someone who wanted to be told what the consensus was so that they could go about cleaning things up. Consensus does not mean "every single editor agrees on what to do", it means "as a group, agree on what to do". Your definition is convenient if you want to ignore all consensus that you disagree with as no longer being unanimous, but consensus does not require unanimity.
The consensus is that those "software" parameters do not belong in Infobox VG. This discussion has shown that no one's interested in (re)adding them there; you're the only one who has indicated support for that idea. So, your options are to convert articles using Infobox Soft incorrectly to IBVG, or to remove the invalid use of parameters from articles using IBS. Which one is done is likely going to be a case-by-case decision, for reasons explained above. --PresN17:24, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
There are more hits for "side quest" (390k) than "sidequest" (230k) in our reliable search. While this is by no means conclusive, it also implies the choice may not be that simple. I mean, what sources does Wiktionary use? — HELLKNOWZ ▎TALK18:24, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
True enough, but a broader general search finds google results of "side quest" (511K) and "sidequest" (758k). -- ferret (talk) 18:28, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
I'd be fine with any, as long as its consistently done in the same article, and that it not be capitalized like your first example, as its not any sort of proper noun or anything that would require that. I think personally write "sidequest", but I probably wouldn't argue or revert if someone changed it after I wrote it either. Sergecross73msg me18:34, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
I agree with Sergecross73 (which by the way, Extremecia capitalized it because it followed the question mark, or were you just being picky there?). Any of the three are fine as long as it's consistent throughout the article. When in doubt, go by how the game treats it (like in the game manual or quest screens). --JDC808♫21:27, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
I wasn't trying to be difficult or picky or anything. I just wanted to clarify/confirm that one of the options wasn't meant to actually be capitalizing it. It may seem silly, but working in music related articles too, there's a ridiculous number of passerby editors who decide to capitalize things like music genre, writing sentences like "The Foo Fighters are a Hard Rock band formed in 1994." I've noticed people capitalize random words a lot casually in life too, outside of Wikipedia. So it was on my mind. Sergecross73msg me21:41, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
It looks like any of the three terms have been used in video game news articles. About the only time I'd have a preference for "side quest" is if the passage talks about "main and side quests", otherwise you might have the slightly awkward "main quests and sidequests" ? AngusWOOF (bark • sniff) 00:12, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
Does this project ever hold meet ups? If anyone wants to meet in the Boston / New England area, even New York, I'd be willing to organize something. I'm in Rhode Island. TarkusABtalk19:50, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
Heh, I just moved out of the Boston area a few months ago! That said, I welcome any excuse to visit the friends and family I still have out there, so I'd be up for this if others are interested.--Martin IIIa (talk) 18:44, 30 January 2018 (UTC)
Question: is there an IRC chat or something where we talk? Or no? I've been editing around here for years and I have absolutely no idea ha. Nomader (talk) 05:26, 4 February 2018 (UTC)
Hey. I'm preparing expansion on the article Asura's Wrath. I was wondering if anyone could help with info or scans of developer comments/interviews from the English version of the game's Complete Works. I don't have it in my shelves. --ProtoDrake (talk) 23:20, 4 February 2018 (UTC)
Line breaks between platforms and Vgrelease in infobox
Something we should also be thinking about providing a note about is that we often use the BR tag between platforms and {{Vgr}} templates. MOS is against BR due to issues on mobile displays. We should being using {{Ubl}} generally. Visually on a desktop, it's basically invisible, but on some mobile clients it can improve display and ensure line breaks are honored. I suggest UBL because {{Plainlist}} doesn't always play nice with other templates (For example collapsible list doesn't seem to work when used inside plainlist) -- ferret (talk) 13:05, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
Current BR style
Release
Microsoft Windows
WW: 1 January 2018
PlayStation 4
WW: 1 April 2018
Xbox One
WW: 1 May 2018
UBL style
Release
Microsoft Windows
WW: 1 January 2018
PlayStation 4
WW: 1 April 2018
Xbox One
WW: 1 May 2018
No style
Release
Microsoft Windows
WW: 1 January 2018
PlayStation 4
WW: 1 April 2018
Xbox One
WW: 1 May 2018
Actually from what I've seen most infoboxes don't use the BR tag between platforms and {{Vgr}}. Instead there is nothing between platforms and {{Vgr}}, since {{Vgr}} automatically causes line breaks. Like this:
'''Microsoft Windows'''{{Vgrelease|WW|1 January 2018}}'''PlayStation 4'''{{Vgrelease|WW|1 April 2018}}'''Xbox One'''{{Vgrelease|WW|1 May 2018}}
I concur with Wrath X, using either is pretty unnecessary; I've added the relevant example above. For reference, the specific guideline agains br tags is WP:VLIST. Talking about mobile displayal, using UBL looks pretty messed up there (gigantic gaps). On a side-note, I often saw pages that used {{collapsible list}}, but then insert an unbulleted list into that collapsible list; such cases should be removed, as the collapsible list, as the name indicates, can and should be used for the listing feature. Lordtobi (✉) 14:41, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
Interesting. A BR after the platform used to be necessary. The rewrites we've done in the past year must have fixed that. -- ferret (talk) 15:04, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
I do end up using BR stuff without thinking, but typically don't since there's plenty of other things which work, including the sample given by Wrath X. Agreed it's at least not as necessary as it was. More so if it's causing problems on other viewing platforms. --ProtoDrake (talk) 23:38, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
No one is proposing to stop using Vgrelease. What you've given as an example more or less looks the same, but has drastically more syntax for the editors to maintain and input (without the built in region linking). Once upon a time, Vgrelease required a BR in front but not after. Changes have since eliminated that need, so we just need to remove the old BRs that no longer have an need. I was just having a moment and didn't realize the BR was no longer needed. (For the record Vgrelease outputs an HTML5 compliant unordered list.) -- ferret (talk) 12:39, 5 February 2018 (UTC)
I'm not mean that we stop using {{vgr}}. I just showed the effect of definition lists. If we like this style, we can just modify the Module, make the template "understand" {{vgr|'''PlayStation 4'''|WW|1 January 2012|'''Group 2'''|...}} and auto output a definition list. --Muhebbet (talk) 14:35, 5 February 2018 (UTC)
That would require quite a bit more work, as we don't include the platforms in the VGR input. Would require updates to thousands of articles to enact. -- ferret (talk) 15:00, 5 February 2018 (UTC)
Not sure I understand the problem here, we should be using the most simple form that works. No need to change things if it requires 1000s of (non-bot) edits for no real benefit. ~ Dissident93(talk)17:43, 5 February 2018 (UTC)
What image should we give to characters' infobox. I mean the famous character article Cloud Strife uses his very own first appearance from the VII game. On the other hand, most Tekken characters like Jin Kazama, Lars Alexandersson, etc. use their latest appearances rather than their debuts. Is there a rule to it? I mean it, because most The King of Fighters characters also use their first costumes like Kyo Kusanagi and Iori Yagami rather than the latest ones. Cheers.Tintor2 (talk) 00:52, 4 February 2018 (UTC)
I don't think there's a rule, but more of a matter of taste, as well as being able to get an image. For me, I like most recent appearance in infobox, or rather most recent appearance in terms of chronology. Most recent appearance (and in particular, most recent chronological appearance) I think better symbolizes what the character is supposed to look like, as well as how the developer wants people to recognize the character. In Cloud's case, that's actually artwork of the character, which the limitations of the PlayStation were only able to somewhat get. Later iterations, such as the movie and the upcoming remake, were actually able to make him look like that original artwork, although they decided to add a little more, though largely retaining the same design. --JDC808♫01:15, 4 February 2018 (UTC)
It makes sense for their image to be based on wherever their most popular appearance was. For example, it would make less sense to show Advent Children Cloud in the infobox.ZXCVBNM (TALK)06:12, 4 February 2018 (UTC)
Tintor2 My experience with character articles is limited, but I can give you an example for reference. For the article on FF's Lightning, I used her first and most iconic appearance for the infobox, then used CGI cutscene screenshots for changes across the XIII trilogy, which have informed her other appearances. --ProtoDrake (talk) 12:55, 4 February 2018 (UTC)
Be careful here. NFCC#3 and all. We can't always document with images every version of a character through changes made in official art. We need sources to describe why changes were made, or reception or elements related to the change of character. (Lightning has it, just a caution in general). --Masem (t) 13:38, 4 February 2018 (UTC)
Can an experienced editor give Sonic X-treme a pass-through?
Hi all. I've spent the last couple of weeks deconstructing and expanding Sonic X-treme. I think it's in really good shape now, but before this I haven't really been on Wikipedia in about three years, so I could really use a second set of eyes to make sure I've got everything in good shape and to scrutinize the prose for opportunities. I think this could be a good FA candidate but would rather not send it to FAC if it's not of a professional quality just yet. Thank you. Red Phoenixtalk04:49, 6 February 2018 (UTC)
Grammar: "He scored the game an 8/10"
This weird construction seems to appear in almost every WP article about games. Surely it should be "the game scored 8/10" or "he rated the game 8/10" or "he gave the game a score of 8/10". Does it seem blatantly wrong to anyone else? Do mainstream dictionaries support this specific kind of transitivity for the verb "score"? 31.50.65.82 (talk) 18:34, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
The table documentation says the table is optional, though. Specifically, "Traditional reviews, or those that provide some type of score, may be few and far between for some games. If you only have a couple of such reviews which could be used to fill the table, consider foregoing the table and instead simply state these in the body of reception text."--Martin IIIa (talk) 00:05, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
Doesn't mean they should be stated in prose as numbers, though. Plenty of other ways to express the rating qualitatively. (Also echo the above that numerical scores should almost never be in prose, since they need context to hold any value—e.g., the score's deviance from the avg/median, the publication's leanings towards the material. Instead of saying "8/10", better to say what that score was intended to signify.) czar01:23, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
The trouble with that is, I've sourced several hundred reviews on Wikipedia, and I still don't know how to tell what the score was intended to signify. (Or if it was intended to signify anything at all, for that matter; I've read more than one critic admit that their scores are to an extent arbitrary, and they only follow the convention of reducing their opinion to a number because the readership demands it.) It's not like I can read the reviewers' minds.--Martin IIIa (talk) 05:14, 6 February 2018 (UTC)
I'm not sure I follow why it's an "either/or" situation. You can give the number and ask say what the score was intended to signify. I mean, I agree that generally, the scores just go in the review table, I just think approaching never is a bit much. Excluding the review score number is excluding key info, and sometimes it just doesn't really make sense to make a review table when a game only has a couple review scores and one or two are without review scores too. Sergecross73msg me13:30, 6 February 2018 (UTC)
Yea we discussed it a bit yesterday. The content is almost importable onto Wikipedia but the Creative Commons licence chosen (CC-BY-NC-4.0) is just slightly outside of the range that WP:DONATETEXT allows, which is a shame. However the book can only be used as a reference for citation if individual authors can have reliability established (every feaure and review is attributed to its author fortunately). Ben · Salvidrim!✉17:07, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
Even if we're talking one of the sections in that book written by a non-reliable author, with editorial control, I suspect that one can pull some appropriate search terms to dig into more reliable sources for the more obscure games (eg pre 2000 or even earlier). --Masem (t) 00:28, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
Screenshots
Hi all! I'm new in the English version of the Wikipedia.
I wanted to translate Book of Demons page from its Polish version (written by me), but I also wanted to add screenshots. I first uploaded my screenshots as "own" and "free" but then I realized that those will require permissions though. I read a bit on Video games style article, and I thought I have to publish them under "non-free use" license, but since I'm not a native English speaker it is hard to me to understand all the law/legal terms and I probably did that wrong and messed a lot by editing their descriptions (see example).
After realising that I will require permission to use those freely I asked the developer (Thing Trunk) for permission, which they granted but the wording suggests that it might be used only in the article. I believe that I can get a free use permission since the developer was excited to hear I'm writing the article about their game. If I will obtain it where I should place the screenshot of the permission (or its text, or "whatever") and how could I change the license on existing media? Would you recommend me to delete the media and upload them once again or just edit their descriptions? Otherwise (in case I will not obtain free use license), I will probably delete the images (if I can) and just leave the article without any visualisation.
Marchjuly I'm not so familiar with the process of getting copywrights to own free images using WikiMedia, however, screenshots are covered by fair use, provided that they are not excessive. You can use template:Non-free video game screenshot on the screenshot to upload it. Taking a look at the draft, it looks like you have one image, and presumably some sort of boxart for the game's cover. You are usually fine to upload a screenshot and a logo for a game, as far as I am aware. There are limits on size and quality of images, however the bots will also clean this up should it be an issue.
A notable sequel to a non-notable game - how to set up
We Were Here is a cooperative "escape the room" game. It fails notability, save for the fact its up for an IGF award this year, and Gamasutra, as usual has a brief discussion with the developers. As a standalone, it would crash and burn a notability check, but WP:V is met.
We Were Here 2 was just released and has a bit more coverage, at least a few reviews. Barely passing the GNG but enough that I'd confidentially spent the time to develop it.
Two games is not a series or franchise, so an article "We Were Here (series)" would make no sense. (That said, whether a 3rd game is coming, I'm not sure yet).
So I'm thinking that if I craft an article We Were Here (haven't checked disambig yet), covering both games and being clear in the lede that both games are discussed in detail, that seems to be the best way to handle it. Alternatively, I could make the sequel's article and then discuss the first game as much as possible by sourcing there, but that seems to be a bit forced. --Masem (t) 00:57, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
If there is literally nothing, or nothing amounting to significant interest about the first game, then it's definitely correct to only write the article about the second game and leave any comments about the first game to the "Development" or a "Precursor" section (per WP:WEIGHT)--"we developed this game because the first game, which released in year Y, did poorly", or whatever. --Izno (talk) 13:46, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
I would like third-party comments from VG members on the Sonic Spinball talk page, relating to a dispute between myself and Jaguar relating to the use of Sega Genesis/Mega Drive as the game's platform over just Sega Genesis, which is the article's name (and therefore the WP:COMMONNAME). ~ Dissident93(talk)22:10, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
It sounds like the issue would apply to EVERY game released both in NA & EU on the platform, no? (Oh god not that Genesis vs. MD debate again didn't we almost kill each other over the article title a couple of years ago...) Ben · Salvidrim!✉22:24, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
Yes, which is my issue with it. Either we go with just Genesis on every Genesis game, or we go with Genesis/Mega Drive. We shouldn't pick and chose per article based on personal preference. ~ Dissident93(talk)00:05, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
Personal preference, no. I could see a case being made if there were EU-exclusive releases to call it Mega Drive in the article but that's pretty much the extent. Ben · Salvidrim!✉00:13, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
This needs to be a project wide resolution across all articles relating to the console. Expunging Mega Drive from every article is a backward step. Pushing Mega Drive to a little enclave of EU only articles is also wrong. Both names are valid. The correct solution is to either use "Mega Drive/Genesis" throughout the article or use it at the first mention and then switch to the region the game was developed in (Mega Drive for JP/EU and Genesis for NA). No one is obliterating every use of Tyre or Faucet in WP, Mega Drive should be accorded the same courtesy. - X201 (talk) 08:55, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
Why would you need to say both throughout the article? I've also removed that from any articles I've maintained. Once you've established that they're the same thing once, you shouldn't have to do it at every mention. People can remember they're the same thing. Sergecross73msg me14:18, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
Yeah, I always use "Genesis/Mega Drive" on the first mention and "Genesis" afterwards, except when regional differences are being directly discussed, when the game is exclusive to PAL regions and/or Japan, and when the game is exclusive to North America. I understand the desire to give the Genesis and Mega Drive names equal treatment, but to the average WP reader the connection between the console name and the country the game was developed in would not be apparent, making the naming seem arbitrary. For regional exclusives, I use just the name the console had in that region. I think mentioning the console had another name in places where the game wasn't released is comparable to the practice of mentioning that the publisher "later became Company X"; however important it is to the subject being mentioned, it's not relevant to the article subject.--Martin IIIa (talk) 15:50, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
Another thing to note: I think people's general knowledge on this has changed. Back in the 1990s, when it was a new product, and the internet wasn't prominent, I bet a lot of people were confused by the whole Genesis/Mega Drive naming situation. But it's been 20 years since its active timeframe, and almost 30 years since its release. We live in a much more globalized world, where a quick Google search is usually seconds away from most people, in the form of internet, computers, and smartphones. And the system is still talked about frequently today, in the form of classic game releases and various console re-releases that are comparable to NES classic. I'm pretty sure people understand the situation now, and if they don't, there's no reason they couldn't figure it out in mere seconds. Sergecross73msg me16:10, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
Nomination for deletion of Template:League of Legends
There was apparently a discussion surrounding the presentation and style of the said template. While I understand the need for simplification.... It's now a daunting proposition to look at it. I saw it on the bottom of Final Fantasy Awakening, I initially thought something was spectacularly wrong with the template structure. Looking at the discussion, it seems there was also a wish to avoid white space, and the new arrangement...doesn't do that very much at all. Can we please have another look at this within the wider video game WikiProject? --ProtoDrake (talk) 12:21, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
Howdy all! I'm back to get suggestions with another Pokémon list, this time the List of Pokémon Trading Card Game sets. Right now the article is a woeful mess of fan content with useful information sprinkled in haphazardly. I've started a revamped list here and would like some input on what to include beyond the basics already mentioned. At present, I'm thinking of including promotional sets/cards in a separate section that summarizes them (or a list if there's too much for prose). I have yet to look into actual sources for fleshing out details on each set so any tips on where to go for that info would be greatly appreciated! I'm coming here instead of the Pokémon project as it's a related topic and users here are more active. ~ Cyclonebiskit (chat) 17:38, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
Gravity gun
Hello project's participants. I would like to highlight some events that happened on the Gravity gun article. Recently I modified the article, fixed and reorganized sources and the sections. The "Gravity gun" is a weapon of Half-Life 2, as many know, even before being a "game concept based on the use of physics". As far as I know, there is no authoritative publication or expert, who have ever spoken about "Gravity gun" as a "video game concept", and even in that case sources were lacking to prove it.
So, I thought of changing the incipt of the article and making it more focused on Half-Life 2's weapon, without detracting from the fact that other games for sure used similar gameplay physics manipulation, but different from the Gravity Gun itself. As I said I also done other adjustments. Subsequently, acting for "hate" as he himself said, user Nicolas.le-guen deleted all my contributions without even discriminating the content, saying that my motivations were "justified a stupid way". I would also like to point out that the user has renamed the article from "Gravity gun" to "Gravity gun (video game concept)" without asking for consent to the project, but acting on its own initiative and suggesting me to create a Gravity gun (Half-Life) article on my own. Of course I considered his "alternative" useless, as just one article about the Gravity gun is sufficient, but it should be based on the weapon itself, before. The voice at now also presents the same other problems as before ("original research", and an entire section without sources). I don't think the article in this state is correct, just as I don't think the user's behavior has been corrected. How would be good to proceed? Thank you. Lone Internaut (talk) 19:00, 6 February 2018 (UTC)
The unilateral move without discussion to an article title with needless disambiguation should be undone and the page moved back to Gravity gun.
As for the topic, such intricate in-universe gameplay elements as "one gun from Half-Life 2" do not usually warrant standalone articles. The topic of "the Gravity Gun from Half-Life 2" is best covered in Half-Life 2#Gameplay. The topic of "Gravity guns" is best covered in the WP:SINGULARWP:CONCEPTDAB page Gravity gun, which can mention the HL2 item as an example of a gravity gun. Ben · Salvidrim!✉19:41, 6 February 2018 (UTC)
Well, "best covered" I would not say: there are no sources in Half-Life 2#Gameplay. The Gravity gun in Half-Life 2, it's not a simple weapon, it actually had for sure a lot of importance in the medium, should it need an article on its own? BFG is not about a weapon that can estabilish "gameplay physics manipulation" concept, but it's a weapon in a more traditional sense of the term, and it appears in other games, yes, but id Software games.
Then, are we sure that physics manipulation devices in all video games are called "Gravity guns"? That would need some sources to prove it. In Dead Space is called "Kinesis module", in Doom 3 is called "Grabber" and so on. But even if we want to consider and call "gravity guns" these gameplay concept, would not be better to call them simply "phsycics manipulation devices" and write a section about them in Game physics article? Lone Internaut (talk) 20:05, 6 February 2018 (UTC)
Looking at the sourcing of the article, I feel like it is heavily WP:SYNTH. It may not be notable enough for its own page. If it is, it may have to only include the HL2 gun and remove the synth of connecting various gravity guns from various games.ZXCVBNM (TALK)21:36, 6 February 2018 (UTC)
Ehm, I had not really thought about it. We were talking about video games, specifically, and the article was born exclusively to the weapon of Half Life 2, in origin. Talking about "gravity guns" in movies and novels and even a "real" gravity gun ... I don't know, the article would be distorted. It would be outside of the project. We were talking about video games, I think that making a general kneading is wrong. At this point, it would make more sense to create a Gravity gun (Half-Life) article, and remove the synth of connecting various gravity guns from various games as suggested by ZXCVBNM user. Half-Life's Gravity gun is an innovation and its importance in the medium can not be denied, like BFG 9000. It would deserve its own article. The project will decide. Lone Internaut (talk) 19:13, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
There's no rule that articles about concepts found in video games have to restrict themselves to only video games. And wikiprojects exist to support article writing, not to restrict what content can be found in what articles. And as far as "The project will decide"... what exactly do you think this discussion is?
All that aside, if I saw a link to an article on Gravity gun, I would expect to see an article that had a big discussion of what the HL2 gravity gun is and how/why it was developed, followed by another lengthy section on how the concept of a physics manipulating weapon had expanded into other games and media, preferably with sources saying that those guns were inspired by the gravity gun, or at least believed to have been so by critics. I would not expect to see an article on just the HL2 gun; I really, really doubt that would be substantive enough to be an article on its own or would really be comprehensive. And if you couldn't make an article that discussed the original gun and the concept like that... then maybe the article doesn't need to exist. --PresN19:50, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
Agreed on all points. An article about one weapon from one game is almost certainly going to be deleted or merged into that respective game. There's not going to be enough substantial, third party coverage about the gun itself to meet the WP:GNG. I have my doubts if the this article would survive a deletion discussion in either scenario, but in general, if you want to write about minor things like that singular weapons in games, I'd recommend a specialist wiki, like a "Half-Life wikia" or something, they're way more lax about standards for things having their own articles. Sergecross73msg me20:32, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
I think this discussion is "bringing to light" an issue that, of course, I'm not going to solve by myself, creating my own rules, moving the article, creating new ones at will or saying that someone's motivation is "justified a stupid way" as if Wikipedia was my property, like Nicolas.le-guen did.
What you "expect" was not different from how the article was, but then my contributions were reverted. And it was not even so different from now: it talked about the Gravity gun in HL2, (which in video games is known by this name only in Half Life), about how it was emulated in other games like Doom 3 (using physics in the gameplay, as a weapon) and how it had impact in the history of video games, of course by critics (by who otherwise?). In addition to that, I had arranged some sources, removed a section without sources, rearranged in order those already present and slightly modified the text. I probably would have contributed even more if the work was not interrupted.
Yes, that editor was wrong to rename the article, but the points being made to you now is that 1) there's almost no way a standalone article for just the Half Life 2 version of the gun would meet Wikipedia's notability/sourcing standards 2) it's a little bit iffy if the general concept even needs an article and 3) if any article of any sort would exist, it needs to be much better sourced, and be far less about its fictional content in the games, and more about the "out of universe" context - developer's commentary on creating it, critic's reception of it, etc. Please read Wikipedia's stances on writing about fictional things and how to approach it. The article spends way to much time just describing what the guns do in the games. That's now how Wikipedia writing is supposed to be. Sergecross73msg me21:20, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
Except for the fact that "Gravity gun", in video games, is a name that appears only in Half-Life 2, of course it's not about only the "Half-Life 2 version" as you can see even now. The general concept revolves aroud game physics, which is an article on its own and can be expanded to talk about "physics manipulation devices". The article can still grow, improvements can be made, sources can be add. That article exist since 01:00, 4 November 2007, has grown, other users contributed. It's strange that only now all of these doubts comes out, they wouldn't probably if it was not for this talk I opened, but my intentions was not to doubt about the article, but about the fact that it would have a more centered incipit on the weapon of Half Life 2, and then on all that follows. Then my contributions were reverted in a not good way and here we are. And still: it is no very different from now, and from how the article has been in the last months/years. Lone Internaut (talk) 21:44, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
I agree here, plus this could be expanded to talk about games where manipulation of physics (rather than just have a physics engine) are core elements of gameplay. HL2 obviously, but then you have twitchy-games like QWOP, Goat Sim, Octodad, Human Fall Flat; and physics-driven puzzles games like Bridge Constructor, World of Goo, etc. I do not know how well the sourcing is to group these, but this seems like the nature place to put them in "Game Physics". --Masem (t) 01:03, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
Yes, it was something I was thinking about. The argument is definitely better if treated in game physics. Of course, in the Gravity gun article, there is space to talk about everything that matters, including devices that are clearly "its direct legacy" like the Doom 3's Grabber, or TimeSplitters' Temporal Uplink. The article can still grow and expand, I don't think it's right to kill it. For all other similar concepts, devices or games where manipulation of physics are core elements of gameplay, the article game physics seems to be more suitable. Lone Internaut (talk) 18:03, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
In light of the recent discussion above, the inherent bias of this project identified, and the countless back-and-forth arguing over which name should be preferred even for articles considered 'neutral',[4][5] I think a project-wide consensus should be reached to straighten things out once and for all. I can't believe that people seriously think that Genesis is the common name for the console—a fallacy even reaffirmed in the 2013 RfC. Per WP:COMMONAME, the definition is ...to use the name that is most frequently used to refer to the subject in English-language reliable sources. First and foremost, I would like to stress that I am not seeking to rename the Sega Genesis article to Mega Drive, but I would like to give both names equal weight throughout all articles. It shocks me to see editors systemically removing all mentions of the name 'Mega Drive' from every article they see, with the most common rationale being that Genesis is the common name. I would like to stress that this is not only false but also an excuse to reinforce a biased decision from a North American-centric environment which Wikipedia hosts (the misconception of Genesis being the common name is even bolstered in the Genesis FAQ). A common name means something the majority of people recognise what the subject is, whether it be a person, video game or a country. Some examples include:
Mega Drive → Genesis. Common name? If we went by this line of reasoning, Star Fox should be renamed Star Wing because it was co-developed in the United Kingdom, nevermind Nintendo's native Japan nor its marketing in the rest of the world. Star Wing is just as much as a common name as Genesis is.
Countries highlighted in red show where the Mega Drive was sold as 'Genesis', whereas those highlighted in blue denote the original name. Blanked out countries have no available data in regards to their sales. (It should also be taken into account that the console was introduced to "most African countries", but sources couldn't be found).
By gathering the relevant sales data for the console I have produced a map which displays the number of territories that had Genesis as the name of the console. The grand total is three, four if you count Puerto Rico. Practically the rest of the world including native Japan retained the original name Mega Drive. Common name is still Genesis, yes? Another good determiner for identifying one's common name is by seeing how many results are displayed via a Google search. For me, a simple cursory search of 'Sega Genesis' provides about 1,500,000 results, while a search of 'Mega Drive' provides 34,600,000 results.[6] I realise that other people get different results, but the fact that Mega Drive outnumbers Genesis by 33 million is a subtle tap on my shoulder hinting that Genesis isn't the common name. Even more so, when I precision it down to "Sega Mega Drive" I still get 4,470,000 results. A search through the video game custom search engine still outnumbers it greatly. If you have doubts that searching Google is an adequate criteria for finding out a preferred name, a page move request for Sonic Spinball was made using the exact same rationale and was met with unanimous support.
34,600,000 results for Mega Drive.
The bias needs to end. The English Wikipedia caters for the entire Anglosphere and not just Wisconsin. The way that the majority of WPVG editors systemically clamp down on the name Mega Drive and replace it solely with Genesis because "the article is called that" needs to stop. ENGVAR is irrelevant to preferring one term over the other – this is an encyclopedia which is used on a global basis. Both names are valid and should have total equality. JAGUAR17:11, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
Never trust the Google estimate. Don't even let it suggest truth to you. The last page of actual results in an alleged 15,700,000 (what it told me for "mega drive") says "Page 15 of about 148 results" and even that's bullshit because there are exactly 148 results. This is the last one in existence and it proves nothing about anything. It does contain a link to "Why you can trust BBC News", though (which is also quite meaningless). InedibleHulk(talk)01:50, 10 February 2018 (UTC)
I propose that all articles on Genesis/Mega Drive video games should use the combined "Sega Genesis/Mega Drive" or "Mega Drive/Genesis at least once in the article. The presumption that Genesis is the WP:COMMONAME of the console to be challenged and both names should share equal weight. The remaining mentions of the console's name in any article should stick with using just one name, depending on editors' discretion.
Oppose proposal as is. I'm all for the part that says "Sega Genesis/Mega Drive" should be mentioned in the article at least once. If you had stopped there, I'd give a hearty support. But I don't support the abolishing the COMMONNAME argument, or the "editor's descretion" part. Far far far too much time has been wasted over at the actual article in regards to the article's naming. (I think last count was like 12?) Supporting your entire proposal would rip wide open those wounds and arguments again. Per the comments I just left above, I don't think its worth people's time and energy to keep arguing over something that I don't believe people are really confused about anymore in the first place. Sergecross73msg me17:33, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
@Sergecross73: sure, my apologies I think I rushed the proposal part. Shall we tone it down to just mentioning "Sega Genesis/Mega Drive" once in the lead? I think that was something along the lines I was aiming for. But I think the common name argument should stay, or at least be open for more discussion. JAGUAR17:36, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
Its up to you on how much you want to take on. Simpler may be better, considering any of these G/MD discussions tend to spiral out of control... Sergecross73msg me17:58, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
I've tweaked the proposal. I hope people won't look down on this, it's just that I feel like I've been the only one noticing misconceptions with both names. The usage of both names at least once in the article/lead should be a good compromise. JAGUAR17:59, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
Oppose per the 2013 discussion on the name change. I think it's kind of crazy to list "Sega Genesis/Mega Drive" in every article-- I think whichever is used when the article is expanded past stub length should be what is used. If there's an issue with it, there should be a footnote at the first mention of Genesis or Mega Drive which notes what it was called in other regions. Nomader (talk) 18:40, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
CommentSupport I have no real issue with doing Sega Genesis/Mega Drive at first mention in the article, although I'd prefer if we just went with Sega Genesis (or Mega Drive in case of PAL/JP only games) in the infobox and later mentions for space saving reasons. Or alternative, we could handle it like we do date formats and EngVar (tied to region or first to place the tags), but this could just invite people to try and stealthy edit in their personal preference and revert anytime somebody else tries to change it (basically what's been going on already), so then again that's not ideal. However, I don't see how changing the article name to just Mega Drive would help anything besides people who hate the name, as Genesis would still have to be mentioned. ~ Dissident93(talk)19:03, 8 February 2018 (UTC)
Support Use Mega Drive/Genesis at first mention then something along the lines of EngVar or developer nationality to decide on single use for rest of article. Whatever solution is devised, common sense needs to reign and the use of Common Name as a reason for mass removal of Mega Drive or Mega CD needs to stop. - X201 (talk) 12:51, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
Oppose Your downplaying of the continental U.S. as "just Wisconsin" seems like evidence you have an anti-US bias and this argument is in bad faith. Per previous discussion, there is no clear reason to change the name. Genesis is shorter, easier to remember, so if both terms are equally valid, I'd go with that one.ZXCVBNM (TALK)14:37, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
Ridiculous. You just said that I'm trying to change the name, I'm not – I'm trying to offer a decent compromise so that both names share equal weight. JAGUAR14:58, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
Oppose The name used on a page should follow what makes the most sense in light of the rest of the page. If we were talking about a Japenese game, we'd stick to MegaDrive; if we were talking one made in the States, Genesis. Non-video game articles but on VG-related topics should use their discretion depending how they were written.--Masem (t) 15:20, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
Oppose - Both names should have total equality, true. This is not the right solution, however. Article names need to be as simple as they can be, and trying to give due weight to both in the title is never going to keep it simple. So, we have to go with one or the other. Tough, but that’s the way it is. I’m not opposed to Mega Drive or to Sega Genesis, but please, only one or the other. Not both. Everyone just needs to drop any accusation of bias and just assume good faith, that the title is the best we can do given the circumstances. Red Phoenixtalk18:27, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
Comment to the proposer - "Sega Genesis / Mega Drive" is used at the top of the infobox for the Sega Genesis article. I would put it to you that this should satisfy your argument, and also I believe is a more professional and aesthetically pleasing way of handling this suggestion than putting it into the prose or titles. Red Phoenixtalk00:15, 10 February 2018 (UTC)
Oppose As someone that prefers "Mega Drive"...I think the "Sega Genesis/Mega Drive" wording looks amateurish. Use Genesis by default unless the game was not released in North America. The Genesis vs. Mega Drive debate has been going on for over a decade on this website, and this just muddies the waters. TarkusABtalk22:34, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
Support Say it both ways the first time, try to avoid saying it at all elsewhere and consider the game's more popular market if you must repeat it. InedibleHulk(talk)01:20, 10 February 2018 (UTC)
someone is combining the The Monster Hunter Freedom and Monster Hunter Freedom Unite games to their corresponding main monster hunter games without any agreement or discussion made. I undid the edits at first because it didn't seem like anyone talked about merging them at all. but mine were undone and was asked to provide evidence on how there's no agreement for it. I'm not sure how to do that. but I don't see any talk pages talking about combining the articles. and its actually done super lazily. they literally cut the article and paste it on.204.153.155.151 (talk) 13:08, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
Seems like disruptive editing to me. There is no indication that those games are not notable enough for their own articles.ZXCVBNM (TALK)14:27, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
WRONG Merging never requires an AFD, AFD is not to be used for merging (however, a merge result might result from an AFD). Anyone is free to boldly merge articles, but in cases where the articles are both reasonably well-established, that should be checked through talk page discussion. --Masem (t) 14:32, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
When I want to merge an article, I always follow the procedure laid out at WP:Merging, even if I think it's a completely uncontroversial merge. Merging articles (as opposed to simply redirecting, which I often see inaccurately referred to as merging) is too long and painstaking a process to have it simply reverted two seconds later and discover that consensus doesn't support it. It's much better to make sure the community supports what you're doing before you go through all that work.--Martin IIIa (talk) 15:28, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
To be fair, the user is an experienced editor. But I don't personally agree with merging articles without ever mentioning it on the talk page(s) as courtesy. Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)15:37, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
Neverrainy consistently makes bad edits. He's one of the most incompetent editors I've come across and net negative to the project. --The1337gamer (talk) 18:25, 9 February 2018 (UTC)
I think the issue is just throwing out personal attacks. If you have the diffs to prove that the editor is harming Wikipedia, that should be reported on the noticeboard, rather than just stated outright that "this editor is incompetent", which accomplishes nothing.ZXCVBNM (TALK)16:22, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
Couldn't agree more. Don't call out users. I said the user is an experienced editor, that should mean he knows the policies, but if his editing is poor, it should be mentioned on the noticeboard, or specific examples on his talk page. I did look, and their record is far from spotless, but no Personal Attacks please. Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)16:44, 12 February 2018 (UTC)
Review request for a DYK
Hey all-- my DYK request for Command and Destroy has been sitting around since 1/9-- it needs a reviewer to approve the ALT2 that the previous reviewer suggested. If anyone wants to come around and check it, that'd be swell! Nomader (talk) 22:07, 13 February 2018 (UTC)
Images for Today's Featured Article
This was news to me ... maybe I'm the last to know. David Levy has okayed File:Freedom_Planet_Torque_Sketch.jpg for a Main Page appearance at Wikipedia:Today's featured article/March 17, 2018. We haven't had many acceptable Main Page images for Featured Article video games. This one is from the press kit for the game. It's CC-BY-SA, and that's a reasonable depiction of one of the main characters. If we can get more CC-BY-SA concept art for future TFAs, that would be great. - Dank (push to talk) 04:41, 14 February 2018 (UTC)
MOS:VG Notification
WP:JFN is being discussed again on the talk page of MOS:VG. Additionally recommend that if you did not previously watch the page when it was a project guideline, you watchlist it now that it's MOS. Any changes related to it should be discussed there now, not here as we have in the past. -- ferret (talk) 17:50, 14 February 2018 (UTC)
I'm having trouble with the Fallout 4 Awards table, as it is all scrambled and messed up! I don't know how to fix it, and I need to add in Fallout 4 VR and its release dates and its 2017-2018 accolades! How can I fix the Awards table? Please help me! --Angeldeb82 (talk) 20:57, 15 February 2018 (UTC)
This should just be a section in the MOBA article. I don't see how this will ever expand, as it's only a paragraph long outside of the lead. If nobody objects, I'll do it in a few days. ~ Dissident93(talk)08:55, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
Yeah good call. Almost did the same thing myself. It'll obviously be notable, but literally nothing is known yet, and based on some of their other mobile games, it could be months until we know much. Sergecross73msg me16:29, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
I would suggest merging them into one "GameMaker games" category. YoYo Games/Mark Overmars's Game Maker/GameMaker/GameMaker Studio are the same tool marketed with different names at different points in time.--Alexandra IDVtalk16:51, 18 February 2018 (UTC)
This would make sense, but the games in the "Game Maker games" category were developed in the tool that is now called Game Maker Studio.--Alexandra IDVtalk11:15, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
During a GA review of Ginga Fukei Densetsu Sapphire, it came up that the game was released as an emulated game on PSP in 2008. I didn't know this, but Emulated games are generally not placed in the infobox's for game releases. However, the game was a physical release. [7] Where do we stand on this? It could be that the game is emulated on the PSP with a physical copy, but should this go in the infobox or not? Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)12:27, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
If a published decided to package and release to retail a game that was essentially an emulation, I would still consider the physical release notable to include as an infobox date, emulated or not. It's emulations posted to digital storefronts that are far less notable (at almost no cost to the devs/publishers, compared to retail). --Masem (t) 14:58, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
This particular entry is a compilation. Although weirdly, a compilation of two visual novels and a shooter. You'd also have to think, that this game would be the primary selling point. Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)15:48, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
I agree with Masem here, although I think an exception can be possibly made for this. My only issue with that is if we allow this, then editors could use this as justification for other physically published emulated collections, such as Midway Arcade Treasures and Sonic Gems Collection, in which cases I would definitely disagree with. ~ Dissident93(talk)22:04, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
Who developed Sonic's earliest games?
I'd like some consensus on trying to work out something I've turned up in my research for Sega Technical Institute and the Sonic the Hedgehog games as a whole. The reason I don't want to just be WP:BOLD here is because we're talking about several of the project's higher-importance articles and several GA's, and I anticipate it may be a controversial proposal. Pinging @TheJoebro64: since I think you will be quite interested in this as well.
Sonic Team started out as Sega's AM8 division and developed a few titles such as Phantasy Star before doing Sonic the Hedgehog (1991 video game). After that, Yuji Naka and Hirokazu Yasuhara, along with a few others, left for America and joined Sega Technical Institute, and it was the team there that developed Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Sonic the Hedgehog 3, Sonic & Knuckles, and Sonic Spinball. According to Retro Gamer Issue 26, which has an article on the history of Sonic Team, "Seven Sonic titles had been either created or supervised by members of the temporarily disbanded Sonic Team before Naka-san was tempted back to Japan in 1994..." (This would include Sonic CD, which was supervised by Sonic creator Naoto Ohshima). Retro Gamer's Issue 36, which has an article on the history of Sega Technical Institute, does not refer to Naka's team at STI as "Sonic Team"; they are referred to as the "Japanese team" or "Japanese developers", to separate them from STI's American developers.
So, that means to me that the developer for these games needs to be changed from "Sonic Team" to "Sega Technical Institute", and that we need to have a closer look at the older games claimed to be from Sonic Team. While I'm sure some past reliable sources have simply "assumed" that this is the case because they're Sonic games and have to be from Sonic Team if they didn't have another studio's logo on them like Sonic 3D Blast did, we have other sources that reliably suggest the developers of these games were not Sonic Team, but rather other divisions of Sega populated with Sonic Team members. I'd like to have some opinions on this proposal from project members. Red Phoenixtalk18:11, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
Here is a conversation that we had recently about this topic. I think the consensus was that "Sonic Team" existed prior to Nights as a loosely defined collection of individuals such as Naka and Ohshima that had ties to Sonic games. Because the collective later worked officially under the "Sonic Team" label starting with Nights, that loose collective is often retroactively called "Sonic Team" by RSs and therefore we followed. But it is far from a closed conversation. TarkusABtalk18:55, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
Thanks for your input, TarkusAB. I could definitely see how that is, and I'm sure that's part of what our sources may have indicated, but if we consider Sonic Team as Sega's AM8 division, which it otherwise is and was officially renamed, then that changes our definition. Furthermore, Ohshima didn't have any hands in the STI-developed games, though he did in Sonic CD and later when Nights into Dreams was developed. What I'm looking at now is that we also have RS's that say the opposite and that we should consider how we define Sonic Team. The more I've worked with sources related to Sonic Team and Sega Technical Institute, the more I am in favor of reversing course based on what we've seen so far. At some point I'll have to do a rewrite of the Sonic Team article to really reflect its history in a more reliably sourced light. Red Phoenixtalk19:03, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
I'd be fine with changing the Sonic 2 article to say it was developed by STI, and Sonic CD to say that it was just Sega. I didn't really comment in the Sonic CD discussion, but my opinion is that we should treat Sonic Team as if it was briefly defunct after the first game came out and then came back after after Sonic & Knuckles. JOEBRO6421:47, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
Why would you be fine with that and not Sonic Team, when neither of them are technically credited? If we are going for what is or is not, then simply settling for Sega would be preferred. That being said, how many sources say STI developed Sonic 3? I feel like this is a large WP:OR issue. ~ Dissident93(talk)21:56, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
Quite a few actually, Dissident93. Retro Gamer says it. Sega-16 says it. It's also the same reason STI develoed Sonic X-treme, even after Naka left. Red Phoenixtalk23:25, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
I didn't mean to put Sonic 3—but I'd change that (and S&K) to Sega, since the Retro Gamer source does look accurate, based on my research. JOEBRO6421:59, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
It's preferred if you used strikeout rather than just outright deletion information. As for the discussion, if sources still retroactively consider it a Sonic Team game (no reason to doubt that, outside of pedanticism), then I don't really agree on changing it. ~ Dissident93(talk)22:06, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
Uhhh, why the hostility? Comments are meant to be left intact because if quoted, it could give a different meaning if you remove stuff in the process. And where are the sources that do say they are incorrect? Like I said, this seems like a WP:OR issue, as the only source brought up so far is a Retro Gamer article, and who is to say they are the ones who are incorrect here? ~ Dissident93(talk)22:19, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
I just looked through Sonic Retro's magazine collection, and none of them actually mention Sonic Team as developing the game. In fact, this Game Players article credits it simply to Sega of America. JOEBRO6422:37, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
Actually, Retro Gamer seems to have pulled this whole AM8 thing out of thin air. The book The History of Sonic the Hedgehog, which features input from Naka, Ohshima, and Yasuhara, just states that Naka and Ohshima founded "a small team" in 1990 after Naka finished the Genesis port of Ghouls n Ghosts. Ohshima makes it clear in the same book that it was just him and Naka at first, so it was certainly not a formal development division and not at all the same group that created Phantasy Star, though both Naka and Ohshima worked on that game. There certainly would not have been an AM8 in that time period, as there was not even an AM2 until circa 1989 (yes, that's right, don't believe those myriad of English sources that say it existed in 1985, Japanese sources say it was established after the completion of Power Drift.), while AM3 was established in circa 1990 (first game released in 1991). The AM8 designation seems to have been a distortion of the "Sega Software R&D Department 8" designation Naka's team briefly had in the late 1990s before taking the formal name Sonic Team. That is actually the first time Sega had a development division that was officially designated Sonic Team. In 2005, the core of the division was absorbed into Global Entertainment R&D 1 after yet another reorganization.
As for when the team actually first used the term Sonic Team, that's a good question. The History of Sonic the Hedgehog refers to the group as Sonic Team throughout, but there is no indication from the people they interviewed as to whether that name was actually used during the development of the original game. My guess is that it started out as an informal thing where the people on the team making the game referred to themselves in that way before it became an official division brand circa 2000. Sonic Team existed as a division for a relatively brief period, but Sonic Team as an informal name for those people that worked on Sonic games together is a thread throughout the entire history of the series. This is why it is so hard to find a good definition of what actually constitutes "Sonic Team." Indrian (talk) 22:52, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
Interesting information you have, Indrian. Curious where "AM8" would have come from, then, especially since Phantasy Star is listed as AM8 in Retro Gamer, and AM7 on its own article. Given what you have, neither one can be right. We do at least know they started calling themselves "Sonic Team" by 1996 since it's right on the box art for "Nights into Dreams". There are actually some other suggestions I've seen that it wasn't official in period-based sources as well; Game Players called the American based STI team that worked on Sonic X-treme "The Sonic team" even though they were a totally different group, and I have to assume even by OR that they didn't have an official "Sonic Team" to confuse them with. Would you still consider, then, that Sega Technical Institute is the actual developer for Sonic 2, 3, & Knuckles, and Spinball? They were developed there by a team led by Yuji Naka. Furthermore, adding confusion, Sonic CD was done by a separate team, but one with Naoto Ohshima. Surely we can't call both of those Sonic Team? Red Phoenixtalk23:31, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
Yeah, like I said I really think the AM8 thing is confusion from the period when they were R&D 8 in the late 1990s, which is sometimes rendered as AM8 in some sources. They were never an "AM" team though, because that was a designation that Sega specifically used for Amusement Machine divisions (not counting periods when AM2 was its own thing because of Suzuki's power and influence, just to further confuse the issue). As for Sonic Team. Yes there have been teams identified as "Sonic Team" throughout the history here, and certainly that includes everything Naka did after returning to Japan from his US exile. I think the confusion comes from the fact that "Sonic Team" may have started as a name used for marketing purposes and then became the way that Naka's team preferred to refer to itself. Even in the heyday of the team with Nights and whatnot, it may have been largely unofficial from an org chart perspective, as Japanese companies do not tend to identify groups below the division level. Sonic Team WAS a division in the early 2000s, which further confuses the whole issue. There probably is not a good answer to this whole conundrum in English sources. There may or may not be in the Japanese sources. Indrian (talk) 23:39, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
Very true. I almost forgot about that. It would make sense that the division took its name from this group. This is not the case, however, with the STI-developed titles, of which the original Sonic is not one. I did a bit more digging into my Sega-16 sources from Ken Horowitz and his interviews with Sega executives; it looks like part of what our discrepancy in the reliable sources may be that while Sonic 2 was more of a collaborative project between the Japanese and American developers at STI, by Sonic 3 they were acting much as two different teams at the same developer. Red Phoenixtalk23:25, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
Seasons
How do you all deal with seasons? For example, the source says "the game will release this summer 1997". I've been told don't say "summer" because the northern hemisphere summer doesn't line up with the southern hemisphere summer and therefore it's confusing. What do I say then? "Q2/Q3"? "northern summer"? TarkusABtalk22:58, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
Most English sources are written from the northern hemisphere (do we have an Australian source listed? probably), so it's usually pretty easy to swap a season to its related quarter (or e.g. "mid"). --Izno (talk) 23:04, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
Actually probably not. Spring = Q2 is about the only one. Summer (usually June-July) straddled Q2 and Q3, Winter goes from Q4 of a year to Q1 of the next (although usually they use "holidays" (i.e. Q4) more than "Winter"), and Autumn/Fall (September-October) also straddles Q3 and Q4. Ben · Salvidrim!✉23:07, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
There are different definitions for what months belong to each season, so I like playing it safe and go Q1/Q2 for spring, Q2/Q3 for summer, Q3/Q4 for fall, and Q4 or Q1 for winter (depending on how the publisher phrases it).--Alexandra IDVtalk23:13, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
They do occasionally, which I always hate, because when it's a ways out, and they say something like "Winter 2019", it's hard to tell if they mean January 2019 or December 2019, which are almost a year in difference. Sergecross73msg me00:01, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
I have seen a couple of cases of games being announced as Winter and to the best of my knowledge they have always been Q1 releases. Based on that we should default to Q1 unless there is evidence to the contrary.--64.229.165.48 (talk) 01:20, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
As long as we are sourcing these announcements, assuming "Winter = Q1" is fine, as long as we recognize that if they really meant "Nov/Dec" when they provide a more specific date, we should provide it. The only gotcha I can see is that editors love include delays: it would be improper to assume that if it was announced "Winter" and then the date narrowed to Nov/Dec, and no one mentions a delay in RS, to assume it was a delay in sources. --Masem (t) 01:27, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
When I saw this post labeled "seasons", before I read it, I thought it meant seasons like how multiplayer games have seasons. I am wondering, how do we address seasons in regards to multiplayer games and is there an article? I've worked heavily on Destiny (video game) and it didn't have seasons, but Destiny 2 does, and I wanted to make some kind of note about it. --JDC808♫05:55, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
Custom VG Search busted
The recent domain move that Gamefaqs made to Gamespot has busted the Custom VG Search Engine. Whoever created it, needs to filter out "gamefaqs.gamespot.com" so that it gets removed. Thanks.ZXCVBNM (TALK)02:13, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
@Zxcvbnm: - I added the exclusion for "gamefaqs.gamespot.com" just now. Can you test to make sure it still works for you, Zxcvbnm? Just at present we're performing tests on Gamespot which is acting a little strange for the engine, so we may have to temporarily remove it again temporarily tomorrow. -Thibbs (talk) 04:22, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
"Busted" is a bit overblown. You can see from Thibbs's talk page that we're troubleshooting a separate Gamespot history bug, hence why the other Gamespot filters were temporarily removed. czar08:01, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
Wow. This guy attempted to create a Miiverse replacement once it's discontinuation was announced. The project failed and folded before Miiverse even went down. And then the guy came here to chronicle his exploits on Wikipedia. Why would someone do this?? Sergecross73msg me04:45, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
Can obviously unwanted draft articles like this be tagged with speedily delete? I tried doing that one time and it got reverted. ~ Dissident93(talk)04:07, 11 February 2018 (UTC)
I checked out this article and found it in pretty poor shape. Mostly primary sources from the developer and publisher. The game is in development, and the most notable thing about it is that there is a legal dispute over the intellectual property. It’s a sequel that likely won’t be able to use any material from the original games except for the title. I tried my best to find the better articles on the subject and focus on the objective parts that don’t repeat what either side in the dispute is saying, and weeding through the hearsay. Either way, the article could use some attention, if only to monitor it for POV pushing and paid editors. 135.23.100.230 (talk) 02:26, 27 February 2018 (UTC)
from our "To Do" list, (See below), it seems as though we have a list of jobs that require looking into. Would anyone be interested in starting some sort of backlog drive, or a collaborative effort to reduce some of these numbers? I've been planning on starting with infoboxes (I did a few of the As on Friday), before pushing some of the other issues.
I understand that the crazy high numbers for Screenshots and Cover Art make them difficult to put a dent in, but if we had a concerted effort to do these I think we could also reduce the backlog.
I also saw that we have a newsletter. Would anyone be interested to see any statistics on these dependencies? (And therefore be something worth looking into), or is this information that would be too much? Please let me know. Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)14:16, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
There was some discussion a few weeks back pn Discord about listing articles with screenshot requests released for platforms that are emulatable (thus, screenshots easily producable), and I think Brubsby did all the Atari games (and I think he started DOS also). In theory I guess every video game article larger than a stub could have cover art & a screenshot; However, cover art should literally be in every article (unless there's some reasoning I'm unaware of) so the ~2500 count is definitely lower than the "real" need. However those gnomes among us looking for more precise maintenance categories than those listed in the "to do" box should take a peek at the extended WP:WPVGBBen · Salvidrim!✉14:36, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
This is true, many emulators for older systems can be run in browser and it's very convenient for taking screenshots. But even just regular emulators work too with a little more effort. I got screenshots for all of the Atari 2600 games that had requested screenshots and started on DOS games, but DOS was a little weirder since a lot of the titles were multi-platform, and DOS didn't necessarily seem like the main one (So I was always a little unsure if the DOS screenshot was sufficient).
But I would definitely love to contribute to a backlog drive! Having some company would definitely motivate me to continue taking screenshots. Brubsby (talk) 16:57, 21 February 2018 (UTC)
Just getting hold of images is the major hurdle for some games, especially if it's a bedroom coded job for early 80s machines like the TRS-80 etc - X201 (talk) 15:12, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
Isn't the above a list of all articles on Wikipedia, and not specifically VG articles (Unless I'm accessing it wrongly). I understand certain game covers and screenshots may be hard to add, but there is no excuse for not looking into the list. Actually, the original question was regarding infoboxes, which are very easy to add (Provided we have a list), and the near 200 articles needing them could be completely reduced in a number of days, with enough people Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)15:51, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
The table of categories just above? The category links are to all articles, but the numbers link to a page which filters it by articles with the WPVG talk page template. --PresN16:24, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
All of the above numbers are manually derived, but have now been updated- purge the page to see. There are a bunch of smaller ones that can be fixed pretty fast. --PresN17:12, 19 February 2018 (UTC)
I think that should be the process, if anyone else is interested, by going category by category removing the backlog.
- On a completely seperate topic, when does the template for the To do get updated? Is that a manual thing, or done by bots? I recently GA reviewed Heavy Rain, do I have to remove it manually from the To Do list, or is this automated (Or better left to administrators?). Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)15:30, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
The Todo ({{WPVG announcements}}) list is manually updated, and you can feel free to add/remove things yourself- it's mostly (but not exclusively) handled by GamerPro64, while I update (also not exclusively) the parallel lists at WP:VG/GA and WP:VG/FA. (Speaking of which, we should really find a way to consolidate those into one location with template magic...). The category counts in the announcements box are automatically updated (purge the page to see changes), while the extended backlog template gets manually updated (rarely). --PresN16:45, 20 February 2018 (UTC)
To the original point, I think it would be cool if someone wanted to write a tool that would browse the category of articles needing cover art or screenshots and cross-reference a repository of such media (there are several good ones) such that editors could add appropriate illustrations (under human review) with less friction. Would improve our articles, nail the backlog, and be useful infrastructure for future article maintenance. czar21:36, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
I think this is quite important. Otherwise we are simply tracking a backlog for fun. I'd be up for including/creating some sort of backlog division/talk/team, etc. to specifically cleanup Video Gaming articles. Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)14:55, 27 February 2018 (UTC)
I'd say "no". It seems like the personal site/blog of someone named Jeff, rather than a professional website with editorial control.ZXCVBNM (TALK)11:08, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
K, I often come across the site when looking for good citations for reviews of old games, it's very hard to find reviews of old 90s games. I need to find an archive of old game magazines. Govvy (talk) 11:24, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
Archived magazines from Google Books and Archive.org are probably the best resources when researching old games, especially ones from the 1970s and 1980s. Once you get into the 1990s, mainstream video game websites will often have either archived reviews (for example, IGN was established in 1996) or retrospectives. I often rely on archived magazines when I write about Commodore 64 games, and I supplement them with modern interviews I find on mainstream news websites. See, for example, Parallax (video game), a Commodore 64 game from 1986. I found most of those reviews on Google Books and Archive.org. Because it was developed by a British company, I searched for interviews at The Guardian to fill out details about the game's development. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 22:33, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
Govvy seems to not be doing computer video games, but if you (or anyone else) is, The CGW Museum has scans of every Computer Gaming World from 1981 to 2006. Archive.org has scattered scans of a bunch of other computer gaming magazines as well. --PresN02:58, 26 February 2018 (UTC)
Does Wikipedia have a standard for how tables should be handled? If there is, I'd appreciate a link for it. I made a change in Life is Strange and Life is Strange: Before the Storm to make the tables easier to look at. the current table in Life is Strange: Before the Storm, hurt my eyes in small amounts of spaces. If I'm going to be honest, it doesn't even look like those lines help the table at all. An editor undid my edits because aesthetics are more important. So I wanted to ask here what should be done or if I'm just wrong about how we should handle tables. In my humble opinion, the colors are very bright and the space is too small to have it and serves no purpose.204.153.155.151 (talk) 15:19, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
Those tables are making my eyes ache too. Aesthetics are not more important. Access and readability are the most important things. Those colours distract from being able to read the information easily, they fail the first point of MOS:NAVBOXCOLOUR. - X201 (talk) 15:44, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
Whomever made that table is trying to fake an episode table used in TV shows and subsequently in games like Telltale's. If there were more info than a single line of data (eg like The Walking Dead: Season Two) then it would be right, but at the same time that table uses a special episode list format. The LiS tables need to either use that (and add at minimum a short summary for each ep), or drop the extra color. --Masem (t) 15:48, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
its an odd organization choice. there's a whole empty row just to create this red/neon pink line between the episodes. I tried to compromise it by adding only a single border between the header info.204.153.155.151 (talk) 16:06, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
It gives me a sense of uneasiness for me for both Life is Strange and Life is Strange: before the Storm tables. Its a feeling that I can only compare it to Trypophobia. The table is too small and basic in my humble opinion to have so much color.204.153.155.151 (talk) 17:01, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
@Czar: I made the same argument in the GA review of the first game, but the reviewer insisted that it be implemented. When it comes to episode-based video games, there should be an accepted MOS on this. Cognissonance (talk) 23:35, 27 February 2018 (UTC)
Ya, I wouldn't expect the GA reviewer, as any other editor, to always get it right. It's useful to ask for third opinions either here or in another relevant forum when a suggestion doesn't pass the sniff test. (And it's useful for GA reviewers to not consider themselves the sole arbiters of quality.) Not sure we need to necessarily run straight to MoS as I think we already have an overarching consensus across WP that we don't need tables for their own sake. czar01:31, 28 February 2018 (UTC)
I know that I'm late to this discussion, but I think that tables should never be used if the same info can go in prose and take up less space. I've also stated this for the accolades/awards table that seems to be used in every article, even if a game only has two or three nominations. In this case, it seems silly that the only argument for having this is "it's like a TV show, therefore it should follow TV article guidelines". ~ Dissident93(talk)03:05, 28 February 2018 (UTC)
I volunteer at WP:Articles for Creation and every few days or so I run across a draft for an e-sports athlete/gamer. I have no idea what criteria are used to judge Notability for e-sports gamers, and I don't know what level of competition meets Notability. Should there be an entry for professional gamers at either of the pages I mention in the heading? MatthewVanitas (talk) 00:41, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
And be aware of what we consider to be reliable sources per WP:VG/S. But I agree at least at this stage, too early to talk about an eSport SNG. Maybe in a few more years though.. --Masem (t) 00:51, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
(edit conflict) WP:NSPORTS currently excludes Esports (or at least, "there is no consensus" it covers them). WP:NVG is an essay, not a guideline, so is a very weak argument to use in my view. It's also about the games themselves, not people. So WP:GNG, as Serge said. -- ferret (talk) 00:53, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
I'm a fan of "sub-notability guidelines should not exist", and given none exist here... use the GNG. ;) --Izno (talk) 01:10, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
I also run into this while at AfC. They bios that pop up vary rarely meet GNG. I'd argue some of the bigger teams are notable (And we do have some articles for this), but the individual players aren't really notable; unless they have regular press. Lee Vilenski(talk • contribs)08:48, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
I strongly agree with most of the concensus here. The General Notability Guidelines are all you need, and I don't see the point in creating more detailed guidelines. Keeping WP:VG/S in mind is useful. ESPN, The Daily Dot, and Kotaku are good common sources, in my experience. ~Mable (chat) 10:22, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
@MatthewVanitas, to the question, I'd look at whether the significant coverage is specific to the player rather than the team or different subject. If the sources look questionable, compare against the video game reliable sources list. Re: notability guidelines, subject-specific guidelines (SNGs) are only meant to expedite discussions on obvious cases. The GNG remains the fundamental standard (whether enough source coverage exists to do justice to the topic without delving into unreliable, affiliated, or primary sources). czar13:50, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
GameGrin
Is the website GameGrin reliable or not? I put a link to the site to some article but some user deemed it unreliable. I would like some explanation. 172.250.44.165 (talk) 15:58, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
Here are some things to consider when trying to figure if a website fits the definition of what a reliable source is considered on Wikipedia:
Do they let anyone write articles? (Bad sign - if answer is yes, any of that content would fail WP:USERG.)
Does the websites have an established staff with credentials? (Good sign.) Or are they just self-proclaimed "fans" or "enthusiasts" without relevant exp or education? (Bad sign.)
Have their writers also worked for other reliable sources? (Good sign.)
Does the website have a history of significance in the industry? Do other websites cite them as an authority? (Good signs.)
Do they have an editorial policy? Ethics policy? Reviews policy? (Good signs.)
If anyone's got any sort of professional credentials, it's nowhere to be seen on the "About Us" page.
They've only been around since 2011, and the website's origins is just from a group of friends/gamers who played online together. Not exactly the origin story for a professional publication.
I've personally never seen them cited by other websites or mentioned as having any sort of importance/relevance in the industry.
GameRankings and Metacritic use a LOT of sources we don't consider reliable, though, so that's not really helping towards reliability. JOEBRO6416:25, 2 March 2018 (UTC)
Neo Geo sources
The coverage of SNK and Neo Geo on Wikipedia is lacking. Does anyone know any sources that reviewed or discussed Neo Geo MVS and AES games when they were originally released? There was the Japanese Neo Geo Freak magazine, but that's all I know. I don't think magazines like EGM and GamePro covered Neo Geo if my memory serves right. There is plenty of retrospective discussion on these games, but I'm trying to find contemporary coverage. Thank you. TarkusABtalk16:09, 26 February 2018 (UTC)
EGM and GamePro certainly did cover Neo Geo; in fact GamePro reviewed almost every Neo Geo AES game as it was released. Next Generation also did its fair share of Neo Geo coverage.--Martin IIIa (talk) 02:18, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
I've been working on the article, it's an interesting game, the fact that is was the first ever eight-player game and only Atari Lynx game to do that. I wanted to get it up-to a good standard so any help would be appreciated. I was trying to find Game Players magazine game of the year for it, [8], could really do with another set of eyes. Also, should there be two info-boxes on the article? One separating the ports from the Atari Lynx version? All help and suggestions would be much appreciated, cheers. Govvy (talk) 14:44, 27 February 2018 (UTC)
I am not going for GA, I just want to get it up to a B standard at the mo, to me it's still at a Start rating. I feel regarding the Atari Lynx, I consider this historically connected to that and it's innervation at the time. Govvy (talk) 15:04, 27 February 2018 (UTC)
I cleaned up the reception section and added reviews from EGM and GamePro. I'll look around for more sources when I get a moment.--Martin IIIa (talk) 06:25, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
4Gamer is usable. How you read it is up to you as long as you are certain that you interpret it correctly, so keep in mind that Google Translate very often gives faulty translations when it comes to non-European languages.--Alexandra IDVtalk16:18, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
Hello. By the way, is my article Goblin Sword sufficient? It has around 12 sources (some may not be reliable) and there is a lot of detail for the game. If so, I would like people to contribute please. Thanks CrayonS (talk) 16:58, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
On a side note, while you can use GTranslate, the ref itself should be to the original site with a note of the language attached. Regards SoWhy17:22, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
New Dark Souls articles
So Zxcvbnm (talk·contribs) has been recently creating numerous articles relating to the Dark Souls series, and while most at first glance they don't appear to be in need of sourcing or whatever, I have to wonder if its better to create a Characters of Dark Souls article where they can all go instead. Some however, like Tower of Latria, don't really belong at all. ~ Dissident93(talk)07:44, 24 February 2018 (UTC)
I'm not sure why you think it doesn't belong, fictional locations/characters are usually gamecrufty, but Tower of Latria got mentioned a number of times in reliable sources as one of the best Souls levels and was specifically mentioned by Miyazaki as inspiring Bloodborne, which I think is decently notable to me. Ironically, it has even more reception information than the article on Rapture in Bioshock, which you would think is the obvious candidate for a notable video game location. I also made sure I only made character articles that were reliably sourced, given Dark Souls has received huge amounts of critical discussion that isn't such a crazy concept. Cramming everything into a "Characters of Dark Souls" would just invite cruft, I am not a big fan of character list articles for the exact reason that if the character can't stand on their own, they are probably just cruft.ZXCVBNM (TALK)07:58, 24 February 2018 (UTC)
Not to get into WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS territory here, but Dog (Half-Life 2) is essentially only sourced by top-10 lists and has been around for 7 years so far. Even a good article like Balthier is mostly from mentions in reviews and top 10 lists. I figured that if articles like that were fine, then 6 sources including actual critical discussion and acclaim would qualify as notable, and there's probably more out there (there have been books written about Dark Souls too).ZXCVBNM (TALK)00:12, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
I don't think those are terribly great either, but I really only comment at AFD, I don't usually nominate articles. So, good luck if anyone takes them to AFD. I don't think they'd all survive. (It feels weird to tell you this, considering how much good work you do at AFD too.) Sergecross73msg me00:18, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
If the bar for entry is so high that they need a bunch of lengthy articles written specifically about them, then I'm not sure if there are any video game character articles that would survive, beyond maybe a few. You can nominate it for AfD if you really think it is non notable, but it seems a bit biased considering so many other game characters have the same kind of sourcing and have survived for years without incident...ZXCVBNM (TALK)00:31, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
Sorry, I didn't mean to accuse you of personal bias against me. Just more like WP:IDONTLIKEIT POV in that suddenly when a character article pops up people rush to delete but not care about it beforehand. I thought the sources were sufficient but if they aren't then what exactly would be needed?ZXCVBNM (TALK)01:51, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
I see. I guess it's a pet peeve of mine when people baselessly fall back on the excuse of "bias" when a conversation had been entirely centered around policy and guidelines up until that point. Feels like a cop out, or a failure to understand the real issue. Anyways, like I said, I don't really nominate articles for deletion, I just keep an eye on WP:VG/D. But if I saw it there, I imagine it would play out a lot like this, ironically. Sergecross73msg me04:50, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
About the Tower of Latria, maybe I'm just not used to articles about fiction settings, but is the "Level content" section and info like "Consisting of a vast prison, a large grouping of stone towers and the poisonous swamp beneath them, it was formerly the seat of the power of the Queen of Latria before it was taken over by her demon-possessed husband, who imprisoned her and her family there." really needed in the lead? Wouldn't MOS:VG guidelines apply to articles like this too? ~ Dissident93(talk)05:01, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
See Rosenberg resolution: We don't make separate articles about characters/game concepts when they've only been covered in listicles and other incidental coverage. (Ask what sources/chapters used in Sif, the Great Grey Wolf, are actually about the topic of Sif. What proportion of the text is game guide material or a compilation of asides that mention the topic?) Wikipedia does not catalog every concept that has ever been covered in sources. Port this content to Wikia and cover summary style in their parent articles. czar08:15, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
What I don't get about that is, hardly any of the current video game character articles on Wikipedia would meet those criteria. Something like Mario is the only thing that would ever qualify for an article. I feel like it oversteps the bounds of proving notability and into the domain of "this character must have a billions-of-dollars corporate advertising budget behind them". There is significant coverage in reliable sources, and "real world importance" feels like a cop-out, as a character can also have real world importance by having an impact on people interacting with a work of media, without, say, a company paying millions of dollars to make Master Chief suits and having people walk around in them in the real world. It turns the concept of a notable character into "whatever a big company decides is notable, regardless of how well the character is designed or used in the game."ZXCVBNM (TALK)10:47, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
P.S. As for comparing it to "Creatures of Half-Life", that article was almost entirely unsourced - it didn't even have tangential mentions, there were almost nothing about the creatures in reliable sources that weren't a strategy guide of the game. In contrast, the articles I created often have at least a paragraph discussing the article subject while some are entirely about the subject of the article.ZXCVBNM (TALK)10:55, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
What I don't get about that is, hardly any of the current video game character articles on Wikipedia would meet those criteria.
Precisely. The rest of the encyclopedia has moved on from mid-2000s fandom days and WPVG is the largest holdout. Plenty has been written on the Little Sisters of BioShock, but are they independently notable or covered incidentally within the scope of BioShock's in-fiction world? (the latter and thus covered proportionately) Real-world importance is perhaps the clearest content tenet of this encyclopedia. Our coverage is proportionate to that of our culture's most discerning publications. There are plenty of reasonable video game character articles that aren't Mario, but that doesn't mean that a collage of one-sentence pulls from 10 articles makes that aspect of a game warrant its own page. czar20:37, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
I still can't say I agree with that stance, because it doesn't make any sense. All of the sources for Ishmael (Moby-Dick) are pulls from books about the book, so are you going to delete that article too because there isn't a book specifically about Ishmael? You could extend that to almost every fictional character on Wikipedia and at that point it would simply be a crusade that isn't based in the reality of how media writes about fictional characters.
I do agree that if a character is only covered in clickbait listicles they shouldn't have an article, but if I can pull paragraph or longer mentions from a number of reliable critical sources then it should have an article.ZXCVBNM (TALK)23:34, 25 February 2018 (UTC)
Ishmael's role as narrator has real-world importance as the subject of numerous scholarly articles, even if they aren't cited in the current text. Problem is that the Dark Souls sub-articles in question largely do not pull "paragraph or longer mentions" and need more analysis than mentions to justify the split. (If Tower of Latria is such lasting importance to the series, start by covering it in the parent article.) As for the other spurious accusations throughout this entire thread, tu quoque. I share Serge's disbelief that any of the above comes as a surprise. czar01:28, 26 February 2018 (UTC)
It seems like your argument is that the article content is WP:INSIGNIFICANT if it doesn't involve suitably real world aspects. I'm surprised that you're surprised I'm surprised. As far as I have always known, Wikipedia operates on proof of notability, not a "real world significance test". While non notable cruft usually has no real world significance, notable topics do not require real world significance to be notable, they just have to pass WP:GNG - which it does. In fact, the initial PROD to my article said it was WP:GAMEGUIDE content, which I specifically made sure it was not. It does not fail any aspects of WP:NOT. I could argue that pretty much anything has real world significance if I tried hard enough - characters are created by real people, games are played by real people, and discussed by real people.ZXCVBNM (TALK)02:29, 26 February 2018 (UTC)
I do think that Zxcvbnm is either underestimating the notability of the tons of notable video game characters or overestimating the exact notability of the characters and areas under discussion now. That being said, it seems to me most, if not all of these meet WP:GNG. To me, what is most important here is that the subject is entirely described using nothing but reliable sourcing (even for in-universe content). I've always seen this as a good way to determine whether something meets notability guidelines. One could decide to create something like a List of Dark Souls bosses, but such a list would be of much lower quality than these articles are because they would have to include all bosses in the game, and I don't know if other Dark Souls bosses are subject to similar sourcing. If we had entries for non-notable characters, those would be filled with gamecruft, because there's nothing else to write about. I do wonder if bloodstains and bonfires could be merged into a Gameplay of the Dark Souls series article, but such an article would be subject to similar gamecruft problems. Like Zxcvbnm, I strongly prefer articles on more specific subjects. These articles all look very clean :) ~Mable (chat) 10:00, 26 February 2018 (UTC)
Yeah, I noticed that criticism and giggled. He must not be aware of the Transformers articles either. From what I've seen in my travels, video games characters are usually much better than others. --Izno (talk) 23:09, 26 February 2018 (UTC)
Ya, all sorts of holdouts, but when external media has complained about disproportion in Wikipedia's topic coverage, video games characters (and porn stars) are the go-tos. Perhaps the tide is changing? Much of WPVG's low-hanging fruit has been addressed. Might be time for comics to hold the mantle. czar18:54, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
There was a large, well documented controversy about the game, that resulted in a new version of the game being made, so it is not a WP:POVFORK. That said, I do think that it is a little too POV at the moment, so I will add counterarguments about the controversy and make sure it is NPOV.ZXCVBNM (TALK)20:35, 28 February 2018 (UTC)
It's not just that though. The parent article - Dark Souls II - is a small 33K in size. There's no way in hell it needs its own spinout with such a small parent article. Add this content to its reception section. Add it as a separate subsection if you feel more importance needs to be placed on it. But there's no way a separate article is necessary. Sergecross73msg me20:41, 28 February 2018 (UTC)
Yes, while I'm open to seeing some of the character articles as just differences in editorial philosophy, this sort of spinout is fundamentally not okay. If it were, we'd have "Reception of Game X" articles all over the place, especially if all it takes is this "well it reviewed pretty well but some fans didn't like differences from other games in the series and also there were some development issues". That's a pretty common occurrence in the industry. Sergecross73msg me20:50, 28 February 2018 (UTC)
Criticism/reception sections should be the last thing broken out of a VG article, unless it is a wholly isolated controversy similar to Controversy surrounding Resistance: Fall of Man. To give a good example, No Man's Sky has a rather extended controversy section, but that needs to stay with the main article, so the development was split off for size purposes. --Masem (t) 21:24, 28 February 2018 (UTC)
I've noticed @Phediuk: has been adding categories that fall within Category:Video games by composer, and have a few questions about it. I know it is mirroring Category:Film scores by composer, and I should note some have been previously established back in 2011, and all the cases I spot checked, the composer is notable (blue-linked). We're not in way-far off territory here.
However, when we consider video games, in contrast to films, the fact we're calling out only the composer seems odd. Yes, we have categories for "Video games produced by..." and "Video games directed by..." but there's only 5 entries of each. Films, you'll see the score, screenplay, directed, and produced regularly because those are all clearly identified by how films are credited, but video games are notorious not in the same ballpark for individual recognition. It makes calling out all the composers specifically somewhat odd. But maybe its just me, to that end. --Masem (t) 06:47, 4 March 2018 (UTC)
I'm planning to move onto the "Video games designed by..." categories once I'm done with all the major composers. Starting with composers was easier because so many of the pages have their discographies listed already. All composers I've added have their own articles already, and were usually already linked in the infoboxes; I am applying the same methodology here as to the film composer categories. Phediuk (talk) 06:54, 4 March 2018 (UTC)
Okay, but I'm still a bit worried here to make sure this is a valid approach. Most ppl in VG development are just not notable at least compared to the film industry, and I worry that while you are starting the right way (verified lists on notable individual's pages), it's going to have novice editors do that when the person is not notable at all, particularly in indie games. I'm only concerned, hence just a bit of debate here before we go full bore either way. --Masem (t) 06:57, 4 March 2018 (UTC)
Most people may not be notable, but people with their own articles by definition are. I'm not making a category for every composer ever, nor do I plan to. If novice editors start adding non-notable categories, those can be dealt with at the appropriate time. Phediuk (talk) 07:01, 4 March 2018 (UTC)
No, you're doing it right (not trying to give you a hard time, just making sure these should be fine). --Masem (t) 14:44, 4 March 2018 (UTC)
It may be excessive, but as long as the composer has their own article, it probably doesn't violate any guideline. On a related note, Trivialist (talk·contribs) just moved a lot of them to say "scored" instead, making this inconsistent with ones that weren't renamed. I don't see how this change is beneficial at all, and it just looks like a waste of time at best. ~ Dissident93(talk)21:08, 4 March 2018 (UTC)
"Scored" aligns with the film category approach, in that "scoring" is more about the music of a product, while "composed" could be a lot of things. --Masem (t) 21:10, 4 March 2018 (UTC)
@TarkusAB:Here you go! Almost thought it had disappeared since it was not with my other 2010 issues, but turns out it had accidentally ended up with my 2012 issues after I scanned the SMT Strange Journey interview from it earlier.--Alexandra IDVtalk20:36, 5 March 2018 (UTC)
In case anybody isn't aware, there is a week-long talk page discussion about what a few authors (they don't even seem to be the usual game critics) have said about the game. I mostly see it as UNDUEWEIGHT that some editors are claiming is a large issue within the game, when it's only being sourced back the opinions of 2-3 people. ~ Dissident93(talk)21:32, 5 March 2018 (UTC)
Agreed. An actual reception needs to be written too. I can do it if no one else wants to, but I'm probably not ideal, I know nothing of this game other than it's name and that I think it's recently sold in the top 10 of a month in a region... Sergecross73msg me23:27, 5 March 2018 (UTC)
We generally give this stuff too much weight. We should look to the reviews which seek to evaluate the game as a whole to gauge how important these issues are. Take Assassin's Creed Unity, the game generated news cycle think pieces on the lack of female co-op characters, but when reviews came out - it was completely ignored, it was not important to understanding or critiquing the game. But the Wikipedia article treats it as the most important facet of the game. Resident Evil 5's "racism" subsection is larger than every other piece of reception section. RE5 is a featured article.
The whitewashing/racism critique should be present in the KCD article, but it clearly isn't the biggest issue with the game, or even its reception. - hahnchen01:55, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
This seems like an attempt at WP:OR. If the game is racist then the article should only cite reliable sources saying as such, not people's Twitters in an attempt to prove it.ZXCVBNM (TALK)02:07, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
Well, participation is welcome there and at its talk page - there's a lot of active POV pushing and inexperienced editors in the mix, so its a bit of a mess... Sergecross73msg me13:36, 6 March 2018 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
I was going to if you don't. The consensus was that it wasn't ready, and the guy got all offended about it when we told him that (despite not making any meaningful contributions to it himself.) Sergecross73msg me18:34, 7 March 2018 (UTC)
Lead too short, development too short, promotion and release too short, reception too short, needs a bunch copyediting. Not worth doing a full review if the nominator hasn't bothered to read or contribute the article. Drive-by nominators are just time-wasters that want to take credit for other people's work. May as well quickfail it and let a capable editor improve then renominate. --The1337gamer (talk) 19:26, 7 March 2018 (UTC)
The plot was considerably worse at the time of nomination too - lots of "and then the character did this" play-by-play awful prose. Sergecross73msg me19:28, 7 March 2018 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Nomination for deletion of Template:Video game music
Announcement articles all seem to go with 4 though, and I see this as an issue in the future, so I'd just go with Black Ops 4. ~ Dissident93(talk)18:23, 8 March 2018 (UTC)
Uhhh per the Roman numerals page, it's non-standard. But yes, tally marks, I suppose that's correct, just not common in modern numbering/titling. Sergecross73msg me17:47, 9 March 2018 (UTC)
Uhhh per the Roman numerals page, it's standard. It states "The "standard" forms described above reflect typical modern usage". --Mika1h (talk) 17:58, 9 March 2018 (UTC)
"The numerals for 4 (IIII) and 9 (VIIII) proved problematic (among other things, they are easily confused with III and VIII), and are generally replaced with IV (one less than 5) and IX (one less than 10)" Sergecross73msg me18:01, 9 March 2018 (UTC)
Wouldn't worry about it yet. It's too early to worry about what becomes commonname. "4" currently have the article content, "IV" and "IIII" redirect there. We can move later if warranted. -- ferret (talk) 17:35, 9 March 2018 (UTC)
— ProtoDrake
— CodeBeastDev
— Coin945
— 3BRBS – AfD
— AngusWOOF
Sent Ya, it's good for account recovery and sending files czar 20:37, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
Template:Metacritic GOTY has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. ~ Dissident93 (talk) 16:50, 31 January 2018 (UTC)
— Czar
— Rukario-sama
Done -- ferret (talk) 22:13, 15 February 2018 (UTC)
