Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Video games/Archive 165

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NPR source addition to Splatoon

Hello! I'm currently working on adding a source from NPR to the Legacy section of Splatoon, however I can't quite figure out how to start the sentence to mention what the source is saying. Anyone have some tips? ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 13:31, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Probably something like, "the series has been praised by fans for its positivity compared to other competitive shooters, with gameplay choices such as restricting voice chat and not making the goal to attack other players, as well as a less demanding and more casual focus." ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 13:47, 6 October 2022 (UTC)
I was thinking I would make it something like, "In an article by NPR...", I'm just not sure how to transition out of that ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 13:54, 6 October 2022 (UTC)
I wouldn't say you need that source highlighting. Unless it's an exceptional or controversial claim, or it's a single critic opinion, for example, I generally don't include direct mention of the source. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 14:12, 6 October 2022 (UTC)
Ah alright. I just don't feel like saying "The series has been praised by fans" would make sense since it appears to be a bunch of interviews with different people who probably aren't fans of the game since they've never played it before (except for the one involving the streamer ThatSrb2DUDE). ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 15:32, 6 October 2022 (UTC)
You could start with "NPR reported on ..." if you really want to emphasize the source. I don't know that it's necessary here but it's your prerogative. Axem Titanium (talk) 17:04, 6 October 2022 (UTC)
I might do that. Since it's not really just fans but it's not just one person either. I'll mess around with it in my sandbox and come back here if need be. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 17:50, 6 October 2022 (UTC)
Alright here's what I have so far, "NPR reported on how Splatoon was different from most other shooters in the genre and has created a more welcoming community than other shooters." Any suggestions on how to change it? The article seems to bounce around to different related topics so it's kinda hard to summarize it. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 17:59, 6 October 2022 (UTC)
I would usually name the writer (assuming a credit is given, which is true in this case), as to reflect that it is one person writing for a major publication and not a major publication itself issuing the opinion. This then makes it easier, if needed, to pull quotes that may be easier to use than attempts to paraphrasing. Masem (t) 00:48, 7 October 2022 (UTC)
Ah alright. Technically here are multiple people featured in the article, but I could probably just say "x stated this (quote)". ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 01:12, 7 October 2022 (UTC)
If you can narrow down a talking point to one person, then you can name them. Masem (t) 01:23, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

Question about GNG

The article Rugal Bernstein was merged some months ago due to notabilty issues apparently. However, once SNK turned into a free DLC for The King of Fighters XV, the character suddenly became hot topic such as here, here, https://abcnoticias.mx/local/2021/8/29/bronco-felicita-gamers-en-su-dia-pide-no-usar-rugal-en-retas-de-kof-145765.html here], here among others. Is it possible for the character to pass GNG with such sources? There might be more. There are far more sources but in Spanish which I think might help. Any suggestions? Tintor2 (talk) 15:44, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Should wait until they are shown to be more than merely announcements and news posts. Fighting game characters have a pretty high bar to pass since they don't get much story development within games for critics to comment on. When an article goes heavily indepth on analyzing the character, that's significant coverage. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 16:05, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Random question - do the publisher's guidelines apply when using non-free images.

Randomly came to mind after Nintendo's reiteration of their policy on copyrighted images/videos on the internet, and while Nintendo is notoriously one of the worst companies to use as an example, it should suffice.

(Translated of course, which also means it's worth noting that Japan's laws are different from the US's (where Wikipedia is hosted), but again, Nintendo specifically isn't the purpose of this) Nintendo's policies detail that "customers who are individuals may post videos, still images, etc. that use Nintendo game copyrighted works only for non-commercial purposes", if they include "your own creativity [sometimes they say and, sometimes or, but it should be irrelevant] comments". Referencing the "who are individuals" from earlier, they elaborate by saying "however, contributors belonging to the following legal entities with which a separate agreement has been concluded may use Nintendo game copyrighted works in the same manner as individual customers, even if they are posting as part of the business of the organization to which they belong" (the part relevant to Wikipedia, as Wikipedians are contributors, not employees).

To my actual question, though, wouldn't use of things like screenshots to fall under these guidelines and thus be allowed, without the need for down scaling and whatnot, provided it includes commentary, which screenshots on Wikipedia are, between non-free use guidelines and general image policy, required to have? DecafPotato (talk) 03:28, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Low resolution is a Wikimedia policy; unless the screenshots are in the public domain or licensed under a free license, the Wikipedia rules still apply. That Nintendo policy is basically just a description of fair use. – Rhain (he/him) 04:45, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
US fair use laws tend to override company policies on images, but it does depend on other factors like if the company is commercially making money off those images, like with Gettys Photos (hence why NFCC#2 excludes those types of works). Masem (t) 04:55, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
If we considered this policy a "license" (which it isn't), our usage would not fall under it, as it states "only for non-commercial purposes." Though the website itself is freely available and largely unadvertised, all content must be legal to sell as well. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 06:29, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Add category for Unity games

List of Unity games exists, but there’s no corresponding category within Category:Video games by game engine. Adding a category to multiple articles from that list will require some automated tools, and I’m not familiar with them. Respiciens (talk) 09:43, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

We had one but it was deleted as it was considered a non-defining category. IceWelder [] 10:29, 12 October 2022 (UTC)
Oh. It’s very confusing that Unity alone is missing from that category. Maybe it should be mentioned in the category text. I mean, even Unreal category with its huge number of games was not deleted. --Respiciens (talk) 10:35, 12 October 2022 (UTC)
I think this may possibly raise an issue I've noticed with some games and people saying which engines they use. Encountered it with Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands (Wii), where I found no sources to substantiate the claim that it was made using Ubisoft's Jade engine. Is there any guideline or MOS regarding game engines? It might in some way apply to this conversation. --ProtoDrake (talk) 16:42, 12 October 2022 (UTC)
In infoboxes, we only inude the game engine if it notable (like Unreal or idTech) or is discussed in depth in an appropriate article (like Dunia). We don't want one-iff engines or those that we don't really know what special features the engine has. Masem (t) 18:04, 12 October 2022 (UTC)
That's what I thought. Just clarification. --ProtoDrake (talk) 21:34, 12 October 2022 (UTC)
By a strict reading of WP:CATDEF, none of the engine categories are defining. Game engine used by the game only gets discussed by gaming media if there's something special about it use in the game, otherwise it's not even mentioned. Meanwhile, lists like List of Unity games cannot get most of its entries sourced. So the sources don't really use the engine as a defining characteristic. Of course, given the number and variety of purely trivial categories we have, that's also a standard upheld very selectively. But I would definitely say that we either have categories for all (notable) engines or none of them, but not some weird mix. No categories for non-notable engines though. —  HELLKNOWZ  TALK 18:23, 12 October 2022 (UTC)
Agreed. --ProtoDrake (talk) 21:34, 12 October 2022 (UTC)
This is what I feel. Game engines that can be documented is something for Wikidata and not categories, now that we have Wikidata. Masem (t) 05:00, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

I started the deletion nomination for Category:Video games by game engine and its subcategories, see notice below. --Respiciens (talk) 10:16, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Category:Video games by game engine has been nominated for discussion

 

Category:Video games by game engine has been nominated for possible deletion, merging, or renaming. A discussion is taking place to decide whether this proposal complies with the categorization guidelines. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the categories for discussion page. Thank you. Respiciens (talk) 10:16, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

DYK for Need for Speed Unbound

Hello! I'm currently wanting to do a DYK for NFS Unbound, however I"m having some trouble figuring out the hook. I figure something relating to the new art style the game is going for would be good (especially since it's source reliably) however I'm not exactly sure how to word it in a way that would fit with a DYK. Any suggestions? ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 13:16, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

This article is still marked as "Start" class and is limited in information, especially a notable lack of criticism. I honestly would try to get more information first before you do a DYK. PerryPerryD Talk To Me 14:43, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
There's not much criticism at the moment considering the game isn't released and it's only recently revealed. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 14:45, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
If the game has yet to be released, isnt it way too soon for a DYK? PerryPerryD Talk To Me 14:46, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
Definitely not. In fact, that's likely one of the only times it would even be eligible (besides 5x expansion or a successful GAN). – Rhain (he/him) 14:57, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
That is right. An article is only eligible for a DYK 7 days (or a week) after its creation (excluding 5x expansion or a GAN). ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 15:26, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
There's really no correlation between those two things, and the article is in decent shape considering we're 2 months away from release... Sergecross73 msg me 14:47, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
I'd argue it is a violation of WP:NOTPROMO to do a DYK for an upcoming video game (or any work of media, really). Wikipedia should not be doing free advertising for people, so while an already released work is fine, adding to pre-release hype makes Wikipedia seem like it is being gamed. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 20:48, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
I don't really spend much time on DYK stuff so I'm no expert...but is that a common stance? I've never encountered anyone ever say that in passing at least... Sergecross73 msg me 20:55, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
@Zxcvbnm: I've never heard of that. And if so then that means it'll be impossible for me to get a DYK on this article. I'd say that as long as the DYK is neutral and isn't about it coming out soon it's fine. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 21:04, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
You could technically argue that about any product that has ever appeared at DYK, upcoming or otherwise. WP:DYKNOT has a point about advertising, so as long as the hook remains neutral, I doubt there would be any issues. – Rhain (he/him) 00:21, 11 October 2022 (UTC)
I've gone ahead and submitted a DYK for it with a hook relating to the art style and an alternate hook relating to EA accdientally leaking the title on their own website like Yeeno suggested below. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 00:59, 11 October 2022 (UTC)
When PMTOK was being reviewed for TFA, an eyebrow was raised about featuring an article about a product that's still new and being advertised. If I recall correctly it was justified that the article was neutral enough to not be an issue. Therefore I have the same stance as Rhain. Panini! 🥪 12:27, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
@Blaze Wolf: You could write something about its title being leaked. For example, DYK ...that video game publisher Electronic Arts accidentally revealed the title for Need for Speed Unbound days before its announcement? Yeeno (talk) 21:26, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
That's what I was gonna suggest. I feel like this is quite common (Nintendo accidentally leaks stuff like this by themselves, like, with every game they release), but it's still interesting. Panini! 🥪 12:29, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Assistance with draft

Hello! I'm currently working on Draft:Need for Speed Unbound (which people apparently can't wait for considering what's on there now was just copied from a completely unsourced version of the page at the wrong title and people kept adding links to it on Need for Speed). I recall Panini! helped me out with my previous draft for Splatoon 3. I don't have any sources on there yet however I will get some soon as I was waiting for sources to actually publish useful information on the game instead of just "Oh wow there's a new need for speed game. More at 6". Any help with it would be appreciated. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 13:33, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

@Blaze Wolf I'm busy but I acknowledge this. It's looking good!
One comment I can give is expanding the gameplay section. While it makes sense to pull a "yeah, what he said" and pretty much just say "the gameplay reiterates that of the games before it", but people probably aren't looking to read another article to understand the gist of the original game they were reading on. This is especially true if a video game series has numerous entries, meaning a reader ends up reading gameplay on Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga when they just wanted to read Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam.
In short, explain the gameplay to a basic extent. You can use the "like previous games" crutch a little bit to get out of explaining it in excruciating detail, but the reader should understand the gameplay from reading only NFS Unbound, not the article about the game before it. Panini! 🥪 12:36, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Nomination of game lists by engine for deletion

 
A discussion is taking place as to whether these articles are suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether they should be deleted.

The articles will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of CryEngine games until a consensus is reached, and anyone, including you, is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the articles during the discussion, including to improve the articles to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the articles until the discussion has finished.

Respiciens (talk) 13:02, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

List of Sonic the Hedgehog characters

Hello,

we recently added a new list criteria Here and we decided that it is okay to add characters from other media such as Sally Acorn. You may feel free to add characters as long as you abide to the list criteria listed on the Talk Page.

-Pizzaplayer219TalkContribs 16:23, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

I feel like the list could reasonably be moved back to List of Sonic the Hedgehog video game characters and a new List of Sonic the Hedgehog comics characters could be made. The redirects can still go to the video game list unless they are not mentioned there. It would still not strike me as non-notable since they are separate continuities with entirely different timelines. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 17:28, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
We already had a move discussion though. Pizzaplayer219TalkContribs 17:30, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
Plus the criteria is pretty strict. Pizzaplayer219TalkContribs 17:31, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
Having a move discussion is putting the cart before the horse. It's out of procedure to move the article based on the hypothetical existence of another article. Draft and have the comic list approved first as passing WP:LISTN, and then a move can be proposed for the video game one. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 19:27, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
A lot of this was covered in the prior discussions though. For instance, I've already pointed out that there was near unanimous consensus at AFD that the comic book character list was unsalvageable. Sergecross73 msg me 21:31, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
This discussion really should be had at the article, not here. -- ferret (talk) 21:37, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jisei (video game series)

Has been relisted 3 times with almost no participation, any thoughts as to whether the first game or the series as a whole is notable would be appreciated. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 09:52, 11 October 2022 (UTC)

Don't know if anyone will see this, but I'm just going to shoehorn in my deletion nomination as well since it got relisted with no participants. Sparkltalk 22:30, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Gameplay of Pokémon

Recently I came across this article that has multiple sections of completely unsourced content and also a lot of info that would really only be interesting to people who play Pokemon (for example: what pokemon is the strongest and weakest for each type). I'm not exactly sure what to do with this article. It's survived a deletion discussion already back in 2006 (See WP:Articles for deletion/Pokémon game mechanics) so I don't think that's the right route to go. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 15:40, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

I also think there's enough sourcing out there to keep the article, although with a greater focus on how the gameplay has changed/evolved over the years. As it is, probably 50% of this article is gamecruft though. Alyo (chat·edits) 15:51, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
There is definitely enough sourcing to keep the article, and I even believe the sections that are unsourced have potential sources out there covering them. (Oinkers42) (talk) 16:03, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
That article is insane. Those details go waaaay to far into WP:GAMEGUIDE/WP:GAMECRUFT territory. I'm more of the mindset that it should be pared way down and merged into Pokémon (video game series)#Gameplay like most video game series. Also of note - that AFD is from 2006. Standards were far more lax back then. Sergecross73 msg me 16:05, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
@Sergecross73: I agree and disagree. On the one hand it makes the most sense. On the other hand the gameplay mechanics of Pokemon might be complicated enough (or the important mechanics need to be detailed enough) that it might not fit well being compressed into a single section. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 16:09, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
Then sources need to be brought up that demonstrate these gameplay mechanics are singularly complicated or notable enough to have their own article. We regularly "dumb down" explanations of stuff because we have better targets for the mechanics (game genre articles, etc.) and because that's beyond our purview as a general encyclopedia. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 16:11, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
I would say any discussion older than a decade is worth revisiting, especially since our standards have risen dramatically since 2006 (when you didn't have to even cite sources inline in articles.) That said, I think an extreme merge rather than deletion is the best option here. Most of it is gamecruft, and if content in it can't be cited to secondary sources that aren't game guides, that's a very strong indication it's not worth mentioning. Moreover, if it's been unreferenced and garbage for years, then I think being bold and cleaning up the mess is the right call versus tagging a bunch of stuff and letting it languish (while it will continue spiraling out of control.) Pokémon (video game series) makes sense as the merge target. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 16:11, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
@David Fuchs: I wasn't simply planning on tagging it and then just leaving it for someone else to deal with. I was going to tag it and then clean it up a little myself. I simply add the tags so other people are aware that the article has problems and to encourage them to help with cleaning it up. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 16:18, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
Definitely requires a lot of clean-up, but I think it's notable enough to stay around; just a bad article at the moment. DecafPotato (talk) 18:10, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

@Blaze Wolf and I have cut it from 155k bytes to 39k bytes, and while I don't feel strongly enough about the franchise to do this myself, I think most of what's left could be reliably sourced. And I would imagine that the topic as a whole has been covered enough to justify its existence. Alyo (chat·edits) 19:41, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

  • A "gameplay of..." article needs strong sourcing from secondary independent sourcing, using primary sources only sparnging for completion. The given article here does not at all have that type of sourcing yet. --Masem (t) 23:01, 13 October 2022 (UTC)
    I entirely agree. I'm just saying that discussions about whether to merge or not should probably start with the article in its updated form, where it's a lot easier to process what amount of sourcing is needed to keep the article. you may not be responding to me, in which case--whoops. also I left this comment before I saw that DecafPotato had readded--further whoops Alyo (chat·edits) 23:09, 13 October 2022 (UTC)

Vib-Ribbon

Hello, Im currently working on the Vib-Ribbon article, And I am looking for advice on what should be changed and worked on in this article to get it to GA Class. Anything helps, Thank you. PerryPerryD Talk To Me 16:11, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Reception needs much expansion, some reviews in the review table aren't used yet. -- ferret (talk) 16:15, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
Thank you, Anything else of note? PerryPerryD Talk To Me 16:16, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
I added details from the missing reviewes, However i cannot access the GameFan review of the game, can you? PerryPerryD Talk To Me 16:37, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
I was able to access the GameFan Review, and added details from it. PerryPerryD Talk To Me 16:49, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
I've added three refideas on the talk page you can use(reviews from The Observer, The Guardian and The Age) Timur9008 (talk) 02:50, 5 October 2022 (UTC)
"Sequels and re-release" is an awkward section. I would recommend making a "Release" section and rename it "legacy". If the release section is too small to stand on its own, merge it with development and rename it "Development and release"
The lead (including infobox) summarizes all the content within the article, so if there's any content that's not in the body of the article such as Staff and Release dates, make sure you add them in the body and add references to them there.Blue Pumpkin Pie (talk) 13:00, 5 October 2022 (UTC)
I feel that more reviews is not the solution here due to WP:DUEWEIGHT PerryPerryD Talk To Me 15:23, 5 October 2022 (UTC)
Fixing MOS:SANDWICH would help a little. - X201 (talk) 15:46, 5 October 2022 (UTC)
In this case, Sandwich is unavoidable without damaging the infobox, as far as i can tell, as there is no other place for the image to go. PerryPerryD Talk To Me 16:18, 5 October 2022 (UTC)
It doesn't seem that the image is that important to be next to that specific paragraph, so setting it to the right (which puts it right under the infobox) should be fine. DecafPotato (talk) 20:24, 5 October 2022 (UTC)
I'd personally keep the image as it is. At most screen-widths, it might work fine in the development section, but with wider screens it would always look off if you put it on the right. (Good luck on this project Perry!) ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 11:11, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

I recently gave a review for this article. PerryPerryD is now requesting a second opinion.Blue Pumpkin Pie (talk) 00:07, 14 October 2022 (UTC)

@PerryPerryD Why are you asking for a second opinion? You have unsourced statements in the Reception section, and unsourced claims in the lede, and I spotted that in a 5 second glance. -- ferret (talk) 00:26, 14 October 2022 (UTC)
I discussed with some people in the discord server about this GAR, And some of them stated that this review is being treated as a FAR. Also, what unsourced statements in the reception section? They WERE sourced, until i was told to pretty much redo the entire thing. PerryPerryD Talk To Me 02:12, 14 October 2022 (UTC)
the unsourced statements have nothing to do from the request to paraphrase. This is clearly your first GAN because during the review you were confused about the lead (or lede). The lead is vital for every article. It summarizes the content that is in the article and if the lead has some information in it.
Lastly, the handful of edits you've made are not enough for you to merit the nomination. You made only a few edits with only a few sources. Where are rhese people frkm discord? Are they wikipedia editors? And how come they arent here to provide the second opinion when you asked for it? Why are you relying on discord to tell you what a GAN review isbsupposed to look like?Blue Pumpkin Pie (talk) 12:15, 14 October 2022 (UTC)
I found the relevant message in the commonly-used Wikipedia-specific Discord server (as linked here), from 2022-10-12 in #english-wikipedia. So yes, it's a social group of Wikipedia editors. I do want to note that it's completely fine, normal, and healthy to discuss something like this in an external social group, but from our perspective here "this review is being treated as a FAR" is simply Perry's own experience. (I have little comment on the Vib-Ribbon GAR itself; I don't think it currently looks GA but I hope Perry can up its quality :) ) ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 12:28, 14 October 2022 (UTC)
My question is if there are editors eilling to implant ideas that I have FA standards and not GA, then where are they to respond to PerryPerryD's second opinion. I think it's fine there's a Wikipedia discord server but I also don't think it should be used as a secondary source. These things should be discussed within Wikipedia in my opinion.Blue Pumpkin Pie (talk) 12:51, 14 October 2022 (UTC)
I'm sorry PerryPerryD, but I think it's totally fine to fail the article at this point. I mean, Ferret has already given a second opinion on this. This game seems pretty interesting, and good work on the article nonetheless! Sparkltalk 12:59, 14 October 2022 (UTC)

Deletion discussions for lists and categories of games by game engine

Hello, there are two discussions going on whether we should keep or delete lists or categories of games by game engine, or both: categories, lists.

I notified about both of them here above, but as there are a large number of lists and especially categories involved, some commenters felt that an additional notification to attract more people is needed. Respiciens (talk) 11:25, 14 October 2022 (UTC)

A tip for the future: giant omnibus nominations generally end in no consensus by death of a million cuts. Invariably, different objections arise to individual items that sap the strength of the nomination overall. It may feel like you're saving time by nominating them all at once, but they simply end up not passing. You're better off nominating them one or two at a time in sequence and building support by pinging repeat participants. I say this without making any judgment on the two XFDs at hand, since I'm still unsure of where I stand. Axem Titanium (talk) 20:35, 14 October 2022 (UTC)
But, in this case, both nomination sets are about articles and categories that serve the same function, just with different engines. This is a fully reasonable case for mass noms. Masem (t) 22:52, 14 October 2022 (UTC)
It's a reasonable case, of course. It makes complete sense to group them into a single nom like these. But if your goal is actually deletion, a deletion outcome is far more likely when you make individual nominations with customized rationales for the specific article/category/template/whatever instead of a giant omnibus nomination with broadly the same rationale. That's just borne out by data, regardless of the strength of the nomination rationale. Axem Titanium (talk) 03:42, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Announcements banner text extraction

It looks like the Article alerts standard text has changed so Template:WPVG announcements/shell's AfD section is no longer displaying properly. Would you be able to take a look, @Pppery? czar 05:14, 16 October 2022 (UTC)

  Fixed * Pppery * it has begun... 14:05, 16 October 2022 (UTC)

Help with Rachel Amber article

Hey, I recently created an article on the video game character Rachel Amber from Life is Strange. Would anyone be interested in helping?

Current, major problems with the article:

Help would be appreciated! KlayCax (talk) 08:07, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Pending AFD

My current AFD for Wadanohara and the Great Blue Sea has no participants and is nearing its second relisting. Just making this post as a reminder since it would be nice to not let this AFD go to waste. Sparkltalk 20:16, 16 October 2022 (UTC)

Just an FYI--AfDs with little to no participation will still often get closed as a "WP:SOFTDELETE". It's not a big deal and it's basically treated as a WP:PROD. Alyo (chat·edits) 20:22, 16 October 2022 (UTC)
Not applicable here, as articles with previous PRODs or AfDs are not eligible for another PROD / soft deletion. Ben · Salvidrim!  08:32, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

New Articles (October 3 to October 14)

 A listing of all articles newly added to the Video Games Wikiproject (regardless of creation date). Generated by v3.14 of the RecentVGArticles script and posted by PresN. Bug reports and feature requests are appreciated. --PresN 03:20, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

October 3

October 4

October 5

October 6

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October 8

October 9


I was out of town, so I didn't get to post this on Monday, but here we are! Waxworker continues to be very busy with categories. --PresN 03:20, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Why is Need for Speed Unbound not rated? I changed it to start class shortly after I moved it out of draft space. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 13:15, 17 October 2022 (UTC)
@Blaze Wolf: Looks like the 1.0 bot never picked that change up? It's pretty flaky about double changes. My script goes off of what's on the 1.0 list, to avoid having to check the talk page of every article (and therefore take extra time), but it is a minor annoyance. I've been putting off fixing it until I get around to rewriting the whole thing to not rely on the 1.0 bot's records at all besides as a list of articles to investigate directly. --PresN 13:35, 17 October 2022 (UTC)
Ah alright. Must be why it didn't pick it up since it was Draft class and then changed to Start class. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 13:41, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

New Articles (October 10 to October 16)

 A listing of all articles newly added to the Video Games Wikiproject (regardless of creation date). Generated by v3.15 of the RecentVGArticles script and posted by PresN. Bug reports and feature requests are appreciated. --PresN 13:59, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

October 10

October 11

October 12

October 13

October 14

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October 16

PresN 13:59, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

It looks like the bot detected nominating a redirect at RFD as creating an article. This is obviously incorrect. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 15:31, 17 October 2022 (UTC)
Hmm, that's going to be hard to fix- the issue there is that the 1.0 bot is correct. Redirects aren't allowed to have content- if you add anything, then the class changes from redirect to unassessed. Unfortunately, the RfD tag counts as "anything", since it makes the article no longer redirect, and if you look at the page history, that edit as a "Removed redirect" tag as a result. I'll remove it, but I'm not sure it's reasonably fixable. --PresN 16:19, 17 October 2022 (UTC)
Could the bot look to see if an RFD tag was added in the edit? ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 16:24, 17 October 2022 (UTC)
Note that Fingersoft was deleted and then undeleted due to copyvio. IceWelder [] 16:24, 17 October 2022 (UTC)
It's actually correct as-is: the article was never tagged for WPVG, and the tag was added this week for the first time. --PresN 16:28, 17 October 2022 (UTC)

Appropriate use of sources

There was a pretty strong consensus at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Video_games/Archive_164#Discussion_on_quality_of_sources that certain types of journalism aren't suitable as source material. There's actually several interrelated issues, and it seemed there was a consensus that we should tackle them one at a time:

  • Some sources just churn out too much content to be used as a measure of notability.
  • Even our best sources will sometimes write a joke / opinion / clickbait article, which isn't good source material.
  • Listicles are especially questionable for inclusion in a Wikipedia article.

Focusing on the lowest hanging fruit, I think we are due for some guidance about the last point. Listicles and rankings should be used intelligently and sparingly, and we can add this to our manual of style. This is my first draft at summarizing our best practices:

Sometimes a reliable source will compile a ranking of elements from a single game. This can show additional reception for that game as a whole. However, Wikipedia editors should avoid creating numerous spin-off articles about every individual game element, in accordance with Wikipedia's policies on due weight and what Wikipedia is not.
If a reliable source ranks the characters from a single game or series, this may support a stand-alone list about that game's major characters (e.g.: "List of characters from title"). A ranking should not be confused with significant reception for an individual character, unless the character is included in a broad editorial ranking of all characters across the game industry, or beyond. Also remember that Wikipedia is not a game guide, and articles should avoid summarizing rankings of game items, levels, or other game elements.

I believe this is consistent with how we are currently using these types of sources. The shorter version:

  • significant coverage for a game = article about a game
  • significant coverage for a list of characters = article about a list of characters
  • significant coverage for a character, separate from the game = article about the character, separate from the game

This is just the start of a discussion, and it might take us some time to make sure we are getting this right. Shooterwalker (talk) 02:26, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

Warcraft 3 Reforged

A discussion at Talk:Warcraft_III:_Reforged#"Review-bombed"_?? could use more opinions. -- ferret (talk) 03:18, 23 October 2022 (UTC)

The Cypher (video game)

Just stumbled across The Cypher (video game). Followed some sources, tried to google stuff - classic sources like MobyGames or YouTube don't know a thing about the game, the studio(s) and/or the designer. Anyone willing to invest a few minutes to prove this game actually exists? Thanks and kind regards, Grueslayer 08:12, 23 October 2022 (UTC)

The game exists. Took me two minutes to find the company website [1]. Says "The Cypher which recently won two awards in the IICS International Summit Awards, and it's also a finalist in the AMI Festival and New Media Invision awards.
Found nothing on Newspapers.com though Timur9008 (talk) 08:37, 23 October 2022 (UTC)
Well, what made me suspicious is that from link 1 I find it hard to get to link 2. Like, what is the IICS International Summit or the AMI Festival? The New Media Invision Awards existed, but Google doesn't find a link to Cypher (which is not that strange, since it's the pre-internet era). Might well be the information on the title is not online, but I find it strange that MobyGames and YouTube don't know a thing about it. Kind regards, Grueslayer 09:09, 23 October 2022 (UTC)
The 1990s is not the pre-internet era. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 05:36, 24 October 2022 (UTC)
Ha! Panini! 🥪 11:55, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

Persona as a Good Topic

Hello. I was wondering if we got Persona 5 and Persona 5 Strikers up to GA quality, Would Persona (series) be eligible to be the main page in a new Good Topic for Persona? Or would it rather fall into a larger SMT Topic. PerryPerryD Talk To Me 16:20, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

If you are including Strikers, the other spin-offs would all need to be included. (Oinkers42) (talk) 16:31, 19 October 2022 (UTC)
In that case remove strikers, But would it be its own GT? PerryPerryD Talk To Me 16:33, 19 October 2022 (UTC)
I would say the mainline Persona series could be a GT (presuming Persona 5 got promoted). Persona 5 could potentially be its own topic later on as well (with Strikers, the television series, the Dancing game, the character list, and the characters). (Oinkers42) (talk) 16:42, 19 October 2022 (UTC)
You are forgetting items such as list of Persona 5 characters. Lee Vilenski (talkcontribs) 16:46, 19 October 2022 (UTC)
I mentioned the character list. (Oinkers42) (talk) 16:50, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

The larger Megami Tensei topic would be huge, so I think it would make perfect sense to do a separate Persona topic - although a large amount of Megami Tensei articles are already at GA/FA, so maybe that's doable, too. I would love to help, but not only have I not kept up with all the Persona spin-offs, I also have had much less time to dedicate to Wikipedia recently.--AlexandraIDV 20:13, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

I think a Persona GT would be doable, but we really should keep it to main series only. There's also the small fact that due to the amount of spin-offs/related media/character stuff that got their own substantial articles, some of the Persona games could have GTs themselves, P4 in particular. --ProtoDrake (talk) 20:28, 19 October 2022 (UTC)
I'd be up for helping out on this - I have a couple SMT items I've promoted/attempted to try and get that series to GT. If we were to do say, Persona 5, you'd want the following items:

Persona 5, Persona 5 Strikers, List of Persona 5 characters, Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight , Persona 5: The Animation, Joker, Ann Takamaki, Goro Akechi, Makoto Niijima, and arguably Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth. A similar amount of articles for Persona 3 and 4. That would make for a good topic, and if anyone does want to make some GAs where there aren't, I can probably help. Lee Vilenski (talkcontribs) 07:24, 20 October 2022 (UTC)

@Lee Vilenski: The Joker you linked to is a disambig page. I'd assume you meant to link to Joker (Persona). ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 12:55, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

New Articles (October 17 to October 23)

 A listing of all articles newly added to the Video Games Wikiproject (regardless of creation date). Generated by v3.15 of the RecentVGArticles script and posted by PresN. Bug reports and feature requests are appreciated. --PresN 14:17, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

October 17

October 18

October 19

October 20

October 21

October 22

October 23

PresN 14:17, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

Requested move at Talk:Wraparound (video games)#Requested move 18 October 2022

 

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Wraparound (video games)#Requested move 18 October 2022 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. ASUKITE 16:21, 26 October 2022 (UTC)

How many video game pages does Wikipedia have?

Specifically individual game pages, so not including pages about companies or systems. I know some series have a single page for all of their games, that's fine to include. Is there an easy way to see this with categories? 2603:80A0:1102:FEA0:C5D3:72B5:B765:80AE (talk) 19:32, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

Unfortunately this is not easy to see with categories. You could look for articles in Category:WikiProject Video games articles however that is most definitely not all of them as there are most likely some articles that haven't been tagged as being of interest to this WikiProject (as seen by articles that say "(newly tagged – originally created X ago)" in the weekly new article announcements post that PresN creates) that would be very difficult, if not impossible, to find without knowing of the game prior. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 19:37, 25 October 2022 (UTC)
If we assume that all articles on individual video games are in Category:Video games by year and its subcategories, then there are ~27600 articles according to petscan. There's probably some that aren't categorized, but that's a good estimate. --PresN 20:35, 25 October 2022 (UTC)
Wikidata to the rescue :) Depends a bit how you want to count, but Wikidata says 27,522. Some caveats:
#title: Items that are a subclass of Q7889 (video game) with a sitelink to the English Wikipedia
SELECT DISTINCT ?item ?itemLabel ?article WHERE {
  ?item (wdt:P31/(wdt:P279*)) wd:Q7889.
  ?article schema:about ?item;
    schema:isPartOf <https://en.wikipedia.org/>.
  SERVICE wikibase:label { bd:serviceParam wikibase:language "[AUTO_LANGUAGE],en". }
}
Click here to launch the Wikidata query
Hope that helps Jean-Fred (talk) 19:46, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

Putting a box around the Metacritic score

I started a discussion at Talk:Thea: The Awakening#Template in reception about whether {{Video game reviews}} is necessary in the reception. It's normally a quiet article, so it probably could use opinions from outsiders. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 17:58, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

Loriciel

Hello to y'all on the page! I recently added a bunch of sources at the talk page of Loriciel, which can be useful to expand the page for those interested. Roberth Martinez (talk) 02:13, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

A couple of questions about Category:Video games about vampires

1: Should I move every article that has its own subcategory (e.g. BloodRayne (video game), Castlevania) out of the parent category? This is usually how we do things, but sometimes parent categories are used to keep track of every entry in a subcategory as well. Right now the parent category is a mix between both, and while I've already started moving pages to subcategories I figured I should get consensus before I do that with the rest.

2: Is it okay if I remove every video game from this category that has vampires but isn't about them in a meaningful way (such as Brawlhalla and The Sims)? ReneeWrites (talk) 14:26, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

Definitely on #2. The category should be only for games that, if you were to write a concise plot or gameplay summary, you could not avoid mentioning vampires. A game that includes a vampire among a huge roster of characters does not met that. Masem (t) 14:39, 29 October 2022 (UTC)
Alright, thanks. I removed them from the category. ReneeWrites (talk) 17:27, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

Requested move at Talk:Golf (Atari 2600)#Requested move 30 October 2022

 

There is a requested move discussion at Talk:Golf (Atari 2600)#Requested move 30 October 2022 that may be of interest to members of this WikiProject. UtherSRG (talk) 03:18, 30 October 2022 (UTC)

Nintendo Power, power meter ratings

How are the power meter ratings supposed to be read? They look like this:

G P C T
3.4 3.0 3.2 3.0

There are several different ways they are currently used in articles. Super Metroid calculates an average 4.7 + 3.8 + 4.6 + 4.6 = 17.7 / 4 = 4.425/5, Yoshi's Island adds up the scores 4.4 + 3.8 + 4.2 + 4.2 = 16.6/20, Virtual Boy Wario Land uses only the last number 4.3/5. Mika1h (talk) 13:03, 30 October 2022 (UTC)

I noticed GameRankings also used the average method. Super Metroid has the 4.425 score: [2] --Mika1h (talk) 13:10, 30 October 2022 (UTC)
I'd take the average of all scores and round to the nearest decimal point. Once you get past a single decimal point, review scores lose all coherent meaning - it's not even possible to differentiate between a 4.425 and 4.435 game. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 14:26, 30 October 2022 (UTC)
GPCT represents thematic categories (Graphics and sound, Play control, Challenge, Theme and fun[3]), not individual reviewers, so they should not be averaged. czar 03:14, 31 October 2022 (UTC)
I agree with Czar that averaging these numbers is not appropriate. I don't think addition is particularly appropriate either? It's an interpretation of the numbers which they aren't designed for, and they might simply just not fit well in a handy scores box. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 08:17, 31 October 2022 (UTC)
A typical single-score video game review factors in all those things, so I still think an average is appropriate. I don't see how that changes things at all. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 12:14, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

Averaging scores like this is us saying that the graphics, gameplay, challenge and theme are of equal importance and that the sub-scores should be weighted equally - we're by doing this going beyond just summarizing what the source said, and I do not find this at all appropriate. If you can't fit all four individual sub-scores into a review score table, I think the solution would be to only represent the review in prose, not in the table.--AlexandraIDV 13:35, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

I agree with Alexandra. Explaining the various breakdowns of the NP review is really not that important, and if it needs to be covered it should be done in prose. Trying to convert their system into a single number is a job for Metacritic or the like, not Wikipedia. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 15:51, 31 October 2022 (UTC)
3rd'ing this. WP:CALC does not apply here; both averaging and addition fall under SYNTH because we as editors are imposing an equal weighting that does not exist in the original source. Use prose or an external source's (e.g. MC) summary score. Axem Titanium (talk) 16:37, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

List of games with Gravis UltraSound support

For the past two days, I have composed a draft that is a list of notable computer games known to support any of the Gravis UltraSound cards. The cards, which were released during the 1990s PC sound card war (which it eventually lost), were notable for their unusual ability to synthesize real-world sound recordings as a basis for musical instruments, and this list is supposed to give an idea of how successful and influential the brand was. Of course, it was left in the dust by Creative Labs' sound cards, but it was compatible with a hundred or so games.

As I was putting the list together, I ran into difficulties regarding the structure of the list and the criteria. I debated whether to list only the titles that are compatible with the original model of Gravis UltraSound, but decided to include any game regardless of the UltraSound model due to lack of information about which cards the games supported. I also considered whether the list should make specific whether the game supports the original UltraSound, but then ruled it out for practically the same reasons. The next issue I am still debating on is how to treat Windows games. Although I am inclined to including them, my issue is which those that "support any Windows-compatible sound card". Such wording would suggest that the games were written for DirectX, or they had drivers for all the recognizable card brands of the time. Either way, I am more comfortable listing games whose requirements directly mention Gravis UltraSound, rather than leaving it up for interpretation. I was inspired by the article List of MT-32-compatible computer games to write it, but my draft is of considerably higher quality and thus far more likely to pass a review, using secondary sources whenever possible. However, I am somewhat demotivated by the criteria issue and the thought that my list article might itself still not be noteworthy enough. Should I just continue the draft and not worry about notability? FreeMediaKid$ 06:30, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Wouldn't this be non-encyclopedic cross-categorization? See this bundled AfD of "games by engine", which was recently closed as delete. Woodroar (talk) 20:59, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
That is what I was talking about when I said notability. I was not sure whether it would be a genuine, useful list or whether it would be as useless as if the draft were a list of games that support Nvidia cards, hence my losing the nerve to continue. Should I nominate the MT-32 list article for deletion? FreeMediaKid$ 23:58, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
I thought about the AfDs you referenced. While it does not help me decide whether my drafted list is acceptable, I can see myself being involved in the discussion and siding in favor of deleting the lists, while also defending List of game engines. The reason would be that I think the "games by engine" lists could simply be replaced by categories. Lists are frustrating because they sometimes blur the line between encyclopedic and "listicle". FreeMediaKid$ 01:12, 23 October 2022 (UTC)
If you are able to write a decent section of well-cited prose about why this technology is particularly noteworthy for those video games, then that would establish notability well. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 12:10, 24 October 2022 (UTC)
Please see the 5 AFD discussions starting at here and related discussions linked from here. My instinct is that a "list of games that support [some tech/hardware]" is not going to get broad support as appropriate for inclusion. Axem Titanium (talk) 16:22, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

I have been considering another draft article about games that use ray-traced graphics. In retrospect, that subject seems far more likely to pass a review than either the UltraSound or MT-32 article, the latter of which I have considered for deletion. I have already abandoned the UltraSound one. Unlike the two sound cards, the idea of ray-traced games spans decades, and the constant media buzz surrounding it is much louder. It has even been described as the "holy grail of gaming graphics" (Apress, 2021). There is the possibility of the subject becoming irrelevant once all the current games implement ray tracing, rendering the list inappropriate, but with technology seemingly doubling in power every two years, ray tracing itself may be replaced by something superior. Now that I have said that, it may be better to change the draft subject to "Ray tracing in video games", and I may still be able to write a prose decent enough to stand on its own. Either way, ray tracing in video games sounds like a noteworthy topic. FreeMediaKid$ 18:02, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

New Articles (October 24 to October 30)

 A listing of all articles newly added to the Video Games Wikiproject (regardless of creation date). Generated by v3.15 of the RecentVGArticles script and posted by PresN. Bug reports and feature requests are appreciated. --PresN 20:30, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

October 24

October 25

October 26

October 27

October 28

October 29

October 30

PresN 20:30, 31 October 2022 (UTC)

Why is Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice here? It was made years ago and doesn't have any info like 'newly tagged'. DecafPotato (talk) DecafPotato (talk) 20:54, 31 October 2022 (UTC)
In fact neither the article not talkpage have edits or log entries this month... Ben · Salvidrim!  22:19, 31 October 2022 (UTC)
Maybe it's related Senua's Saga: Hellblade II which is redirected to that page. --Mika1h (talk) 22:39, 31 October 2022 (UTC)
Yep, 1.0 bot listed it as "Senua's Saga: Hellblade II renamed to Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice." Looks like it's because the article was created on the 30th, actually moved to Draft:Senua's Saga: Hellblade II the same day, and then a redirect created in its place - so when the 1.0 bot said it was moved to that new title, my script checked and saw that the first revision of the Hellblade II page was on the 30th and that it redirects to Hellblade 1, which matches, so my script didn't look deeper. Unfortunately, this kind of corner case error just keeps happening in different ways, and will continue until I rewrite the whole thing (again) to not trust anything the 1.0 bot says and just take it as a list of articles to investigate- the 1.0 bot habitually misses things if an article is created and moved on the same day. (For the curious: the reason my script trusts the bot is because otherwise it needs to do about 10x the number of page loads to check article/talk page histories, e.g. take 10x the time to run, and in ~95% of cases the bot is right, and most of the rest I have catches for. Unfortunately the last 1-2% aren't solvable without thoroughly verifying the edit histories of every article, because if I knew which articles I couldn't trust the bot on then I wouldn't have an issue in the first place.) Tl;dr: thanks, removed. --PresN 02:32, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

Draft:ICandy_Interactive_Limited

Hello everyone,

I am trying to create a page for an Australian videogame company. Can an experienced editor check my Draft? I have copied the format from Alphabet Inc. Thanks Kc-morgenstern (talk) 03:54, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

There's over 30 references in the article but most of it looks like routine business coverage as described by WP:NCORP, which would not confer notability. There's also a number of references that fall under WP:NCRYPTO. Basically, I'm having trouble separating the wheat from the chaff. Can you please share your three very best sources for why you believe your company is notable? (Thank you for the COI declaration, btw, we appreciate that you are up front about that.) Axem Titanium (talk) 09:39, 1 November 2022 (UTC)
Hello again!
So, I am not an expert but I think these three are the best references:
  1. 1- https://sea.ign.com/sea-indie-games/181737/news/largest-southeast-asian-video-game-company-icandy-just-became-a-whole-lot-bigger
  2. 2 - https://themarketherald.com.au/icandy-interactive-asxici-seeks-approval-for-share-buy-back-2022-05-24/
  3. 3 - https://vulcanpost.com/770212/icandy-interactive-lemon-sky-acquisition-games-metaverse/
Other than these, I would like to mention that the company is literally the largest gaming company in Australia, New Zealand, Southeast Asia. I read that notability is not inherited, but iCandy is the parent company of many well-known subsidiaries that have worked with other gaming companies behind major videogames. The article will certainly be improved over time. Thank you Kc-morgenstern (talk) 11:47, 2 November 2022 (UTC)
All three of these sources sound like rewritten press releases to me. The Vulcan Post source is the most obvious, because they link to the press release and you can compare the bullet points in the article, but the others have a similar by-the-numbers PR feel. I would expect organic third-party coverage to dig into the company's history, include details about (and maybe quotes from) their founder(s)/creator(s), but also feel like a journalist is telling a story. Woodroar (talk) 13:08, 2 November 2022 (UTC)
I agree with Woodroar that these three sources still feel like routine corporate announcements (see this section, "standard notices, brief announcements, and routine coverage, such as the expansions, acquisitions, mergers, sale, or closure of the business"). You are correct that notability is not inherited. That means that the development studio of a notable video game is not automatically notable and the parent company that controls a notable development studio is not automatically notable. Some of the games or studios that iCandy controls may be better candidates for articles than the parent company itself. Please also consider that an article about your company isn't necessarily a good thing. Axem Titanium (talk) 18:12, 2 November 2022 (UTC)

"Genres by decade" categories unnecessary?

Categories like Category:2010s interactive fiction, Category:2010s fighting video games, and Category:2010s horror video games were recently made and seem like overkill. It would require a 100% recategorization of all games that are currently categorized by genre, for unclear reasons, and seems totally unnecessary. Thoughts? ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 12:44, 5 November 2022 (UTC)

They are not all new, but yes they should be removed as non-encyclopedic cross-categorizations. TarkusABtalk/contrib 16:23, 5 November 2022 (UTC)
I agree. Games are recognized by their decade/year, and by their genre, but unlike films where the decade/genre is common (like Category:1990s action films) the same rationale doesn't work here. Masem (t) 16:33, 5 November 2022 (UTC)
I agree that they should be removed, but I think "it would require a recategorization of all games" isn't a valid reason. While it is a significant amount of (likely unnecessary) work, something being a lot of effort shouldn't be used as a reason to not improve the encyclopedia. DecafPotato (talk) 18:49, 5 November 2022 (UTC)

New Articles (October 31 to November 6)

 A listing of all articles newly added to the Video Games Wikiproject (regardless of creation date). Generated by v3.15 of the RecentVGArticles script and posted by PresN. Bug reports and feature requests are appreciated. --PresN 13:48, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

October 31

November 1

November 2

November 3

November 4

November 5

November 6

PresN 13:48, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

"was previously a userpage" that's a new one. Also, just sort of spitballing here but, if Draft:The Living Tombstone were to actually make it into mainspace, would it actually be of relevance to this Wikiproject? As far as I know the only thing they have relating to video games is their cover of Jump Up Superstar from Super Mario Odyssey. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 14:27, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
perhaps transfered from sandbox directly? PerryPerryD Talk To Me 15:44, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Yes, "was previously a userpage" is a counterpart to "was previously a draft". It's basically saying that the article previously existed outside of mainspace, and got moved in to article space. --PresN 16:02, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Yeah, or anywhere in the userspace. I start a vast majority of my drafts at "User:Sergecross73/(draftname)" and them move them to the mainspace. Anything like that. Sergecross73 msg me 16:07, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Probably? WPVG is pretty open about including articles, so "band that makes songs based on games" is probably close enough. --PresN 16:02, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Well, I think their cover of "Jump Up Superstar" is their only video game cover. However I could be wrong with that. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 16:05, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Sorry if this conversation is becoming a bit casual, but I just searched up their YouTube channel and saw they have made plenty of songs relating to video games like FNAF, Overwatch, Splatoon and Baldi's Basics, so it's definitely relevance to this WikiProject. Sparkltalk 16:11, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Ah alright. That's just the only song I had heard by them so I didn't know if they had made others. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 16:15, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Video game music is actually their primary music focus, with some original music also PerryPerryD Talk To Me 16:32, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

Wikidata affecting infoboxes?

I just created an article for the indie game Dujanah, and it got linked to a Wikidata page... which seemed to add in some ludicrous fields in the infobox. Because the game was created by one person, the developer, Jack King-Spooner, is now listed as the publisher, designer, programmer, artist, writer, and composer.... which is extreme, to put it mildly and looks kind of ridiculous. Is this an automatic setup with Wikidata that auto-populates infoboxes? And is this something that I have to edit on the Wikidata side instead of the Wikipedia side? (I'm just not very familiar with the process here). Nomader (talk) 19:47, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

Hi Nomader, to prevent infoboxes from automatically pulling data from Wikidata, you can add the parameters to the infobox but leave its contents empty. I went ahead and added a bunch of empty parameters to Dujanah so it only shows one role being fulfilled currently. (Thank you for making this article, by the way!) ReneeWrites (talk) 20:13, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
You're a legend, thanks so much for both fixing it and for the explainer! Nomader (talk) 20:29, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

Roughly half of games in twin-stick shooters category aren't

Someone recently renamed Category:Multidirectional shooters to Category:Twin-stick shooters. Multidirectional shooters covered games where the player can rotate and shoot, like the Asteroids series and clones and games like Yars' Revenge. Now that the category is Twin-stick shooters, it's a mess. There are all these games that don't even have joysticks. The right solution feels like going back to Multidirectional shooters and adding a sub-category for twin-stick, but that's a big rearrangement that I don't have time to make. (Also, I removed a some games from the category before I realized what was going on; other people might have done likewise.) Dgpop (talk) 17:43, 7 November 2022 (UTC)

I don't even know what "Twin stick shooters" is supposed to mean. That it uses 2 Joysticks? Would games supporting the use of a flight stick (or yoke) be considered twin stick? ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 17:45, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
I don't mean to be rude, but you're already on the internet, there are ways to figure these sorts of things out... Sergecross73 msg me 17:47, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Unfortunately the internet is not the most reliable or perfect place to gain information. Especially considering the link you provided doesnt really answer the question. its more-so an example. PerryPerryD Talk To Me 17:57, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Agreed, and you could say the same thing about information on Wikipedia. You could basically say that you don't need to cite things because you can find them out on the internet. But this is Wikipedia. If categories aren't clearly defined here then article will be miscategorized. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 18:00, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
You opened with stating that you didn't even know what a Twin Stick Shooter was. The website answers that very directly: What is a Twin Stick Shooter?
Twin stick shooters are a genre of game which use two controls, typically operated by the thumbs. One control dictates the character's movement, the other the direction of shooting. I don't know why you bothered to answer a thread you knew nothing about, to stay that you knew nothing about the subject, but that aside, I was letting you know that it took mere seconds to find an answer to your first question. Sergecross73 msg me 18:04, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Yes, but if I didn't know what the category was defining then that possibly means other people don't as well. IF we weren't to define categories on Wikipedia at all then articles would constantly be miscategorized. We cannot jsut tell people to "google it" or look it up on the internet. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 18:10, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Opened a CFD here PerryPerryD Talk To Me 17:53, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
You just said you don't even know what a twin stick shooter is? Why would your next move be to delete the category? Sergecross73 msg me 18:05, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Please do not put words into my mouth. I know exactly what a twin stick shooter is. I was stating that the link you provided wasnt the best source. PerryPerryD Talk To Me 18:08, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
also its categories for discussion, more speicifcally, renaming. PerryPerryD Talk To Me 18:08, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
How am I putting words in your mouth? Your literal first words of this discussion was I don't even know what "Twin stick shooters" is supposed to mean. Sergecross73 msg me 18:14, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
I am not Blaze Wolf, That was Blaze Wolf's introduction into this discussion. I am PerryPerryD. PerryPerryD Talk To Me 18:15, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
That wasn't them at all. That was me. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 18:15, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Apologies for misreading some signatures here. That aside, my confusion is just split across multiple editors then. Regardless of who, it seems bizarre to rocket this straight to CFD (How will general editors be able to answer this when there's WP:VG regulars that don't even know the the difference?) but to each their own. It could just be as simple as doing some cleanup. Sergecross73 msg me 18:27, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
I opened a speedy renaming request. This is not something that needs consensus, so going through CFD doesn't seem like the right course of action. It was done in error through speedy, so I'm requesting it be fixed through speedy too. After that we can make a twin-stick shooter subcategory and move the appropriate articles there. ReneeWrites (talk) 08:16, 8 November 2022 (UTC)

There is an RFC at Talk:Star Control concerning what external links should be provided from the article (in view of the complex history of the intellectual property for the game). Participation is welcome. Robert McClenon (talk) 01:29, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

The Bloody Baron

I wrote an article about The Bloody Baron and was hoping someone would help rewrite a better summary. I did my best but it's easy to get lost in the details. I also think it might be the first Wikipedia article about a video game quest... which is both interesting and tricky. Archrogue (talk) 15:14, 3 November 2022 (UTC)

This is.. difficult. The article has a lot of references which would make it notable.. but its also a quest from a Game with its own article. Im conflicted here. PerryPerryD Talk To Me 15:24, 3 November 2022 (UTC)
My biggest advice would be to trim the summary section down as much as possible. My personal rule-of-thumb is "if you can't cite it to a secondary source, don't have it in the article." You don't have to be that strict on it, but nine paragraphs is way too long for any piece of fiction. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 15:29, 3 November 2022 (UTC)
Seconded. Entire game plots are supposed to be limited to 700 words, so you can only imagine what would be acceptable for a side quest. Sergecross73 msg me 16:38, 3 November 2022 (UTC)
(It isn't really the first article we have on a video game quest. Besides articles on individual levels, we also have Cat hair mustache puzzle and Le Serpent Rouge puzzle, for example. No Russian is also listed as a "mission" rather than a level) ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 15:25, 3 November 2022 (UTC)
As someone who hasn't played the Witcher 3, I can attest that I've heard a lot of mentions about this particular quest in the aether of games media quite often. Based on the dev section, there does seem to be reporting on this specific quest. I'm not thrilled by the prevalence of TheGamer listicles in the Reception section. I would definitely look through reviews of W3 itself for ones that call out the Bloody Baron quest instead of relying on a dozen TheGamer listicles. The summary needs a trim too of course. Axem Titanium (talk) 16:35, 3 November 2022 (UTC)
In particular I would ditch all the listicles entirely. They are pretty much scraping the bottom of the barrel and rarely should be included as references unless absolutely necessary. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 19:39, 3 November 2022 (UTC)
Yeah I feel like we've come to a determination listicle stuff at best gets a combined mention in stuff like character articles? It really shouldn't be anchoring a reception section. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 20:36, 3 November 2022 (UTC)
Yeah, I'm having mixed feelings about this article too. It's clearly notable. But more and more editors are in agreement that The Gamer isn't a very good source, especially when relying on their listicle content. Still, the article is well-sourced in general, with other third party sources to demonstrate notability. Without hijacking this talk section, it would be good to have another discussion about appropriate use of sources and listicles. Shooterwalker (talk) 23:49, 4 November 2022 (UTC)
I did shorten the plot summary a lot but copy editing isn't my forte. I'm sensing a wave of criticism and I'm trying to understand. I have seen some hate for The Gamer at AFD. But I'm not using it to demonstrate notability and there are better sources for that. I just found a lot of coverage at The Gamer, and the headlines sum up some of the reasons why this quest is so well-received: the element of choice and the tragic story at the heart of it. Archrogue (talk) 00:26, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
Nice work trimming the plot section down, it looks much better! It should really be shortened even more, but I know how hard that can be. Maybe someone else who has played the game could give it a copy-edit at some point. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 11:45, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
My issue with TheGamer's coverage of this topic is that they turned one article about how TBB is a good quest into 9 articles that say basically the same thing. It's pretty obvious content/click farming. A lot of coverage =/= good or interesting or meaningful coverage. And by including them all on Wikipedia, we're directly contributing to the proliferation of low-effort click farming articles by giving them a ton of free traffic. I would pick one article, preferably not a listicle, that summarizes "TheGamer's stance/opinion" on TBB and has something interesting to say to include in the article. Axem Titanium (talk) 17:57, 7 November 2022 (UTC)
pops up like a prairie dog A Valnet site doing content click farming, shock! I refer to the multiple recent "If you article relies on Valnet/CBR, then it isn't notable." -- ferret (talk) 00:16, 8 November 2022 (UTC)
The thing is that I'm not using TheGamer to prove notability. The notability is proven by PC Gamer, PC Games N, Polygon, and more. As far as I can tell TheGamer is still a reliable source and I'm trying to sum up what it says about this quest. Archrogue (talk) 18:41, 8 November 2022 (UTC)
It's a situational source at the best of times and most editors on this project wouldn't touch it at all. Ask yourself why they would feel possessed to write the same article 9 times across a half dozen writers. My instinct is to say that 1) it's a proven hit that drives traffic, and 2) the writers are under a deadline to produce content or risk getting fired. So it's not really the case that TBB is so freaking good that it deserves 9 articles' worth of coverage, it's that the writers at TheGamer are under impossible pressure to deliver clicks and ad revenue at any cost, including to their reputation. So they find somehow some way to provide juuuuuust a slightly different angle to write yet another listicle about how TBB is great, which I believe it is, but I don't think the 9th article on it really adds anything at that point.
Personally, I would only use TheGamer if they had some kind of primary source---an interview, a piece of development info, etc. I don't think their editorial output is particularly useful and citing their listicles is discouraged. Axem Titanium (talk) 16:42, 9 November 2022 (UTC)
At the very least, they should be used in an article with due weight to their importance, which I think goes to how much you cite them as much as their actual prose content. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 16:58, 9 November 2022 (UTC)
Agree with Axem Titanium and David Fuchs. The Gamer is technically reliable. But summarizing every time they mention a game can lead to strange results and is a type of WP:UNDUE weight. Jontesta (talk) 19:59, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

New Articles (November 7 to November 13)

 A listing of all articles newly added to the Video Games Wikiproject (regardless of creation date). Generated by v3.15 of the RecentVGArticles script and posted by PresN. Bug reports and feature requests are appreciated. --PresN 14:54, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

November 7

November 8

November 9

November 10

  • None

November 11

November 12

November 13

Does this deserve an own article? soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 17:45, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
I tried boldly redirecting, and got reverted, FYI. Sergecross73 msg me 21:42, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Waxworker working overtime on categories this week! One from someone else that didn't make the cut but I wanted to call out as odd- Category:Epic video games. Also, shouldn't Narrative of video games be Narrative (video games)? --PresN 14:54, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
Yes, the "epic" category popped up on my watchlist. I was just about to start a discussion on it, as I was reverted when I tried to remove it. Is that really a WP:DEFINING trait? It's so vague it's not helpful, in my opinion. I haven't gotten much clarify from its creator, who reverted me with the edit summary saying epic is not a genre, even though that's exactly what he wrote when he created the category. Sergecross73 msg me 15:09, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
I would agree it is vague that it doesn't help in categorization. Masem (t) 15:14, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
The epic is indeed a genre, although I am heavily dubious it is a video game genre. The epic (genre) article claims it is, but cites a book from 1971 for that statement, when you'd think no epic video games existed yet, so I am doubtful that is the truth and not just something added by a random editor. While I am sure there are games that qualify, I doubt the term is used often enough that it is not original research for most games. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 16:03, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
To me, it's like creating categories like "Category:Fast video games" or Category:Calming video games" - no doubt the descriptor is used, and surely there's low-hanging fruit like Sonic or Animal Crossing, but there'd be a ton of disputes on "How fast is fast enough to be included" and "What if I find Doom to be relaxing, can I add it?" Etc. Ultimately I just don't think it gels with how people use categories. It's too vague and subjective. It feels more like those recently deleted vague categories like [[Category:Child friendly video games]]. Sergecross73 msg me 16:31, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
That has definitely got to go. soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 17:45, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
It's been sent to CFD - Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2022 November 14#Category:Epic video games Sergecross73 msg me 00:35, 15 November 2022 (UTC)

WP:VG/LEAD addition

Hi everyone, I was wondering if there were any objections to my idea to add avoiding mentioning of cover art style or stylings of promotional material in the lead at WP:VG/LEAD. Case in point, "DEATHLOOP". I'm sure I've seen (and removed) other instances as well. Thoughts? soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 10:13, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

I would love that. It's a constant headache in the music world as well. (Modern musicians love to name their songs in all lowercase or all caps.) I think, unless there is a specific difference in intended meaning, or a problem with recognizability, it's pointless to point out or explain to the reader. Sergecross73 msg me 13:28, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
This is MOS:TMSTYLE stuff. Doesn't belong in MOS:VG, we shouldn't have special rules from any other space for this. Regardless, this should be discussed at the MOS talk page, not in wikiproject talk. -- ferret (talk) 13:41, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
MOS:TMSTYLE even suggests that simple all caps replacements are not notable for us. (we'd want to note "F3AR", but I think that can be served as a footnote) Masem (t) 13:44, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
Hi @Ferret:, would you prefer I restart the discussion at the talk page? I agree that it's TMSTYLE, but it might be helpful to have a VG-specific guideline to point to. soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 10:38, 17 November 2022 (UTC)
@Soetermans Whether it's a change to TMSTYLE, or, an inclusion of some specific TMSTYLE language for MOS:VG, the discussion has to happen at the MOS's talk page, which doesn't explicitly belong to the Wikiproject. Changes implemented in the MOS that were discussed solely here have been challenged in the past as a LOCALCON. -- ferret (talk) 14:08, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Short description

The inconsistency is bothering me; I want to set this in stone. I've seen tons of different types, even in Good and Featured Articles, so I'm asking here to gather consensus: what should the short description for video game articles be?

Some options are, using Super Mario Odyssey as an example:

  1. Video game (i.e. "Video game")
  2. [YEAR] video game (i.e. "2017 video game")
  3. [YEAR] [GENRE] video game (i.e. "2017 platform video game")
  4. [YEAR] [GENRE] video game by [DEVELOPER] (i.e. "2017 platform video game by Nintendo EAD")
  5. [YEAR] [GENRE] video game by [PUBLISHER] (i.e. "2017 platform video game by Nintendo")
  6. [YEAR] video game by [DEVELOPER] (i.e. "2017 video game by Nintendo EAD")
  7. [YEAR] video game by [PUBLISHER] (i.e. "2017 video game by Nintendo")
  8. [GENRE] video game (i.e. "Platform video game")
  9. [GENRE] video game (i.e. "Platform video game")
  10. [GENRE] video game {by [DEVELOPER]/by [PUBLISHER]} (i.e. "Platform video game {by Nintendo EAD/by Nintendo}")
  11. Video game {by [DEVELOPER]/by [PUBLISHER]} (i.e. "Video game {by Nintendo EAD/by Nintendo}")

Or any others. DecafPotato (talk) 04:47, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

For the record, I prefer #3, i.e. "2017 platform video game". DecafPotato (talk) 04:49, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
This has been discussed before and can be found in our MOS: WP:VG/SHORTDESC. IceWelder [] 08:12, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
It's still remarkably inconsistent. Why does God of War (2018 video game) get the "action-adventure" label, but God of War Ragnarök does not? Why is the year a title released in considered more important and defining than the genre, the core driving force of the core aspect of a video game? Why is this inconsistent with related media (The Empire Strikes Back, Avengers: Endgame)? Why is there zero rationale whatsoever for the guidelines on WP:VG/SHORTDESC? How was this "discussed before" when the most recent discussion (over eighteen months ago) had a split of potential ideas? If this guideline is present in the manual of style, why is it hardly applied? Why does the guideline's shortcut (how most people see guidelines, if we're being honest, very few read fully the MOS top-to-bottom) have less than 100 pageviews in its entire lifetime? DecafPotato (talk) 21:29, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
I think the main issue is that short descriptions are rather confusing since a lot of articles can have the same short description, and yet WP:SD says "a disambiguation in searches, especially to distinguish the subject from similarly titled subjects in different fields". ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 21:45, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
The action-adventure label for GoW (2018) is in place of the year because it's already mentioned in the article title. WP:SDDUPLICATE states that "A short description is not a definition" and it should "avoid duplicating information that is already in the title." ~~ lol1VNIO (I made a mistake? talk to me) 21:54, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
The purpose of a short description is to help on a search results page, particularly in the mobile app. It is meant to be like a disambiguation between other topics also named X. Thus most video games only need "YYYY video game" as the short description. The genre doesn't help there. Masem (t) 22:04, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
That is to argue that a short description's only purpose is to disambiguate, which it clearly is not. Otherwise, obscure topics simply would not have one. But I believe my issue is beyond that of this project's scope, and will continue it in a more general capacity if I feel like it. DecafPotato (talk) 23:59, 16 November 2022 (UTC)
Yeah, I think your point of concern does go outside of this project. I'd argue that the reason for short descriptions is not just for disambiguation, but for a much more basic reason- if I'm on the mobile site/app, and I go to the search bar and type "God", then a bunch of things pop up that I have no idea what they are. Short description is nothing more or less then a short gray-text bit below the article names that adds some context to what the heck these things are. It's never ever used in a context without the article name, or in any context-rich environment. It's just there to add some bare context to what the article name refers to. I'd prefer to have a bit more text there myself, but it's constrained by the literal width of the search results box, so I get why its usually a minimalist few words. I've actually seen a big trend recently where if the name of the article is enough, then the short description is blanked. I'd argue that consistency meansthat , if we're going with like a 3-word description, that any article with (2018 video game) disambig in the title doesn't need a short description at all. --PresN 02:30, 17 November 2022 (UTC)
Yes, what you're referring to is WP:SDNONE which states that, should the article title be sufficiently descriptive itself, than you can use {{Short description|none}} instead. TarkusABtalk/contrib 03:14, 17 November 2022 (UTC)
I prefer #3 as well, followed by #2. I feel the year of a game's release and the genre it's in are strong and succinct defining traits, I don't feel that way about who developed/published it. I think it's a good idea to formalize having the short description for video games list only one genre; most games fall into several and including them all could easily cause the short description to go over the recommended maximum letter count. ReneeWrites (talk) 15:19, 17 November 2022 (UTC)
The current guideline at WP:VG/SHORTDESC is fine imo. Popcornfud (talk) 16:25, 17 November 2022 (UTC)
The examples provided at WP:VG/SHORTDESC should be coded into {{Infobox video game}} and {{Infobox video game series}}. That would help provide a baseline (and remove SD templates from articles that are close to this syntax), with users still able to override such descriptions if there is truly a need to deviate from what's in the MOS. The film and television infoboxes (and others) already do this, don't see why the video game ones shouldn't either. - Favre1fan93 (talk) 18:28, 17 November 2022 (UTC)
{{Infobox video game}} at least does, per Special:Diff/1066961840. -- ferret (talk) 22:22, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Claptrap Article Clean-Up

Just came across the article for Claptrap from Borderlands just out of curiosity; and its IMHO a very sloppily written article with the segment particularly focused on the character's reception hard to read and seemingly biased by using every negative piece of reception from a half baked games journalist the author could find. I understand the character does have a negative reception, but the article's tone doesn't feel very Wiki-like at all and reminds me more of some complaint list some Redditor pulled out at 3:20 AM in a "Worst Video Game Characterz Evar!" thread. The associated talk page has only one entry from somebody saying "glad the article recognizes how shitty Claptrap is!" suggesting further poor maintenance of the page as well. I am not experienced enough with writing for WikiProject Video Games articles (and have actually never finished a Borderlands game completely so my experience with the character and reputable sources for it is small); but I would appreciate if somebody could give the article a look to check for bias, grammar and citation credibility issues. Thank you. Xboxtravis7992 (talk) 00:41, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

I can't say I agree with you, the article looks in an okay state to me. Reception was largely negative, but there are still some reliable sources that mention something positive. And the talk page comment actually says Claptrap isn't worthy of having an article, which is not true. soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 01:33, 17 November 2022 (UTC)
I don't think you need to have played a game to write about them or characters in them, necessarily. You should mostly go off of what reliable sources say rather than your own feelings, but I agree that the original article was swinging a bit too hard in one direction. It's true that the character was subject to a lot of negative reception, but a lot of people love him, as well, and I was able to find plenty of sources to reflect that. ReneeWrites (talk) 16:41, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

List of highest-grossing media franchises cleanup

I've started a discussion at here for this. Since that page is a part of our Wiki project I think its time we clean that page since Maestro2016 was banned. I'm not sure why my pings don't work but I would appreciate it if someone would ping all relevant/possible editors. Timur9008 (talk) 16:46, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

New Articles (November 14 to November 20)

 A listing of all articles newly added to the Video Games Wikiproject (regardless of creation date). Generated by v3.15 of the RecentVGArticles script and posted by PresN. Bug reports and feature requests are appreciated. --PresN 14:00, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

November 14

November 15

November 16

November 17

November 18

November 19

November 20

PresN 14:00, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

(newly tagged – originally created 18 years ago)

THAT's a new one. 18 years is a very long time. Someone born around that article's creation is now a legal adult (in the US, at least). DecafPotato (talk) 20:20, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Development of Super Mario Bros. 2 and Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels

Very few games have a separate article purely about their development, though I believe my rationale for this one speaks for itself. Anyone vaguely familiar with video game history has inevitably heard of the tale of Super Mario Bros. 2 and Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels's development, a Mario game scrapped for the west because it was too hard, and a licensed Japanese television tie-in reskinned for the west as Mario. As the development of these two games are so deeply intertwined, it makes sense to have it in a stand-alone article, otherwise both articles' "development" section would essentially be the same (see Production of Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame for an example of this in practice). Doing this requires that the development of the game alone satisfies WP:GNG, which I'd say it does. I've started a draft that includes all the sources I've gathered, including a 160-page book about the game, and several articles from reputable outlets dedicated solely to the game's development. If you're reading this a bit after I post it, the draft should be in current development for you to check out the proposal, and please give me your thoughts. DecafPotato (talk) 22:21, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

I predict a lot of suspicion that the article is WP:SYNTH. It is not really enough that the development of the games are linked in your personal opinion/observation; they have to be mentioned in reliable sources TOGETHER. If you are certain that is the case, the article may stand, but I'd watch out for making connections yourself as opposed to WP:RS making connections or I'd expect it to be rejected. There's also the issue of making it more than just a content fork of the development sections of both. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 11:44, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
This is definitely an important thing to keep in mind. I do think a lot of the sources presented here (of course especially the Boss Fights book) are well-positioned to talk about the connection between these two games, and I'm excited to see a full-fledged article on it here. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 12:24, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
Got it. I'll remember to keep that in mind. DecafPotato (talk) 21:17, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
The Boss Fight books are well known for extended personal ruminations on the games (as opposed to 160 pages of analysis) and this one is no exception.[4][5] I've looked at a lot (most?) of this sourcing before in writing The Lost Levels article and while this development story is memorable, I have not seen it discussed in sources as independenly notable from the games. The argument would have to be that there is preponderance of sourcing that would be undue weight if not made into a summary style split. czar 06:30, 24 November 2022 (UTC)

About Template:Super Mario and what counts as the Mainline games of a series

What should count under the main entries of this series, specifically with Super Mario Maker, its sequel, Super Mario Run, and Yoshi's Island. Should we take the developer's intent or the company's website as an absolute? I myself am mixed on these games being on the template and I wanted the community's perspective. (Oinkers42) (talk) 05:22, 23 November 2022 (UTC)

It ought to be solely down to whether reliable sources call it a spinoff. For example, I don't see sources calling Super Mario Run a spinoff, but there are more than one that call Super Princess Peach a spinoff. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 13:41, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
Check through the archives of the Super Mario talk page, it's been discussed a lot in the past. I'm not saying it's correct - I'm pretty certain opinions have shifted over the years. But it could be a good refresher for you if you wish to initiate new discussions on it. Sergecross73 msg me 13:55, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
All four of those games are designated as mainline by Nintendo, IIRC JOEBRO64 14:27, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
The U.S. website declares all of them besides Yoshi's Island to be part of the series, but strangely excludes the Lost Levels and includes the recent remakes (likely for promotional purposes). [6] The Japanese website includes everything the U.S. website includes, plus the Lost Levels, 35, and Super Mario Maker 3DS (for some reason). [7] (sort by series) They really do not have a consistent list, but Yoshi's Island is excluded by both. (Oinkers42) (talk) 15:06, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
This is why I don't think we should go with "official" lists; they are definitely marketing in most cases, Nintendo obviously doesn't want to miss an opportunity to advertise a new game. DecafPotato (talk) 21:19, 23 November 2022 (UTC)
Here you go: Hilliard, Kyle (October 4, 2015). "Is Yoshi's Island A Super Mario World Game?". Game Informer. Retrieved November 24, 2022. czar 05:00, 24 November 2022 (UTC)
In cases like this where there's no single, clear answer to what's mainline and what's not, it might be better to sidestep the issue by listing the spin-offs together with the rest. We don't need to give a definitive answer in the navbox - it's just supposed to be a navigational aid.--AlexandraIDV 16:07, 24 November 2022 (UTC)

Free ebooks from the Golden Joystick Awards

As part of the Golden Joystick Awards, Future plc is giving away free ebooks that might be of interest for the project:

Also, a reminder of the ebooks offered in 2019, which are still available:

All of these are published by Future Publishing and written by its staff, so they can probably be considered reliable. Regards, IceWelder [] IceWelder [] 21:49, 23 November 2022 (UTC)

Nice, I'll take a look at these tonight if I have time.--AlexandraIDV 16:08, 24 November 2022 (UTC)

Category wanted

I just updated Giga (brand), which is about to cease operation next year. There are some category work left behind, namely Category:Video game companies disestablished in 2023 or even Category:Japanese companies disestablished in 2023 or anything. Handling categories in enwiki is beyond my ability for now, perhaps someone could help me out? MilkyDefer 14:52, 24 November 2022 (UTC)

I actually made a script that helps you copy categories with a year change. Feel free to check it out. IceWelder [] 17:35, 24 November 2022 (UTC)

Mario Kart 8

Mario Kart 8 had previously been covered in one single article. Recently, it's been split out into 3 separate articles:

  1. Mario Kart 8
  2. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
  3. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe - Booster Course Pass

There's a discussion debating how to handle this here. I feel it could use some more input. Thanks. Sergecross73 msg me 05:06, 18 November 2022 (UTC)

If there's anyone left who hasn't participated, this discussion could use an experienced closer. Thanks. Sergecross73 msg me 17:53, 25 November 2022 (UTC)

I'm Back

I'm just saying hello, I was quite active in this project between 2007 and 2012, then I went on a long break. I am back, at least for a little bit, and will be mostly working on old 8-bit home computer game articles. Marasmusine (talk) 13:29, 26 November 2022 (UTC)

Welcome back! There's still some regulars around here from that timeframe. I created my account in late 2008 and became active around here in 2010 at the latest. Sergecross73 msg me 13:42, 26 November 2022 (UTC)
It seems I was responsible for getting one of your articles redirected some years back... lol. Inclusion standards have definitely changed since that time. ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ () 16:05, 26 November 2022 (UTC)
Welcome back on board! Its always good having some of the old Wikipedia guards back on the spotlight. Roberth Martinez (talk) 20:30, 26 November 2022 (UTC)

The Thanksgiving Thread

This isn't on topic per se but I still felt it was necessary. I know barnstars are a thing but I feel we don't send those enough, and hopefully seeing this message will bridge that gap a bit and spark more action.
Please use this thread to send a quick bullet point of gratitude to a user you are thankful for in the video game Wikiproject, to recognize what they are currently doing or their past achievements. It's Thanksgiving soon and I know there's a lot of users here who could use some thanking.

Thanks @Axem Titanium:, I had no idea what I was doing there. (Oinkers42) (talk) 23:15, 25 November 2022 (UTC)

Genshin Impact characters AfD

Hi everyone,

It's been quite a while since I've been active at WP:VG. I was working my way to becoming more involved, but I'm here already. I've just AfD the list of characters from Genshin Impact, but I'm a little out of practice. I appreciate your input, no matter on which side you fall on the discussion. You can find the discussion here. soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 17:13, 8 November 2022 (UTC)

Well, that was a bust. The article is being kept, but I think at least @Sergecross73, Axem Titanium, Archrogue, and Satellizer: agree that the bulk of the article is WP:GAMEGUIDE material, right? Please correct me if I am misinterpreting anyone's words. @Awesome Aasim: already removed the 'rarity' column and the translations of the names into Japanese and Chinese. Shouldn't the columns 'element', 'weapon' and 'voice actor' be removed as well? I think that's pretty gamecrufty too. soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 13:47, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
Or the 'status' column. There's two main characters, 'playable' and 'upcoming'. Seems unnecessary. soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 13:49, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
I'd definitely have the element and weapon columns removed as gameguide. I don't think you'd get much of a chance of the item being deleted outright, the list likely passes WP:LISTN, but we should cull in-universe info as much as possible. Lee Vilenski (talkcontribs) 13:52, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
Same. Sergecross73 msg me 14:01, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
I think having the list with the weapon and element is a good start, since after more story and in-universe information can be added for each character, thereby making the tabulated list unnecessary until the list grows much much larger. Some of these characters that have gotten more coverage to be notable for a standalone article could be spinned into their own Wikipedia article, while others can just have the information listed on this page. In any case, any information provided in this list should supplement the information already provided on Genshin Impact. Also think about when there are hundreds of characters each with their own notable coverage having each article; having a table with a summary of each character page will definitely be helpful. Aasim - Herrscher of Wikis ❄️ 14:03, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
Weapon and element type are still gameguide and provide little to the nom gamer 9f what they mean. And you should work from the assumption that most of these characters are non notable, being mostly gachta style rewards. Masem (t) 14:24, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
The huge majority of the characters listed there pass Wikipedia:Notability. For example, Yun Jin has received nontrivial coverage here, and Klee has received nontrivial coverage after an AR filter of her went viral on TikTok. I would not say that "all" or "most" of these characters are non-notable; some characters have received more significant coverage than others. Think about also what we do with all the non-notable Pokemon species - instead of having their titles redirect to the main Pokemon article, we have the title redirect to the relevant entry in the list. Going into detail about game mechanics is quite important provided it can be done encyclopedically. Okay, I might be using a little of "other stuff exists" as an argument.
The previous form the article was in before I cleaned it up and condensed it was even more gamecrufty, going into excessive detail about each character's role in the storyline rather than focusing on conception and creation. Not to mention, no sources. Anyway, I think that is the last I am going to leave it at for now. Aasim - Herrscher of Wikis ❄️ 17:15, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
Linking to a single source as evidence of meeting the WP:GNG is not a very compelling argument, for the record. I'm not saying they're not notable, I'm just saying you're not really going about this right. Sergecross73 msg me 17:24, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
Yes I agree in its current form the article is heavily gamecruft. I'd do away with the tables entirely and just list out the characters (like what is done in the Non-playable characters section which is currently looking ok). Over time the character descriptions can be expanded upon with individual discussion and reception of each character etc. Satellizer el Bridget (Talk) 05:47, 15 November 2022 (UTC)
Yes, if anyone is ambitious enough to do that, I believe that's the best path forward to getting the article back on an encyclopedic path. Sergecross73 msg me 13:19, 15 November 2022 (UTC)
Imagine though Genshin gets to 200 or so characters. Surely, you do not want an article with 200 sections, one for each character. There are dozens of lists that tabulate information in a similar manner, such as List of generation III Pokémon. Sure, I am not using "other stuff exists" as an argument, but a good question is what is the best way to present all this information on all these characters in an easy to navigate and understand way. Information that cannot be presented or discussed in an encyclopedic manner can be deleted, while other information can be kept. Aasim - Herrscher of Wikis ❄️ 19:18, 15 November 2022 (UTC)
I don't think that's particularly common outside of Pokémon and maybe a handful of it's clones. And we can figure that out if and when we get there at all. We dont necessarily need to plan today for hypotheticals that may never even happen. Sergecross73 msg me 19:25, 15 November 2022 (UTC)
Given that currently there are 50+ player characters, and dozens more non-player characters, it would be best to prioritize readability while at the same time removing unencyclopedic information. Characters that have gotten more than trivial coverage can be spun into their own articles, while other characters could just remain as a list for good. A lot of the NPCs can just be stripped though as it is currently since they fall below notability standards. We are not going to have a List of Genshin Impact weapons or List of Genshin Impact artifacts article anytime soon as that is obviously entering Wikipedia:GAMECRUFT. What would be worth evaluating is what information, about each character, is worth including, and what is worth deleting? Aasim - Herrscher of Wikis ❄️ 16:33, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
Thanks for the tag. WP:GAMEGUIDE is clear that we don't cover characters in a game guide manner, with tables of stats, items, abilities and so on. This is regardless of how many gaming sites publish their own game guides that talk about a character's main abilities and uses in the game. Compare Characters in the Mario franchise. Mario isn't exactly one of the most complex characters, but you can see that the article focuses on his character design and impact, and not a breakdown of his various abilities and power-ups. For Genshin, we would remove the columns for the weapon and element of each character. I am not sure that the "playable" column belongs here either. Archrogue (talk) 18:40, 21 November 2022 (UTC)
Agreed. Sergecross73 msg me 12:05, 29 November 2022 (UTC)
This type of game guide information can now be hosted on Wikibooks, from the perspective that a game guide is a book. What sort of information is relevant on an encyclopedia can be hard to define sometimes. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 13:12, 29 November 2022 (UTC)

Thomson MO/Thomson TO platform cats

I noticed that there aren't any platform cats for Thomson computers, but haven't made them myself as I know nothing about them, and I'm unsure whether there should be separate cats for Thomson MO/Thomson TO computers (article says that the two model ranges are "incompatible in software"), or just make "Category:Thomson games". Some games that have versions for Thomson computers: Monopoly (1985 video game), L'Aigle d'Or, Temple of Apshai Trilogy. Any thoughts on how to format a cat for these? Waxworker (talk) 17:54, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Also, it should be noted that while there aren't many Thomson games on English Wikipedia, there are a lot on French Wikipedia (there they seem to have both MO/TO in one cat). Waxworker (talk) 18:06, 22 November 2022 (UTC)
Due to lack of input, I ended up making the categories myself, making two separate cats for TO/MO. Waxworker (talk) 23:01, 29 November 2022 (UTC)

Opinion: El Shaddai

Hi. I've just finished an eyeball-singeing expansion of El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron, and I'd really like someone to throw other less-fried eyeballs over it. I've been meaning to do this article on and off for literally years, and only just now got the stamina to make sense of all this. Not planning to do anything major on Wikipedia till next year (aside from the Crimson Dragon GAN if that happens this year), so someone just doing light tidying would be a huge help. ProtoDrake (talk) 21:09, 1 December 2022 (UTC)

New Articles (November 21 to November 27)

 A listing of all articles newly added to the Video Games Wikiproject (regardless of creation date). Generated by v3.15 of the RecentVGArticles script and posted by PresN. Bug reports and feature requests are appreciated. --PresN 14:55, 29 November 2022 (UTC)

November 21

November 22

Does a theme park ride fall under the scope of WP:VG, just because it's based upon a video game character? soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 09:31, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
The article was previously BLARed for not being notable. The redirect was then converted back to an article. I suggest taking it to AFD. If you want you can take Mario Kart: Koopa's Challenge to AFD as well. Pizzaplayer219TalkContribs 13:29, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
To answer the question, though: yes- traditionally, "is related to video games, broadly construed" is all it takes to get tagged for WP:VG, in the absence of any stricter rules. --PresN 14:40, 30 November 2022 (UTC)

November 23

November 24

November 25

November 26

November 27


I'm not too keen on List of years in video games, but I was the one who redirected it in 2020- any other opinions? --PresN 14:55, 29 November 2022 (UTC)
It does feel like its purpose can be handled as a category, but if we want to discuss this one we might as well discuss it together with all the other lists in this same style, like the comprehensive List of years in literature. That being said, all the video game years easily fit inside of Outline of video games#History of video games, so we may have little reason to have a separate index for it? ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 15:11, 29 November 2022 (UTC)
It's a pretty standard article to have across various "year in (___)" articles - all the "year in music" type articles have similar equivalent articles, for example. I think it has its place. To me, the bigger issue is just that it's so ugly. Perhaps with some cleanup/reorganizing/formatting changes it'll be more palatable? Sergecross73 msg me 16:39, 29 November 2022 (UTC)
There's probably no need to include any of the major events that are currently in parts of that list. Just a quick index to the specific decade and year articles. Masem (t) 13:44, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
On the one hand, the arbitrary entries for specific historic events or releases is ugly and messy. On the other hand, this is basically the only purpose the list serves... ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 15:33, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
I never thought to add "The Cuphead Show!" to WikiProject Videogames until now... and I've been watching that article for a while. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 14:59, 29 November 2022 (UTC)
Not entirely related but I would be interested in helping bring back the VG newsletter if people are actually interested in it (it was last edited in May 2022). ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 15:06, 29 November 2022 (UTC)
I think it would be nice, but I already kind of obsessively keep up with this WikiProject lol – DecafPotato (talk) 07:33, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
I always enjoyed reading it, though I usually didn't have much bandwidth for contributing to its creation. I think that was a bunch of people's stance - so it'd probably be appreciated if the manpower to create it can be mustered up. Sergecross73 msg me 14:33, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
Alright, I've gone ahead and asked Panini! and Thibbs (tho I don't think I'll get a response from Thibbs since they haven't edited in 3 months) if they could help since they were the last 2 people who edited the draft. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 15:36, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
The other day I came across one of the subpages for the VG newsletter and was wondering why we stopped doing the newsletter. If the newsletter does get revived again then I will most likely sign up for it. Pizzaplayer219TalkContribs 15:41, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
I'm not sure why production of the newsletter stopped either. I might move the page for the next newsletter to a different title (since part of the title is the date which clearly did not happen, tho I'm not entirely sure when it would be ready to release, that date would most likely come as it gets closer to completion) ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 15:43, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
It stopped, most likely, because it's a moderate amount of work for relatively low engagement. Newsletters are relatively antiquated on Wikipedia—most sputter out and end up publishing sporadically. For less logistical work, posting quarterly stats to this talk page and an occasional write-up/interview would probably get more engagement and require less coordination. And then any mass message reminder to subscribers becomes a periodic reason to return to this talk page. Another option is to package "the newsletter" as a Signpost article, if of interest to a larger audience. czar 09:45, 1 December 2022 (UTC)
I honestly might consider making the newsletter a monthly thing with a summary of some of the important things that happened at the end of the year (meaning there would be 2 newsletters in December) since it would require a lot less work since the quarterly format means I need to find a lot more information since I have to include multiple months. ― Blaze WolfTalkBlaze Wolf#6545 16:10, 2 December 2022 (UTC)

VG chronology template

Hi everyone,

Did something happen to the chronology sidebar template? See Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty#Plot and Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater#Story. I remember it being in a neat little box, but I can't seem to find a diff when it was deleted and I don't know the exact name of the template. soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 21:41, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

@Soetermans An IP did it like, three days ago. [8]. I reverted. -- ferret (talk) 21:54, 20 November 2022 (UTC)
@Soetermans: It's {{Metal Gear chronology}} and was edited here by an IP who, I presume, just wanted to move Portable Ops to the note. ~~ lol1VNIO (I made a mistake? talk to me) 21:55, 20 November 2022 (UTC)
@Ferret and Lol1VNIO: thank you both for quickly replying and ferret for reverting. soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 22:08, 20 November 2022 (UTC)
Here's a weird thing: I was checking my recent edits and now I see that the chronology template doesn't show up on mobile view. The native desktop mobile view I mean, not the browser enforced version, if you catch my drift. soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 21:22, 3 December 2022 (UTC)

NBA 2K Mobile Citations

I've been working on a draft for NBA 2K Mobile, and I have a lot of good info on it since I do play the game itself. However, it's hard to find sources to find information on the topic. I was wondering if you guys would help me get citations for my info, no need to add more info. I would prefer if you kept all the info on the draft but if you need to remove some information because you couldn't find any citations for it, then that would also be alright. I greatly appreciate any help since I am pretty new here and am still getting the hang of Wikipedia. Here is the link to the draft in-case you want to help https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draft:NBA_2K_Mobile.MasterMatt12 (talk) 19:25, 3 December 2022 (UTC)

See WP:VG/S for advice on locating sources. I recommend adding information about the game's development and critical reception, as your draft only discusses in-game elements. TarkusABtalk/contrib 20:05, 3 December 2022 (UTC)
I am currently working on that right now and thanks for the help. MasterMatt12 (talk) 20:11, 3 December 2022 (UTC)
Do you think that just adding reception and sources to other info in the article would be enough to get it approved? MasterMatt12 (talk) 20:16, 3 December 2022 (UTC)
Hi @MasterMatt12:, quick note: the gameplay section is overly detailed and mostly unsourced and you're addressing the reader with 'you', see WP:YOU. Good luck with the draft. soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 21:05, 3 December 2022 (UTC)
Thanks, I'm trying to just get info and then find sources, and I'll work on the perspective. MasterMatt12 (talk) 22:27, 3 December 2022 (UTC)
Do you want me to remove info on the topics in gameplay, or the topics itself like endurance and rules? MasterMatt12 (talk) 22:38, 3 December 2022 (UTC)
You can describe the gameplay at a high level, but it should not read like a game guide. See NHL 17 for an example of a good sports game article. TarkusABtalk/contrib 23:54, 3 December 2022 (UTC)
Alright makes sense. MasterMatt12 (talk) 00:29, 4 December 2022 (UTC)
Yay my article got approved thanks guys!! MasterMatt12 (talk) 18:28, 4 December 2022 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:Atari Lynx games

 Template:Atari Lynx games has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the entry on the Templates for discussion page. oknazevad (talk) 03:17, 6 December 2022 (UTC)

You know, I really am confused by this nomination, there is nothing wrong with it. @Oknazevad: The Atari Lynx due to its limited amount of games is one of the few systems you can actually create a navbox for to link the games together. I feel your argument is somewhat floored. Govvy (talk) 11:03, 6 December 2022 (UTC)

New Articles (November 28 to December 4)

 A listing of all articles newly added to the Video Games Wikiproject (regardless of creation date). Generated by v3.15 of the RecentVGArticles script and posted by PresN. Bug reports and feature requests are appreciated. --PresN 19:37, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

November 28

November 29

November 30

December 1

  • None

December 2

December 3

December 4

PresN 19:37, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

Im not seeing anything related to W Wish on google. Should I AFD it? Pizzaplayer219TalkContribs 22:03, 5 December 2022 (UTC)
Nominated at AFD. Pizzaplayer219TalkContribs 22:21, 5 December 2022 (UTC)
I don't know, it's a Japanese-only release from just before the era where everything sourcing-wise would be online. I know nothing of it, but sometimes that sort of stuff has sourcing in Japanese and/or hard copy sources. There could be sourcing further out there. Sergecross73 msg me 22:22, 5 December 2022 (UTC)
I see you didn't wait long before nominating. Oh well. Guess we'll see what happens at AFD. Sergecross73 msg me 22:23, 5 December 2022 (UTC)
Looking at Google Books, Scholar, and especially News Archives, it doesn’t seem like there is any mention anywhere. Pizzaplayer219TalkContribs 22:28, 5 December 2022 (UTC)
Yeah, looks like the article creator has had a number of similar articles deleted in the past too, so there's definitely reason for concern. Sergecross73 msg me 22:50, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

Award show subpages

Didn't we delete a set of awards sub-articles a while back? Was it for DICE or some other award show? I'm not finding the discussion easily. Are these Template:DICE Awards a recreation of that? All created by a single user over the course of the past few months. Axem Titanium (talk) 02:24, 6 December 2022 (UTC)

I don't recall what awards it was, but yes, we definitely did. Sergecross73 msg me 02:27, 6 December 2022 (UTC)
Probably NAVGTR; there were ten individual award articles that were deleted alongside the main one. – Rhain (he/him) 03:18, 6 December 2022 (UTC)
That was 2020, though. Hmm, I remember a more recent one too but can't find it; the DICE awards pages were complained about back in March, but it was a small discussion; previous discussion in 2018. The AIAS awards were brought up in 2020 (with NAVGTR). I thought maybe it was the G.A.N.G. awards, but that was back in 2018. --PresN 03:28, 6 December 2022 (UTC)
It appears that they were complained about in March... by me! 😂 Shall we have a more thorough discussion about it now? To me, DICE is right on the edge for award shows that warrant an extensive tree of networked pages documenting every single award they give out. They're clearly less respected in the industry compared to the Game Developers Choice Awards, which notably only has one subpage for their GOTY. And they don't have the built-in credibility of the BAFTA Game Awards, which piggybacks off the BAFTAs to get mainstream press coverage. Axem Titanium (talk) 19:19, 6 December 2022 (UTC)

If it were up to me, I think we should pare back our coverage of all game awards, including BAFTA and DICE, to the level of the GDC awards, which only includes a short list of winners only for their most important awards on the main page and one subpage for GOTY. That feels like it matches the coverage more closely. Unlike, say, the Oscars, video game award shows don't generate a massive torrent of thinkpieces about historical trends, notable snubs, etc. every year. At most, you get one article about the nomination announcement and another one with the winners at the major game news sites. I think most people who visit these sites care more about site-specific awards for the sites they like, and the winners of the major industry awards are just an interesting curiosity. I don't think games are at the point where they warrant the massive trees that the Oscars get, based on the coverage. Axem Titanium (talk) 19:19, 6 December 2022 (UTC)

Could I get some help writing Draft:Choo-Choo Charles?

Hello, all. I've created a draft for a video game, which has sufficient sources, but it's currently a bit barebones. Could I get some help from people more experienced with writing video game articles to help improve it so it can be published as a page? Thanks, Di (they-them) (talk) 22:03, 6 December 2022 (UTC)

The article does look ready for article-space as-is; it's already looking very nice. More expansion would definitely be nice, of course. ~Maplestrip/Mable (chat) 14:51, 7 December 2022 (UTC)
I decided to boldly move the draft to mainspace as it seems like it meets WP:GNG. Pizzaplayer219TalkContribs 15:23, 7 December 2022 (UTC)
Hi @Di (they-them):, I agree with Maplestrip and Pizzaplayer219, it was already in good shape. I copy-edited it earlier today and moved the inspiration bit to the development section, besides that it was good to go. Great work. soetermans. ↑↑↓↓←→←→ B A TALK 15:31, 7 December 2022 (UTC)

Sources for Moria

Moria (1978 video game) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Does anyone know of reliable sources for the PLATO game Moria, especially when the game was published? The article title says 1978 but the first sentence says "around 1975". There are two sources supporting the 1975 date, but they were both added after the article was created in 2007. I'm concerned this is a case of circular sourcing/citogenesis. Woodroar (talk) 21:19, 3 December 2022 (UTC)

@Woodroar: "There are several other CRPGs written for PLATO between 1976 and 1979, such as Oubliette (1977), Moria (1978), Avatar (c. 1979), and Orthanc (1978). [...] The version of Moria was updated in some fashion in 1984, though the earliest copyright notice was 1978. The authors credited are Kevet Duncombe and Jim Battin..." {{cite book |title=Dungeons & Desktops: The History of Computer Role-Playing Games |edition=2nd |first1=Matt |last1=Barton |first2=Shane |last2=Stacks |publisher=[[CRC Press]] |date=2019 |isbn=978-1-138-57464-9 |pages=44–45}}. Note that while I have the 2nd edition book, the first edition came out in 2008 with the same language.
This doesn't contradict the statement in the article, though, that it was made starting in 1975 with a 1978 copyright notice. I really doubt that Wolf's 2012 book Before the Crash used dates from Wikipedia, though I suppose it could have been, and since dnd came out in 1975, they could have started on Moria that same year. I see on google books that History of Digital Games has it as 1975 as well as several other less-historical titles; they may just be pulling from Wolf's books. The Friendly Orange Glow: The Untold Story of the Rise of Cyberculture mentions it being created in 1976 (p. 288) - it goes on for several pages talking about it, but google books only has snippet previews. That said, it appears to have been based on a 1997 interview with Duncombe, which makes me wonder where the 1975 date came from. --PresN 21:59, 3 December 2022 (UTC)
The claim that a version of the game existed in 1975 seems to be a thing that comes from Duncombe, when asked in 2016 for this Norwegian article he claims that a version was created in "1975 or 1976" that didn't have the 3d graphics or multiplayer componetns, however he doesn't state if this version was even published so this is far from a good source. Another time in 2007 he said that the 2D version was a prototype before it was turned into a full game, implying it was never realised. I feel like his vague wording is what originated the claim that the game was created in 1975.
https://spillhistorie.no/kevet-duncombe-on-moria/
https://web.archive.org/web/20171120234946/http://www.armchairarcade.com/neo/node/1396 FopCrow (talk) 22:22, 3 December 2022 (UTC)
Well, that spillhistorie post is from 2016, so not where Wolf and Barton got it, but it seems likely that Duncombe has previously said "1975", "1976", and "1975 or 1976". I'm not finding anything more than this; absent any physical evidence (I couldn't find anything in the PLATO Notes archive, but I didn't look too hard), I don't think we can determine which year is correct. I'd say in the article that development began in 1975 or 1976, initially as a 2D game before being rewritten as a first-person wireframe 3D game. A copyright notice was added beginning in 1978, and an update was made in 1984. I'd also move the article to "Moria (1975 video game)" (trying to shove both in is bad, and 1978 is definitely wrong- "done" or not in 1978, it was publicly available before then). --PresN 22:54, 3 December 2022 (UTC)
I did a search on Newspapers.com but there is nothing there. Timur9008 (talk) 18:46, 4 December 2022 (UTC)
Proceedings of the IEEE dating PLATO's Moria in 1978, which is based on this Armchair Arcade article, but that says development started in 1975. Still looking for something more definitive. --Masem (t) 18:57, 4 December 2022 (UTC)
Before the Crash from Mark Wolf has it 1975. Masem (t) 19:02, 4 December 2022 (UTC)
History of Digital Games also has it in 1975. Masem (t) 19:04, 4 December 2022 (UTC)

@PresN, FopCrow, Timur9008, and Masem: thanks for the sources, everyone! It looks like PresN fixed the article, moving it to Moria (1975 video game) and adding some nuance with the dates. Cheers! Woodroar (talk) 23:33, 5 December 2022 (UTC)

A suggestion on the current approach is to add an efn footnote to explain why the 1975 or 1976 date is vague or uncertain. There's also probably better wording on that sentence eg "Development began around 1975-76" and with the footnote, its a stronger statement. Masem (t) 23:38, 5 December 2022 (UTC)
Good idea, added. --PresN 04:42, 8 December 2022 (UTC)

Staff question

Hey. This is a question that cropped up as I'm planning on doing expansion/tidying work on Final Fantasy XVI. The infobox currently mentions both Hiroshi Takai and Kazutoyo Maehiro as directors, but from what I understand Maehiro is "creative director" while Takai is the "director" director. Does a "creative director" count as the co-director for an entire game in this instance? My gut instinct was to pose the question before many any edits or starting my sandbox revisions. I don't want an edit war to start over an infobox credit. I've noticed the term "creative director" thrown around a lot with several SQEX games, but this is also possibly a larger question depending how many other games this question may cover. ProtoDrake (talk) 20:11, 9 December 2022 (UTC)

This is a prime candidate for a "case-by-case" analysis. My understanding, based on far too much familiarity with Square Enix Creative Business Unit 3, is that Maehiro's "creative director" title is akin to a co-director title and he should be listed as such. Yes, this does go against the guidelines I helped develop at Template:Infobox_video_game#Full_syntax, but I think this is the exception that proves the rule. But if people are against it, his status as main writer captures his contribution well too. Axem Titanium (talk) 22:39, 9 December 2022 (UTC)
Both can be listed in the infobox, with the body explaining this difference. Masem (t) 00:55, 10 December 2022 (UTC)