The Wiki Discussion Thread

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bhurnie

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@mento:

2 - what about discontinued MMOs or games that don't exist (cancelled, not released) that still have a page? Pedantry I suppose, these aren't rules, and there's not many of them anyway.

8/9 - not an issue for me either way, but is that a preference or wiki limitation?

15 - (again, not something that will affect me) excuse my naivety, but do you mean scans of instruction manuals or scans of game items that people here have manually done?

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Mento

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#52 Mento  Moderator

@bdhurkett:

2: For defunct MMOs, I'd say use the present sense when talking about the game itself (mechanics, setting, story (if any)), and past tense when describing its online features, like scheduled events or user communication. I'd definitely need a MMO expert to chime in on this, since I never touch the things. I'm not even sure how many let you keep playing offline after the servers have gone down.

8/9. Site preference for the most part. It's possible to write titles with accented characters, but until recently it was never certain if the search engine could read them reliably. It definitely can now ("Pokémon" would show up whether you searched for "pokemon" or "pokémon"), but these days we tend to err on the side of consistency. (Release titles are expected to follow suit for consistency as well.) Macrons, which are elongated vowels often found in romaji, are better expressed as two letters (like "oo" or "ou" for "ō"). We do have an exception I forgot to mention: If a title is spelled out with an accented character on the official box art, we accept it. So that includes Ōkami, the aforementioned Pokémon and a handful of others.

15. Scans of instruction manuals. It's considered copyrighted material. Official box art is exempt for reasons I forget (it's a necessary exemption for promotional purposes? I'm useless with copyright laws).

But yeah, nothing about this guide is final yet. At the moment it's just a list of stuff I've picked up while working on the wiki over the years, from seeing what others have done and talking out stylistic quandaries with senior editors. There's a ton of pages old and new that don't conform to many or all of these "unwritten rules" because they have remained exactly that for so long.

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Valhallen

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I'm looking to start helping with the Wiki and I can't believe I never found this thread. Any tips on where to start? I don't want to make a bad first impression. I've uploaded a picture of Yoshi and that's pretty much it :P

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BeachThunder

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@agent_york: Welcome to the wonderful world of wiki editing :D

I recommend starting by adding associations to game pages (characters, concepts, objects, locations). There are listed on the right side of a page. For example, if you know a game has a couch in it, then you can add that to the 'objects' section. Make sure you only add stuff that you're certain of though.

Keep in mind that you're new to the wiki, so that means your edits will not show up immediately. They need to be approved by a mod, which could take a while.

You should be fine if you have a look at the first post of this thread under "Things to keep in mind when editing the wiki" and this post by Mento.

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Valhallen

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@beachthunder: Thanks for the advice! I've submitted quite a few associations with objects for the most part. Waiting very excitedly(and a bit nervously) for them to be either denied or approved!

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BeachThunder

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I feel compelled to share this absolute...gem of a sentence that I found while editing the Soulcalibur page:

Seen by many of its fans as one of the greatest fighting games of all time, it is clear to see why this game has found a fond place in fans hearts and continues to be loved today with newer installments of the series.

...

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BlackLagoon

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tommytoad

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How long does an edit take to be verified?

I've made some changes to http://www.giantbomb.com/fatshark-ab/3010-6781/ yesterday but they have still not shown up

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bobafettjm

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@tommytoad: They have to be manually approved by a moderator, so whenever there is one of them checking the queue.

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BeachThunder

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#60  Edited By BeachThunder

So, Jeff suggested (on the most recent Unprofessional Fridays) making a concept about games mentioned in rap songs. I think it would make sense if it were generalised any kind of music, because there are a heap of songs with game references out there.

I suppose one problem with music though is that literally anyone can make a song. Although, I guess the same can probably be said for games too...

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Slag

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@beachthunder: maybe limit to songs published by a label?

The wiki has a cutoff with games I think when it comes browser based ones, so it probably makes sense to have some sort of line in the sand.

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BeachThunder

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@slag said:

@beachthunder: maybe limit to songs published by a label?

The wiki has a cutoff with games I think when it comes browser based ones, so it probably makes sense to have some sort of line in the sand.

Yeah, that seems fair. There's also the problem of how specific a reference needs to be. For example, it's spelled differently, but it's implied that Horse the Band's song, "Cutsman" refers to Cut Man from Mega Man 1. However, Cut Man also makes an appearance in a bunch of other games. Off the top of my head, the most unambiguous game reference I can think of is Bad Religion - Frogger.

While we're at it, I suppose we could also think about games referenced in movies...

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bobafettjm

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#63  Edited By bobafettjm

@beachthunder: I had actually thought of that for non-gaming TV shows before, but figured it would be something that would never come to be.

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BeachThunder

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@bobafettjm: Well, we have a bunch of concepts that relate to video games referencing other media, so I suppose the other way around makes sense too.

Seeing as Silent Hills is no more, now would be a good time to reconsider PT having its own wiki article. I'd say that it only makes sense given that PT's moved from just being a teaser for another game to essentially being its own standalone thing. It would also be helpful for associating the correct game to lists, blogs, threads, etc... rather than having to link to a game that will never exist when they actually mean to refer to PT.

One other solution is renaming the Silent Hills article to PT and using Silent Hills as an alias. I'm not sure if there are any issues that would arise from doing that though.

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bobafettjm

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#65  Edited By bobafettjm

Alright since I decided to put off my weekly wiki updates due to lack of time every week I will post this here. I made a concept page for In-Game Social Network Links for games that link you to things like their Facebook or Twitter profiles. This is for merely links that send you to those pages and not ones that have integration.

I know there are a ton because I remember seeing them all the time, but now that I made the page I am having a hard time. So if anyone else knows of any hit up the page and add them.

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lighthaze

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So, I have no idea if this is the right thrad, but I was just trying to build a list and for whatever reason I cannot add "Prince of Persia" (the 1989 one) to the list. It's there in the Wiki, other people have it in their list, but if I search for it, it does not come up. Anybody have an idea?

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fisk0

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#67  Edited By fisk0  Moderator

Is there any kind of general policy of what should be put in the publisher field for games when it comes to stuff that has seen plenty of (budget) re-releases? I'm kinda fond of Abime/Amiga Hall of Light's way of handling it, where they have separate fields for Publisher and Budget Publisher, as well as geographical grouping of both, as can be seen here: http://hol.abime.net/712

But since there's currently only a single publisher field for the main site (you can of course go more specific with the releases), should one put all publishers of the game in the field on the front page, or just the original or US publisher(s)?

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fisk0

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#68  Edited By fisk0  Moderator

@beachthunder said:

Also, does anyone have any more examples of horseshoe level design? The page seems to stem from this Gamasutra article.

I'm not exactly sure where to draw the line here, but Descent 1 used it a lot, I think. There's the odd example of a 3D horseshoe seen from the bottom of the U looking up at two exits in Descent's first mission which I'm not sure if it counts.

I seem to recall it being used in the starting (Medical?) area of System Shock 1 too, but maybe not so much later in the game.

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bobafettjm

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@fisk0: I am all for listing all of the publishers that indeed publish the game. I generally will then try and explain in the overview which company published it in which region/platform or if it was for another release.

@lighthaze:It does not seem to be coming up in search for me either. Maybe try submitting it to the Bug Reporting forum?

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Mento

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#70 Mento  Moderator

@lighthaze: The original Prince of Persia's right here. The search engine's being finicky right now and lists it without an image and as being released in 2012.

@fisk0: What Bobafettjm said. I try to elaborate on which release has which publisher in the overview if there's a number of them. We're going to need a better way to indicate reprintings and budget stuff in the Releases tab.

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fisk0

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#71 fisk0  Moderator

Oh, what's the current stance on including the digital distribution platform in release titles these days? I couple of years ago the recommendation seemed to be to title a Steam release "Game title (Steam)" in cases where the game was released on both GOG and Steam with slightly different release dates (example), but recently I've seen that releases I've submitted with that format have been edited down to the game's title only.

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Mento

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#72 Mento  Moderator

@fisk0: From upstairs: We're currently sticking with the first time the completed (or "version 1.0") version of the game is available for sale as the official PC release date, irrespective of whether it hit Steam, Desura, GOG, or somewhere else first. So with that in mind, we're not including multiple digital release dates or recording those that came later.

The exception would be rereleases if they came a lot later, had different names and/or included extras, like a GOTY Edition. I'm less sure about the criteria for those, but having a different name and new content is usually grounds for a new release.

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fisk0

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#73  Edited By fisk0  Moderator

How do we handle pen names/pseudonyms that are actually multiple people? For example, there's Alexander Zorich, which is two writers - Yana Botsman and Dmitry Gordevsky, credited just as Alexander Zorich in several Russian games (The Tomorrow War, Men of War etc.). Should I just create the one person entry for that name and mention it's two people in the wiki text, or create two separate pages with their real names (which I don't think they've ever been credited under) and request the Alexander Zorich alias to be used for both?

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Yummylee

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#74  Edited By Yummylee

@fisk0: Separate pages, most definitely.

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aquacadet

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Hello wiki editors. I've decided to jump right in and start actually contributing to the site I love. My goal is to have at least 365 updates by next year.

I had a quick question regarding abandon-ware. I'm sure it's covered somewhere, but a quick glance at FAQs and rules didn't lead me anywhere. Are GB game wiki pages allowed to link off to sites that host downloads for abandon-ware? I was updating the Big Rig page and I found a site that had a ton of info and a download link for it. I assume the powers that be don't want those kind of links so I didn't include it on the wiki page.

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bobafettjm

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@aquacadet: First off, welcome to the wiki editing world, we can always use more.

Secondly, my immediate reaction would be to say no, we probably should not link to downloads of "abandonware" unless maybe the publisher of the game officially put it on their own site to download.

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Slag

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This thread seems to be doing its job of centralizing general wiki talk, any chance for it getting a sticky?

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BeachThunder

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Sigh, this is the kind of thing that just makes me want to give up on the wiki. I love the wiki, but sometimes it seems that people just expect someone to come in after them and clean things up. I'm starting to feel like I just can't bother anymore :(

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F-Metroid

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#79  Edited By F-Metroid

I love editing. I always seem to enjoy it more than I should. I suppose it makes me feel intelligent.

I just added and edited the full page for 2004 Thunderbirds (GBA), you know, the mediocre game about the hated 2004 film from Universal? Universal, that makes sense that Vivendi Universal was the developer.

The game's not as bad as the movie is hated. The game's OK. Some good level design, some bad design. I've been a Thunderbirds fan for 11 years now, so I still find myself playing it, even though I'd give it 2.5 stars. Thankfully I found YT vids that allowed me to provide sources for the gameplay.

On a personal level, I didn't rate the film for being kind of a poor representation of the show. I though the redesigns for the vehicles were great, and Bill Paxton was a perfect choice for Jeff. Bill's a personal favorite. And I can get passed the "it's a kid's movie, so let's make it about kids" aspect. But Ben Kingsley didn't show his real talent when he could've played an awesome Hood, the minions were stupid, and Bill Paxton stole all the scenes he was in. Plus, the Hood stuck to a generic bad-guy plan. For a movie, the plan should've been more complex. And the movie focused more on the island than the machines, which were hardly an element.

I give both the film and the game 5/10.

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bobafettjm

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@f-metroid: Thanks for all the hard work on that page! Always nice to see someone else doing some wiki editing.

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BeachThunder

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#83  Edited By BeachThunder

Do we need to consider 'clickers' as a new genre? There seems to be an insane amount of them now:

  • Cookie Clicker
  • Sakura Clicker
  • Adventure Capitalist
  • Clicker Heroes
  • Tap Heroes
  • Tap Tap Infinity
  • Time Clickers
  • Insanity Clicker
  • Cow Clicker
  • Clicking Bad
  • Candy Box
  • Make it Rain
  • Bitcoin Billionaire

And obviously the Steam sale thingy...

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bobafettjm

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@beachthunder: I was wondering if that Steam Sale monster game should have a page? I kind of feel like it should as not only was it in a Giant Bomb video, but it was pretty unique and worth documenting.

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BeachThunder

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#85  Edited By BeachThunder

Sadly, I don't think so. It's basically a game within another program. Consider the flight simulator thingy in Excel 97 or the maze in Encarta. Neither of those have a pages.

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Slag

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@beachthunder: @bobafettjm: re: Steam Monster game-I thought browser based games in general didn't get pages.

and I totally agree! Clicker games seem very mechanically distinctive from other genres. Imo they should get their own genre classification.

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bobafettjm

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@slag: Some browser games do get their own pages, especially ones featured on the site in some way. The Monster Game is really a browser game that was played through the browser in Steam.

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Slag

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BeachThunder

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@slag: My understanding of browser games in the wiki is that they can be added if they are notable. That is, they fit into at least one of the following categories:

  • Require some kind of payment from the player.
  • Was created by a company that also has produced non-browser games.
  • Was worked on by someone otherwise well-known.
  • Is part of a franchise that includes non-browser games.
  • Has been written about in an editorial capacity by Giant Bomb or another a well-known source.
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Slag

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@beachthunder: Seems like the Monster Game would satisfy at least 2 of those criteria then.

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bobafettjm

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Also, should Rare Replay have all the franchises of each game in the compilation? I noticed there are several of the franchises linked to the game, but was not sure if they are supposed to in a compilation.

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Slag

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@bobafettjm: oh gosh , that's a really good question.

Is there any clear precedent for a similar mix of games?

Game Room appears to have no connection to component game franchises. Same with Sega Genesis Collection. My guess is that is the correct way to do it? I.e. no they should not?

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bobafettjm

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I always thought that in compilations they weren't added, but then I thought about it and I wasn't sure.

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ketchupman36

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I have a question about a wiki edit I made: http://www.giantbomb.com/wiki/moderation/189487/

I included a new company to be added but it looks like it wasn't accepted in the review process and it doesnt show up on the game page. Why is that? I'm new to editing the wiki so I'm just wondering if I didn't do it in the correct way

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Slag

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@ketchupman36: I think you don't enough points yet , to be allowed to create new pages. You'll need a moderator to do it for you.

Might want to use the PM all mods option to ask one of them to do it for you, I copied the text from the sidebar, but it should work. Click on the red text below.

" Contact the moderators

The Giant Bomb moderators are here to help. Click here to send a private message to our entire mod crew. "

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BeachThunder

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Just a suggestion: if you guys have put a lot of effort into an article, it might be a good idea to save a capture of it via http://archive.org/web/web.php

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BeachThunder

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What games fit under the 'Aquatic' theme? There's some really obvious things (e.g. Ecco), but is BioShock, for example, an 'aquatic' game?

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Slag

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What games fit under the 'Aquatic' theme? There's some really obvious things (e.g. Ecco), but is BioShock, for example, an 'aquatic' game?

I would think so yes. I mean it takes entirely place in basically Objectivist Atlantis (or Sea Lab if your prefer).

Ultimately though it depends on how the Staff defines the Aquatic theme.

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bhurnie

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Just a suggestion: if you guys have put a lot of effort into an article, it might be a good idea to save a capture of it via http://archive.org/web/web.php

Is this just in case it gets lost or overwritten accidentally, or archive.org not visiting much, or...?

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BeachThunder

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#100  Edited By BeachThunder

@slag: Hm, I don't recall the staff ever publicly defining any of that. I suppose that if SOMA is considered aquatic, then so is BioShock...

@bdhurkett: Yep, a lot of unexpected stuff happens in the wiki. For example: recently, a bunch of pages lost all of their associations.

Also, I don't believe archive.org automatically archives stuff; if you want a page added there, you have to do it yourself.