Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Video games/Archive 2

This is an archive of past discussions on Wikipedia:WikiProject Video games. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Archive 5

News section?

Per Wikipedia:WikiProject best practices, I suggest we add a News section to the main project page. How does everyone feel about this? Our first item could be announcing we decided on standard infoboxes. :-) — Frecklefoot | Talk 16:50, Aug 11, 2004 (UTC)

I thought this project used {{Gamebox}}, ie: Template:Gamebox.? —John | Talk 22:18, Aug 11, 2004 (UTC)

Joining

Well, I was redirected here after asking about a gamebox. Since I'm jumping on the train already moving, I'm a bit clueless. For Instance, I was planning on writting Articles on button mashing, Olympic Videogames and on several games falling on those categories: Olympic Gold, Winter Olympics, Olympic Summer Games, Sydney 2000, Salt Lake 2002, The Games: Winter Challenge, The Games: Summer Challenge, etc. Is there any particular guidelines to do this, such as the gamebox ?

Lastly, where's the dotted line to sign in ? WolfenSilva 19:21, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Sign here. :-)

We've been having some debate about infoboxes for articles. I think the conclusion we reached is, you can use any infobox you like (or none at all). Some participants indicated they liked this infobox for game released on several platforms (with additional boxes in a "Platforms" section) and Template 7a for game released on just one platform. But it's really up to you. You can browse some infoboxes we played with in the past, but the two mentioned are the most refined. I'm thinking about adding a "Game designer" line to the box, but other than that, I think they're complete. Some seblence of these infoboxes will be posted on the main project page eventually.

Also, if you're interested in arcade games, there is a Wikipedia:WikiProject Arcade Games you can also join. Welcome aboard! :-) — Frecklefoot | Talk 19:35, Sep 1, 2004 (UTC)

Welcome! Frecklefoot said it all. If you are interested in Sydney 2000 and Winter Olympics, that's a different subject. Check out Wikipedia Project: Sports Olympics for those. Or are you talking about videogames with those same titles as the events? —John | Talk 21:30, Sep 1, 2004 (UTC)

The videogames. I have a soft (very soft, indeed) for button mashers and all kinds of multi-event sports games. Olympic Gold, in particular, was the game I spent more time playing in the last weeks. ŵŞ 21:59, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)

John, how come you haven't signed in as a participant? :-) — Frecklefoot | Talk 21:37, Sep 1, 2004 (UTC)

Just wanted to quickly say "hi" to the C&VG Wiki Project crew. I'm a relative newbie to the world of Wiki, but I'm already hopelessly addicted. Check out my user page for links to some of the articles I've already contributed. Comments and suggestions would be most helpful. I'm just about to start writing up individual entries for all of the Magnetic Scrolls adventure games, having just written the main article about hte company. Feel free to expand my [[Mercenary (computer game)|Mercenary) article too! --Sonance 08:26, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)

First infobox

well, added my first gamebox, for Grim Fandango. Any comments ? ŵŞ 22:07, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I really like the additions you made to the infobox. I also like the screenshot you added to the bottom since the length of the article doesn't allow for it elsewhere. I made just a couple of tweaks (added a link to game designer, added ESRB rating and added to the article proper). — Frecklefoot | Talk 15:41, Sep 6, 2004 (UTC)

IMHO the screenshot is as part of the information as the box cover. I don't think the screenshots are to show how good/bad the game is, they are part of the actual information, and since most of the times there is only one, why not squeeze it inside the box? I think it worked great for the few times I've used it, it doesn't mean it will work like that all the times. ŵŞ 11:32, 11 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Video game music

While video game music is a great article, List of video game music is a cluttered mess. See User talk:ShaunMacPherson for a proposed solution on how to reorganize soundtrack listings by company and game, rather than alphabetical.

 Ihavenolife 01:20, 15 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Standardisation of Videogame region terminology

It's frequently useful to talk about game releases and differences between them. However, I think we could do with standardising the region terminology. Should we refer to "North American", "Japanese", and "European" regions, or "NTSC-US", "NTSC-J", and "PAL"? The problem I have with the former is that it kind of glosses over releases for most of Asia, the Middle East, Africa, Oceania and South America.

--Sockatume 15:09, 22 Sep 2004 (UTC)

The problem with the latter, however, is that most people have no idea what the acronyms mean. As long as we include wikilinks to definitions of the terms, though, it should be fine. :-) — Frecklefoot | Talk 15:12, Sep 22, 2004 (UTC)

I've created: PAL Region, NTSC-US, and NTSC-J Sockatume 03:46, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Bit-count/eras

Suggest that "bit" counts for platforms be limited to naming which era (e.g. 32-bit era) a platform belongs to. Anything else is too vague or controvertial (see: Atari Jaguar) for use.

--Sockatume 03:27, 24 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Eras suggestions: STANDARDISATION

Which generations should the Sony PSP and Nintendo DS be assigned to, the 128-bit era or the seventh generation era? The format so far seems to be that any machine which is manufactured during an era is part of that era, so it seems likely that they'd fit into both to me. Also, should we standardise eras by numerical names? At the moment it's the "Pong Era", "Atari Era", "Nintendo Era", "16-bit Era", "32-bit era", "128-bit era".

Addenum: eras are a bit of a mess right now IMO. Should we standardise that any machine launched or continuing to be available for sale during an era is considered part of that era? That'd put the PlayStation Portable, Nintendo DS, Tapwave Zodiac, and Gizmondo in the 128-bit era, and most likely they will continue into the seventh generation era, although that's not certain yet.

Sockatume 23:41, 27 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I'd rather avoid giving bit classification to portables or comparing them directly to home consoles. It's always a bit of an grey area, since (for instance) the GBA might be considered a 32 bit console, but it's far more close to the sNES than with the PS2, altough both were released at about the same time (ok, the GBA is two years older, but you got my point). So, IMHO, portables should take no more than a footnote in each era. \ wolfenSilva / 16:23, 2 Oct 2004 (UTC)

That sells handheld consoles somewhat short, though. I reckon a switch to a "<number> generation era" standard would make it easier to group handhelds in with the systems they're launched beside (GBA and GC in the same era, PSP and PS2 in the same era, GB and NES in same era). I just don't see the point in compromising things because we've historically groups consoles according to a strange measure of power. Sockatume 17:01, 2 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Not to mention the issue of POV. C'mon, Nintendo era? Atari era? ~ FriedMilk 21:05, Oct 4, 2004 (UTC)

The 8-bit and 16-bit eras are a lot more self-contained and easier to refer to, probably because the overlap was minimal and they're effectively both history (emulation/retro-gaming aside). In many of my articles I find that referring to these two eras by name conveys things easily without too much hassle. While there's some difference, at least in the terms of gameplay evolution, between 8-bit/16-bit consoles and 8-bit/16-bit computers, it's usually obvious from the context which they're referring too.

We start getting into a grey area with the 32-bit era. Whereas 8-bit and 16-bit refer to some pretty specific epochs that are defined by the types of games that emerged from those respective eras, it's no so straightforward when we get to the 32-bit machines. I like to think of the Sega Saturn, Sony PlayStation and Nintendo 64 as all being part of the same era, yet the first two are 32-bit consoles and the latter is 64-bit. Likewise the GBA, while technically 32-bit, clearly belongs in some sort of "handheld" era, but is unlikely (historically) to be comparable with the Nintendo DS and Sony PSP.

In short, the whole notion of assigning bits to eras gets a bit too complicated once we step beyond the 16-bit era. Assigning generations is a bit problematic too, as there's never been a standard consensus of how many generations there are and which one a particular console/computer belongs to. The term "next generation" is usually referred to either the current generation of consoles at the start of their cycle, or the next batch of consoles towards the end of the current cycle. Ie, whereas a few years ago the PS2 was considered "next generation", that term's probably more fitting for the PS3 at the moment.

What a headspinner! At the end of the day, I think it's just best to use the most concise, unambiguous term possible in our articles. --Sonance 08:41, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)

IMO, the whole "bit era" stuff ended at 16-bit, after that I'd call them # Generation. If you think about it, the XBox is actually a 32-bit system, GameCube 64-bit, N64 64-bit etc etc etc. Too much grey. It gets worse when you bring in portables and you try to stick them in a generation/era. IMO I'd keep those seperate from video game consoles. K1Bond007 18:22, Nov 12, 2004 (UTC)

That's not true about the XBox and GameCube, but I agree that it's confusing with all the "bits" and that it really ended at the 16-bit era. Andre (talk) 22:41, Nov 12, 2004 (UTC)

What about the XBox makes it 128-bit? Usually when we refer to era in bits we refer to the processor -- it's always been this way. The NES was 8-bit, the SNES was 16-bit, the PS1 was 32-bit. The Xbox processor is a Pentium which as we all know is 32-bit. The only true 128-bit platform in this so called "128-bit generation" is the PlayStation 2. GameCube uses a 64-bit processor and so did Dreamcast. K1Bond007 23:16, Nov 12, 2004 (UTC)

Yes, Andre. It's true that the Xbox is 32 bit. And the fact is, I don't think it's a good idea to use bit numbers beyond the 8 bit eras and 16 bit eras. The fact is, bit numbers are very insignificant as far as the capabilities of the system, and given history, not very signficant in relation to the era/timing/historical placement of it. So I would definitely suggest that the 8 bit and 16 bit eras be used, but the rest be named otherwise. Since we're going by eras as historical timeperiods, handhelds therefore do belong in that class although traditionally they (like PC gaming) have been more seperate, so it might be appropriate to keep it equally seperate? D G 03:27, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Right, after some funky editing which messed some things up a bit, I reckon it's high time that we standardised this once and for all. I call for a nomination of standards and a vote for which should be used. Sockatume 18:58, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I really think the best solution would be to name these articles something like the following:

We could use terms like "X era" inside the parentheses where such a term is neutral and accurate, and years (given as an approximate range) elsewhere. Or years for all articles. Thoughts? - Fredrik | talk 19:11, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Sounds reasonable to use years for all articles. More... standard. How about:

with the former as a redirect, and the article opening "The history of videogames from (1995-2000), also known as the 32-bit era, was blah blah blah"?

Also, I reckon it'd be wise to pull out the "notes on era naming" from each era and have that as a single, seperate article to reduce redundancy (including a link, say "Note that the 'bit number' naming may be misleading; see notes on videogame era naming"). Sockatume 19:20, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

"Note on ..." articles aren't a good idea. However, a separate article on the use (outside of Wikipedia) of bit values to refer to eras, covering the problems with this convention, might be. Also, I'd prefer to open with something like:

In the history of video games, the period between approximately 1989 and 1995, often referred to as the 16-bit era, was blah blah blah...

-Fredrik | talk 19:32, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. Now we need to get some other folk involved. Might be a good idea to sort out a standard infobox while we're at it. Sockatume 19:41, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Computer and Video Games Collaboration of the week?

There have been a lot of new Collaborations of the week popping up for specific subjects (such as Magic Collaboration of the Week--see the bottom of Collaboration of the week) so I was thinking that it would be a great idea for someone to start up a Computer and Video Games Collaboration of the week. Anyone interested? --pie4all88 19:38, 3 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I think it's a great idea, and I'll be glad to help in all extent possible. \ wolfenSilva / 06:23, 4 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I'm all for it. Fredrik | talk 14:01, 4 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Ok, glad some people are interested in it. I guess I'll make a new page for it on Wikipedia:Gaming Collaboration of the week and announce it on some collaboration pages. So stop on by--many of Wikipedia's articles on video games are stubs at best, so they can be really improven. --pie4all88 20:32, 4 Oct 2004 (UTC)

All right, the page is up now at Wikipedia:Gaming Collaboration of the week. Please check it out, edit what's written there (there's probably a mistake hidden in there somewhere), and spread the word of its existence. Let's continue this discussion on GCOTW's talk page. I look forward to collaborating with all of you to make a better Wikipedia! --pie4all88 21:50, 4 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Lists of stats

Before I go making any changes I'd like to discuss "lists of stats" articles (which the guidelines say are more appropriate for WikiBooks). I've been looking at a few articles that might be considered lists of stats and want some opinions (in descending order of statsishness):

What is the consensus on lists of stats?

I believe that lists of stats are bad because they assume the reader is already quite familiar with a topic. In my experience, I've found that readers (but not editors) are mostly not knowledgeable of the subject, typically having followed a link from a news site to bring themselves up-to-speed. I also think that a list of stats article is similar to the recipe articles that have been moved to WikiBooks. --Mrwojo 19:08, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Super Famicom/Super NES and Famicom/NES

I find the use of both in each case to be somewhat frustrating, as they are effectively the same systems. Can we decide on one to use in infoboxes and so on? Andre (talk) 21:08, Oct 26, 2004 (UTC)

Now that I think about it, the articles are awfully similar and probably ought to be merged under one title. Andre (talk) 21:12, Oct 26, 2004 (UTC)

Yes, they should be merged. Fredrik | talk 19:55, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

New articles

I just thought it might be of interest to members of this project, I recently wrote an article on serious games and on game programming (not be confused with game programmer, which I also wrote). Check them out if you like. :-) — Frecklefoot | Talk 19:30, Oct 29, 2004 (UTC)

Great articles, especially game programming. I ran a spellcheck on them and added a paragraph on embedded languages to game programming. --Mrwojo 14:23, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Thanks—I'm glad you liked them. Thanks also for the addition (I knew I had missed something). :-) — Frecklefoot | Talk 15:39, Nov 3, 2004 (UTC)

Great articles, thanks! I contributed a little while reading. D G 03:57, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Infoboxes art and release date: country of origin or american releases?

I am a bit troubled about the current usage of infoboxes on console video games.

With computer vide ogames, over 90 % video games featured in the English wikipedia are programmed by US companies, and so they are released first in USA. It is safe to assume their infoboxes contain the cover art and release date of the US versions.

On the other hand with console vido games (SNES, PS1, PS2, etc), I would guess that 70 % (more or less) of such games are Japanese programmed games, and the rest, American programmed games. So, the issue arises with cover art and release date of Japanese games. For example in Pikmin, the cover and date refer to the american versions, but it was released two months earlier in Japan (see dates here [1]).

The option I favour would be adding three fields: "country of origin" "release date in country of origin" and "american release date"; and make a consistent decission regarding cover art.

Another possibility would be arriving at a consensus regarding if infoboxes should cover release on the country of origin or american releases of the game.

Be the taken choice either of the two, I think this should be notes on infoboxes too, to avoid confussion. --xDCDx 18:47, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

So let's vote:

Add three fields for infoboxes: "country of origin", "release date in country of origin" and "american release date". Cover art from the country of origin.

--xDCDx 18:47, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Add three fields for infoboxes: "country of origin", "release date in country of origin" and "american release date". Cover art from the american release.

Leave infoboxes as they are now and provide art and release date for the country of origin.

Leave infoboxes as they are now and provide art and release date for the american release.

Leave infoboxes as they are now and provide box art for the American/English version, release date for country of origin

Andre (talk) 19:19, Nov 7, 2004 (UTC) - This is the English Wikipedia, so we should have English language box art. However, release date should be the first date of the game's release.

Discussion

Comment: It's more customary to discuss and attempt to reach consensus first. Iff this fails, then vote.

Here are my thoughts on the points raised:

On "country of origin" in infobox: I don't think it's too important, especially if you link the developer.
On "release date": I agree — it should say the first release date.
- Perhaps for clarity we could optionally include the distribution area in parentheses like January 3, 1997 (Japan) or March 1, 1999 (worldwide), etc.
- An extra cell for the American release date is a bad idea. Something like "English language release date" would be better (if applicable).
On box art: This is the English Wikipedia so we should use the English language version.

--Mrwojo 22:05, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

No offense, but only two questions should be asked, "original or ocidental artwork" and "original or ocidental release date", as it is now, it just looks a big mess with all the subsections, mostly with no votes at all. Anyway, my vote is on keeping the ocidental release dates on gamebox, then add a "japanese release" section in the middle of the article with both artwork, release date and other tidbits of information to fill in a bit. However, may I also remind you that this is the MAIN wikipedia, not united states, united kingdom or what else. \ wolfenSilva / 21:56, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Indeed, but the box art should be in English, because this IS en. Andre (talk) 22:25, Nov 9, 2004 (UTC)

The UK/Europe boxart is usually different from the US stuff though. Frequently it's the Japanese boxart; google for Final Fantasy 8 and MGS: The Twin Snakes' ]]box art for some examples. I say, we have "Release Date (NTSC-J, NTSC-US, PAL)" on the left side, and the release dates in order on the right (regions ordered by release date too).

Alternatively, just put the first release date in the infobox, and give a full list of release dates at the start of the article; for example Metroid Prime 2: Echoes. Sockatume 19:02, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Softography/lists of games

What's the best approach to formatting a list of games from one specific company? And what should we call that list? On a number of pages I've created recently, I've christened the list as a "softography":

In the former list, the legend is specified in the format: "title (year, publisher)", whereas in the latter it's "title (year, platforms)". I guess it doesn't make much difference if the context of both lists is easily understood, but I wondered if there was any inclination towards any particular style of formatting for these sorts of lists. --Sonance 22:43, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

"Gameography" is my favorite even though it looks in need of a hyphen. The current form that seems most popular is simply "title (year)". Perhaps we could avoid the question of advanced list formatting to an extent by including just the year and wiki-linking every game. --Mrwojo 00:04, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

"Softography" is the "official" term, at least I've used it before (in Sensible Software, I think). Then, about the lists, it depends on the context. \ wolfenSilva / 01:23, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I like gameography, sans hyphen. Softography seems like it's for computer software specifically. Andre (talk) 02:07, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)

Console software is software too! Howeve, Softography sounds like a contraction of softcore pornography.

Are you including the Leisure Suit Larry games?

D G 04:13, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Forwarding cleanup articles to you all?

I'm working on cleaning out WP:LO(Leftovers) and you all seem to have a to-do box with a list of articles to be expanded. I'm wondering if it would be good and useful for me to copy the items on Computer and Video Games from Leftovers and add them to your list? Yes, no? JesseW 07:51, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Go for it. Andre (talk) 12:19, Nov 15, 2004 (UTC)

Ok. I did. I only found one, though. (Thought there were more...) JesseW 05:55, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Infobox design

I think the infobox design at Total Annihilation looks pretty good. Maybe that could be used instead of the current design.. (I'm just talking about the design, not the content.) What do you think? --Conti|✉ 16:20, Nov 23, 2004 (UTC)

I prefer the one we have now. Andre (talk) 18:18, Nov 23, 2004 (UTC)

That's two for the current, now. \ wolfenSilva / 13:01, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Categories by year

Should all years of a game being released be listed for a category? Example: If a game is developed in 2003 for GameCube and later in 2004 the exact same game is released for PlayStation 2, should there only be a 2003 computer and video game category at the bottom OR should it have both 2003 and 2004? K1Bond007 23:05, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)

I say both. Andre (talk) 23:06, Nov 30, 2004 (UTC)

Mod vs. modification and other naming

Couple of naming issues I want to bring up:

Modification vs. mod article title (see Talk:Modification)
If disambiguating something about games or gaming, should it be "X (games)" or "X (gaming)" (ignoring video/computer issue)? (See Category:Computer and video game terminology for example.)
Category:Role-playing computer games is growing, but should be Category:Computer role-playing games. Anyone want to help migrate?

--Mrwojo 23:21, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Modification/mod resolved, article was moved to mod (computer gaming). Category:Role-playing computer games listed on Wikipedia:Categories for deletion to get it renamed. --Mrwojo 04:03, 24 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Terminology category

Since Wikipedia is not a dictionary, Category:Computer and video game terminology should only include articles that are actually about terminology, not articles about things which have names that are part of c&vg terminology. This category appears to function mostly as a category dump for random c&vg-related articles. Fredrik | talk 23:36, 7 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I agree. Other topics use a singularly-named higher level category to separate X-related things from Xs (such as Category:Opera and Category:Operas). We can do something similar by placing JAMMA, Category:Video game characters, etc. under a Category:Computer and video gaming topic. --Mrwojo 21:39, 13 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject computers

I was wondering if anyone would like to participate? Right now we've just started off. Also, if it gets off the ground, I was wondering if we could become the superproject of your own? Only to show hierachy, of course, certainly we wouldn't get in your way! If there are objections that's OK. - Ta bu shi da yu 14:09, 17 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Moved from WikiProject Video games talk

I am open to suggestions for revisions to this project manifesto. The infobox could probably use a few more categories, too. If you have any suggestions relating to this project, please let me know here. -- Grunt 18:37, 2004 Jun 15 (UTC)

I have manuals for several games, but hardly any boxes. I am not sure how/if to include them in the infobox. See X-COM: UFO Defense, where I put an image of the cover a bit down the article. --Yath 07:50, 25 Jun 2004 (UTC)

This seems very similar to Wikipedia:WikiProject Computer and Video Games... pie4all88 20:49, 18 Oct 2004 (UTC)

That infobox has already too much information that should be placed on the article itself. Full Title, Other titles, Producer and recomended specs are of no use in a table that should give only a basic introduction of the game. Also remember that not all articles can be developed as deep as X-Com can be, I've had trouble finding enough information to make the body text larger than the box a few times. \ wolfenSilva / 11:06, 19 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Assistance in Computer and video games

I'd like to ask for assistance in bringing this set of articles up to a better standard.

Please see the following if you are interested:

--Slike 11:53, 24 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Save Bomberman II

Vote to keep! Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Bomberman II. Andre (talk) 21:24, Jan 1, 2005 (UTC)

Or vote to delete. (It's up to you).— Slike | Talk | 05:24, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I'm assuming that the frequenters of this talk page are knowledgeable about video games and are aware that Bomberman II is at least notable enough for its own article. Andre (talk) 18:16, Jan 2, 2005 (UTC)

Of course, but some people may disagree, as this is all about preferance. I don't mean to be disagreeable, just making it as easy to disagree as it is to agree :) — Slike | Talk | 21:59, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC)