This one is pretty controversial. I personally think a character should be considered a fictional being part of some coherent story or somebody from history (by this I mean a "version" of a character that is slightly exaggerated and visualized to fit the game like this as opposed to this or set in a fictional storyline) . The problem with athletes in games is that they are usually portrayed as they are in real life and not beefy, super human versions of themselves. This means the pages for athletes are filled with pictures of them from random sports events and games, which have nothing to do with video games.
I could understand maybe a few pictures and concepts for these people but pages like this and this are pretty ridiculous. First off, these pages are written to be more reminiscent of a wikipedia article than a GB, as the overview is basically a biography of that person with events having nothing to do with a game that person was in. Also, since all pictures of that person are fair game, literally thousands of pictures of the same person can be uploaded for easy points, and about 95% percent of those pictures have nothing to do with the game, concept art, or developers who made it. My apoligizies go off to newtruegunner if I offended your ways of editing.
So, I ask the mods to consider adding a rule to either not make athletes characters or to restrict page information and images for athletes if it is not game related, an in game screenshot, or concept art. Because isn't that what Giant Bomb is all about? The games?
edit: BTW I'm also pretty sure the first outrageous article I mentioned was word for word copy-pasta Wikipedia, considering the superscripts after many of the words.
Athletes shouldn't be characters.
I think they're playable characters within the game, I see no problem with it.
It's not like all the articles about the athletes are bugging anyone.
As long as you're not milking it for however many points its worth through scantily clad pictures, thats fine with me.
Sorry to be quoting myself - at least it's better than sounding like a stuck record - this is my reply to a similar question in this topic:
A Character is anyone who's in a game, be it a real person or a fictional being.
A Person is someone who is credited in a game.
Let's say Rodney Mullen is in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater as a skater, and he got special thanks in the game credits.
In this case, he would have both a character entry and a person entry; the character entry would list details of his character in the game, his stats, his tricks, other games he's been in etc. whereas the person entry would list information about Rodney Mullen's involvement with the game industry, perhaps his bio, and so on.
I'm certainly not the official voice on this sort of stuff - although this is the last stance on the subject we heard from the staff, I expect things might change in the future. For now, our massive database of athlete 'characters' should be concentrating on detailing their usage in games - while I'm not even sure myself what's so unique about these athletes in games - perhaps their stats, a very brief bio and any problems that might have been had with licensing etc. might work.
Hope this clears things up - if only slightly!
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