User:Archivist Toadette/Draft proposals

Real World Subjects vs. Real World Terms

A recurring trend on this wiki is to create articles on real-world terms, such as Genre, Level, and Pre-release and unused content. I know we've said something like this in the first proposal aimed at reducing generic subjects, but allowing these articles as precedents would lead to further unnecessary articles, such as Episode, Map, Cutscene...the list goes on. Keep in mind that wikis are not dictionaries, and we don't necessarily need articles on those subjects, same as the generic subjects. Therefore, in a similar vein to the generic subjects proposal I linked to, I propose that we allow articles on real-world terms only if they have a function or purpose that makes them unique and discernible from the way the term is applied elsewhere.

The following are examples of real-world terms that would be allowed:

• Cheat code – The cheat codes and their effects vary per game; New Super Mario Bros.'s is a simple button hold that allows Luigi as a playable character, whereas Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble!'s has a cheats section where the player can enter five-letter code words to drastically change the gameplay (for example, typing "COLOR" in the SNES version gives Dixie and Kiddy a palette swap).
• Game Over – The Game Over screens are entirely unique for each game, and Game Overs aren't just achievable by "losing". Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, for example, has a Game Over that occurs by making the mistake of reading Ghost T.'s diary.
• Easter egg – Same as cheat code.
• Fourth wall – Fourth wall breaks occur very often in the Mario universe, such as how in Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam, Starlow references the Year of Luigi when Luigi is otherwise alone in west Gloomy Woods thanks to King Boo ("You had, like, a whole YEAR named after you!"), or how in Paper Mario: Color Splash, Huey makes a remark when he sees the final memory revealing that Bowser had accidentally created his black paint alter-ego, "You're telling me we could have avoided this entire game if we just installed a "Don't Mix the Paint" sign?!".
• Unrevisitable area – Same as fourth wall.

The following are examples of real-world terms that would be forbidden:

• Glitch – They are recurring, but they don't differentiate enough in concept from glitches in other franchises.
• Level – There's nothing different about the concept of levels in the Mario franchise. You play them, you beat them, you move on to the next level. It's the same thing.
• Genre – Genres in the Mario franchise are conceptually no different from genres elsewhere.
• World – Same as above.
• Minigame – Same as above.

Whatever happens to the targeted pages in the aftermath (i.e. merging into the glossary or converting into a list) has no bearing on this proposal.

If this proposal passes, I will begin drafting some text to add to the generic subjects policy, which I will propose later on.

Proposer: Toadette the Achiever (talk)
Deadline: TBA 2018, 23:59 GMT

Support

1. Toadette the Achiever (talk) Per proposal.