MarioWiki:Proposals/Archive/70

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All past proposals are archived here. Please add archived proposals to the bottom of the page.
Previous proposals

Overturn the proposal that resulted in the deletion of Category:User eo (category for speakers of Esperanto)

Overturn 20-0
Myself, I don't care about this language, and needless to say, neither do most people on the planet, but I take issue with the proposal that had it removed in the first place for a few reasons.

  • The proposal argues that this language "is not a real language", that "nobody really picked it up", and likens it to the fictional language of Klingon. Despite its status as a constructed language, it is, in fact, very much a real language intended and created to be functional. It has a(n admittedly small) number of speakers across the planet, some of whom may well be potential editors on this wiki for all we know. The comparison to Klingon, which was created with an artistic purpose, is misleading.
  • The proposer was outed as an extremist (read up on the details at your own risk) who seemingly was planning to have other language-based user categories removed, as he followed up with another proposal targeting the Georgian user category. The wiki's policies outline that we shouldn't assume bad faith in users, but given the circumstances here, I hope you'll allow me the assumption that this user had ulterior motives in their little curatorial project, namely in altering the wiki ever so slightly according to their outlooks. Proposal failed and the user was banned for their concerning behavior, preventing further such proposals from being made.

Now, as you'd expect, the Esperanto user category certainly never saw much use--in fact, only one user employed it as of 2014 (archive.org) and even then only listed Esperanto as a second language (archive.org) (though, the very point of Esperanto was to be an auxillary language between people who don't speak the same native language). That user, who goes by Pakkun (talk), has since taken the category off their page, so you could argue that this proposal lacks a tangible purpose as "User eo" would be dead on arrival should it be recreated.

The point of this proposal, however, isn't to recreate this language immediately; it is to negate the proposal that currently prevents its creation if someone ever considers they'd derive some use from it. This community should be open to anyone regardless of their cultural background. The previous proposal is contrary to that.

Proposer: Koopa con Carne (talk)
Deadline: October 5, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Support

  1. Koopa con Carne (talk) per proposal.
  2. Ahemtoday (talk) Per proposal.
  3. Camwoodstock (talk) Honestly, we would be down for more Conlangs to have user categories. We can't imagine the overlap of, say, Vötgil speakers to Mario Wiki users is very large, but like, in regards to a strictly English wiki, the Conlang categories in particular are just for-fun categories at the end of the day, and who the hey are we to expressly prohibit other people's fun? And even in the most generous reading of the events, it still feels like a bit of warped priorities when some categories have been in need of reforms for awhile now (sorry about the Thieves category thing, we're still thinking of that and honestly at this point we wouldn't mind someone else chipping in with that) and haven't gotten them, but we have an entire proposal dedicated to... Deleting a category for Esperanto speakers??? (And for the record, this was back when Category:Canines was called Dogs--something something, obligatory mention of Penkoon.)
  4. Shadow2 (talk) We DID this? wtf??
  5. Nintendo101 (talk) Per proposal.
  6. DryBonesBandit (talk) Per proposal.
  7. Hewer (talk) Per proposal.
  8. Arend (talk) With the provided context, something about Trig Jegman's proposals rubs me the wrong way. If it's true that he was trying to gradually remove other languages, where would he stop? He stated that Esperanto and Gregorian are languages not supported by Nintendo (a weak argument IMO, as Nintendo =/= this wiki), and not widely spoken, so would he first try to get all small-spoken languages removed? Would he eventually try to get larger languages removed just because Nintendo doesn't support these languages? Would he eventually go even further and get even languages that are supported by Nintendo removed because they're not as widely spoken as other languages? Would he eventually make it so that English is the only language remaining? Would he then remove that category too because if that's the only language category for users, then what's the point of keeping it? Or worse, is this a ploy to recognize who is native to other languages and would he try to get non-English users banned so only English-speaking users have access to the wiki (and then remove the English category)? ...Uh...fearmongering aside, per all.
  9. Waluigi Time (talk) No harm having it if people want to use it.
  10. TheFlameChomp (talk) Per all.
  11. ThePowerPlayer (talk) Per all.
  12. Axii (talk) Per all.
  13. Mario (talk) The more the Marior. That older proposal was dumb.
  14. Jazama (talk) Per all
  15. SeanWheeler (talk) I'm not a fan of banning users for off-site drama, especially when it's political. But if his proposal was bigoted, then maybe it should be overturned.
  16. FanOfYoshi (talk) Per all, especially Sean. This proposal was asinine at best, in retrospect, and harmful at worst. And that's coming from a man who doesn't have full context as to what happened.
  17. Shy Guy on Wheels (talk) Per all. That category never hurt nobody.
  18. Killer Moth (talk) Per all.
  19. Pseudo (talk) Per all. This is a really gross thing to delete.
  20. FanOfRosalina2007 (talk) Per all. That was just mean to delete a language category. People still speak this language, so we should represent it!

Oppose

Comments

The real question is if we can have a Klingon category (as a certain other editor who is no longer with us due to concerning behavior mentioned on that proposal). Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 17:11, September 28, 2024 (EDT)

Up for debate whether user categories can have some basis in fiction. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 17:16, September 28, 2024 (EDT)
We think that Conlangs in general should just be allowed, just because it both feels really, really weird to try to police what Conlangs "count" as languages, and because the idea of focusing even more proposals on such a for-fun topic feels.... A little too much, when that effort is best used elsewhere. ;P ~Camwoodstock (talk) 18:14, September 28, 2024 (EDT)

We should be open for Inklingese and Smurf. ArendLogoTransparent.pngrend (talk) (edits) 20:24, September 28, 2024 (EDT)

Per Arend. --Green Yoshi FanOfYoshi 05:50, September 30, 2024 (EDT)

@FanOfRosalina2007's vote reminded me of a point I wanted to add to the proposal within its first three days, but forgot: there is a category for speakers of Latin, a dead language, so that old proposal's argument that "Esperanto is spoken by too few people to be relevant" is bust as long as the wiki supports Latin. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 17:29, October 4, 2024 (EDT)

Should we add an Occitan category, perhaps? It's a near-dead language that has actual historical significance in certain areas, unlike Esperanto's status as a conlang with "official" linguistic status. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 15:56, October 5, 2024 (EDT)

Lower the requirement for a disambiguation page from 5 to 4

Lower requirement to 4 7-0
As of now, the requirement for a disambiguation page's creation is five pages:

"If there are five or more pages which could be reasonably associated with a given name, then a disambiguation page must be created" (MarioWiki:Naming)

This rule feels needlessly restrictive, considering the amount of clutter links make at the very top of the page. "For a minigame in the WarioWare series, see X. For an object in Super Mario Odyssey found in the Luncheon Kingdom, see Y. For an underwater enemy from...", you get the idea. If this proposal passes, the threshold on MarioWiki:Naming will be lowered from 5 to 4.

Proposer: Axii (talk)
Deadline: October 6, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Support

  1. Axii (talk) ^
  2. ThePowerPlayer (talk) One or two other articles are fine, but having three separate articles in the {{about}} template at the top of the page is the point where a disambiguation page is ideal.
  3. SeanWheeler (talk) We don't need to clutter the {{About}} template.
  4. Killer Moth (talk) Per proposal.
  5. Pseudo (talk) Frankly, I'd support bringing the requirement as low as 3. Per proposal.
  6. Mariuigi Khed (talk) I too I'd go with 3. Per proposal
  7. Dine2017 (talk) Per proposal.

Oppose

Comments

Do you have any examples of how many subjects would be affected by this change? — Lady Sophie Wiggler Sophie.png (T|C) 10:52, September 29, 2024 (EDT)

I don't think there's an easy way to tell, but I can't imagine it being too many. Axii (talk) 12:05, September 29, 2024 (EDT)

Character gallery division by each generations

canceled by proposer
The character gallery proposal was passed a month ago, but I failed to add new suggestion to proposal before passed. Sometimes the Japanese and oversea release dates are different when classified by decade. If the Japanese release date is 2009 and the North American release date is 2010, the division will be different. However, if it divided by generations, this problem disappears.

Mario's gallery page is still long sized despite divided by each decade. Some characters' gallery are short and can be merged with the previous ones without any problems. Since Donkey Kong didn't have his own series in 2020s and only appeared in Mario spinoffs, so it's fine to merge it with the 2010s. If there is no proper appearance for a long time, it can last more than 15 years.

I offer the following options:

Option 1
Divide by 6-8 years for Mario by each mainline, and every almost a decade from the year of most important work for other characters. If the proposal fails, split only to Princess Daisy.
Option 2
Divide for Mario by one console generation, and two console generations for other characters.
  • Mario
    • Mario (1981-1994) (2nd/3rd; Until NES)
    • Mario (1989-1998) (4th; SNES/GB)
    • Mario (1996-2001) (5th; N64/GBC)
    • Mario (2001-2005) (6th; NGC/GBA)
    • Mario (2004-2012) (7th; Wii/DS)
    • Mario (2011-2018) (8th; Wii U/3DS)
    • Mario (2017-present) (8.5th; Switch)
  • Luigi
    • Luigi (1983-1998) (3rd/4th; NES/SNES)
    • Luigi (1996-2005) (5th/6th; N64/NGC)
    • Luigi (2004-2018) (7th/8th; Wii/Wii U)
    • Luigi (2017-present) (8.5th; Switch)
  • Princess Peach
    • Princess Peach (1985-1998) (3rd/4th; NES/SNES)
    • Princess Peach (1996-2005) (5th/6th; N64/NGC)
    • Princess Peach (2004-2018) (7th/8th; Wii/Wii U)
    • Princess Peach (2017-present) (8.5th; Switch)
  • Princess Daisy
    • Princess Daisy (1989-2018) (4th to 8th)
    • Princess Daisy (2017-present) (8.5th)
  • Yoshi
    • Yoshi (1990-2001) (3rd/4th/5th)
    • Yoshi (2001-2012) (6th/7th)
    • Yoshi (2011-present) (8th/8.5th)
  • Toad
    • Toad (1988-2001) (3rd/4th/5th)
    • Toad (2001-2012) (6th/7th)
    • Toad (2011-present) (8th/8.5th)
  • Wario
    • Wario (1992-2001) (4th/5th)
    • Wario (2001-2012) (6th/7th)
    • Wario (2011-present) (8th/8.5th)
  • Donkey Kong
    • Donkey Kong (1981-1996) (2nd/3rd/4th; Until SNES)
    • Donkey Kong (1996-2012) (5th/6th/7th; N64/NGC/Wii)
    • Donkey Kong (2011-present) (8th/8.5th; Wii U/Switch)
  • Bowser
    • Bowser (1985-1998) (3rd/4th; NES/SNES)
    • Bowser (1996-2005) (5th/6th; N64/NGC)
    • Bowser (2004-2018) (7th/8th; Wii/Wii U)
    • Bowser (2017-present) (8.5th; Switch)

Proposer: Windy (talk)
Deadline: October 15, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Option 1 (Split by each mainline)

Option 2 (Split by console generation)

Oppose

  1. Hewer (talk) The obvious subjectivity of "important works" makes these divisions feel unhelpfully arbitrary. Also, you can't say "if the proposal fails, split only to Princess Daisy" (assuming I'm understanding that correctly), proposals need an option that results in no changes being made.
  2. Nintendo101 (talk) A good organizational scheme is intuitive, and both options seem to require completely different rules for each character. This is what I said about console generations in the proposal that had passed, "Not all of the material in these galleries come from video games, and it is inherently more intuitive for viewers not very versed in gaming culture to use the same dates they use in their everyday lives. There are also some disagreements on which consoles belong to which generations. So while there are certainly other ways this material can be subdivided, the Gregorian calendar is the simplest."
  3. Killer Moth (talk) Per all.
  4. OmegaRuby (talk) While I get what you're going for as someone who is very passionate about the design evolution of Super Mario series characters over the years and console generations, the design of this just feels too convoluted and confusing to maintain especially as we move forward and go into new console generations and design changes. Per all.
  5. YoYo (talk) per all.
  6. Camwoodstock (talk) Per all, especially Hewer; this is way too subject to, well, subjective opinion as to who's important enough, as evidenced by the fact the "oppose" option was originally "no matter what, we're doing this to Princess Daisy anyways".
  7. Nightwicked Bowser (talk) Per all, also you were warned before for enacting a proposal that failed.
  8. Ahemtoday (talk) Per all.

Comments

What about, instead, dividing it per series? Like, one for the mainline games, the Advances, the Parties, the Karts, just to be more coherent, 'cause... take a look at Mario: first a 9-years span, then 5-year span, again a 5-year span, then an 8-year span... doesn't really look that organized/coherent: if we instead divide it by series, it would be more coherently grouped. --My avatar's face to use in the signature Mariuigi Khed 05:03, October 8, 2024 (EDT)

The "important works" is renamed as "each generations". We should divide it into approximately 7-year units based on the year the Mario mainline was released. Without a proper standard, there were many cases where it ended in failure. Windy (talk) 05:44, October 8, 2024 (EDT)

If this proposal fails, I would like to merge some characters so that they allow to have more than 15 years since their debut (example: Gallery:Bowser (1985-1999)), as less than 10 years from their debut is too insufficient. (less than 10,000 bytes) Windy (talk) 10:38, October 8, 2024 (EDT)

@Windy you cannot execute changes from a failed proposal, per rule 18 above, which states:

Proposals must have a status quo option (e.g. Oppose, Do nothing) unless the status quo itself violates policy.

- Nintendo101 (talk) 13:38, October 8, 2024 (EDT)

I do think the "by decade" approach has an issue in that it assumes the person looking for an image knows which decade something released, which can be especially hard to remember even for experts in years that are near the turn of the decade. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 12:06, October 8, 2024 (EDT)

There's this tho -- KOOPA CON CARNE 13:41, October 8, 2024 (EDT)
I agree with you, Doc. But why doesn't anyone agree to change the classification? Windy (talk) 14:25, October 8, 2024 (EDT)
I'd suggest looking at their reasoning in opposition. It may not be a perfect system now, but they clearly feel your proposed alternative isn't better. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 14:32, October 8, 2024 (EDT)
I understand you. Gallery:Mario is still a long sized even when it divided by 10 years. The others are small enough that the first few years can be merged into the next decade. As time goes by, it may become difficult to find the game without knowing the platform or decade. We need to distinguish between 2D and 3D. Windy (talk) 14:48, October 8, 2024 (EDT)
Which can be annoying to have to flip to (and I currently have five tabs open for this site specifically lol) Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 14:32, October 8, 2024 (EDT)

Shorten the disambiguation identifier for Yoshi's Island pages with the subtitle only - take two

Do not shorten 5-13
Last season, I had to cancel my last proposal since I was caught plagiarizing someone else's proposal. This time, I've come up with another proposal that is not plagiarized.

Take the "Choose a Game" screen and the main game's title screen in Yoshi's Island: Super Mario Advance 3 for example. As you see, the logo for the main game on both screens ONLY reads Yoshi's Island, not Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island.

The following pages will be affected:

Current name Will be moved to
Fuzzy (Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island) Fuzzy (Yoshi's Island)
King Bowser's Castle (Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island) King Bowser's Castle (Yoshi's Island)
Magnifying Glass (Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island) Magnifying Glass (Yoshi's Island)
Spiked Fun Guy (Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island) Spiked Fun Guy (Yoshi's Island)
World 1 (Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island) World 1 (Yoshi's Island)
World 2 (Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island) World 2 (Yoshi's Island)
World 3 (Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island) World 3 (Yoshi's Island)
World 4 (Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island) World 4 (Yoshi's Island)
World 5 (Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island) World 5 (Yoshi's Island)
World 6 (Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island) World 6 (Yoshi's Island)

Once this proposal passes, we'll be able to use the shorter disambiguation identifier with ONLY the subtitle for the Yoshi's Island pages.

Proposer: GuntherBayBeee (talk)
Deadline: October 10, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Support (Yoshi's Island)

  1. GuntherBayBeee (talk) Per proposal
  2. LinkTheLefty (talk) You know what? I'm actually going to agree with this. One reason is because, according to this, this has to move, and there were concerns raised with the overly long identifier that I agree with. The other reason is because Yoshi's Island is a perfectly valid shorter name for this game. Look at any of the Super Mario Advance 3 materials: the Super Mario World 2 portion was removed. Also, outside of Super Mario Advance 3, Yoshi's Island has been used as the shorter title on occasion. This is in keeping with other proposals about using shorter identifier titles where applicable, and it will not conflict with "(Yoshi's Island series)".
  3. SolemnStormcloud (talk) Per LinkTheLefty.
  4. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) - Per LTL. I personally prefer to shorten it to Super Mario World 2, but that's clearly not Nintendo's own preference, so that is moot.
  5. Altendo (talk) Per all.

Oppose (Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island)

  1. Hewer (talk) Reusing my oppose vote from last time: the remake replaces (and reorders) the subtitle rather than just removing it, so we've never had a game just called Yoshi's Island, and I don't know of any other time we've used a title for a game identifier that isn't actually a title for a game. "Yoshi's Island" also isn't quite as immediately obvious what it refers to compared to "Super Mario RPG", "Donkey Kong Country 2", or "Donkey Kong Country 3". I think this is going a bit too far and ends up a little more confusing than helpful.
  2. Axii (talk) Per Hewer
  3. ThePowerPlayer (talk) Per Hewer.
  4. Shy Guy on Wheels (talk) Per Hewer.
  5. Shadow2 (talk) Long titles are not a problem.
  6. SeanWheeler (talk) It's funny seeing Hewer support a full name this time. And like my points against him about Fox, Sonic and Shadow, Yoshi's Island is pretty vague. But unlike those crossover characters where I'm worried about hypothetical confusion of newer readers, or new species articles in the case of Fox, I might actually think the identifier is referring to the island, not the game.
  7. Sdman213 (talk) Per all.
  8. TheFlameChomp (talk) Per all.
  9. Nintendo101 (talk) Clarifying.
  10. OmegaRuby (talk) Regardless of what Nintendo goes with, I'd rather it be shortened to Super Mario World 2 or nothing at all. Yoshi's Island feels too broad as it's a series of games. Feels like changing the game identifier for every Donkey Kong Country-specific article to just (Donkey Kong Country). Which one is it talking about? Won't know until you open the article.
  11. FanOfYoshi (talk) As a guy who became very active during the period in which i played SMW2YI a lot, so much so that i ended up registering under my current username, i'd say only using "Yoshi's Island" would be counterproductive, because it would imply some enemies have made reappearances outside of the original game (when it isn't necessarily the case for some). Per all.
  12. Camwoodstock (talk) Per all; plus, and this is a more personal thing, but we think these truncated names are particularly confusing in regards to the World names in particular, since "Yoshi's Island" is sometimes colloquially used to refer to the Yoshi platformer games (in contrast to, say, games like Yoshi Touch & Go or those puzzle games).
  13. Sparks (talk) Per all.

Comments

@Hewer I respectfully disagree. "Yoshi's Island" is actually short for both "Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island" and "Yoshi's Island: Super Mario Advance 3", so I think there's a possibility to use the "Yoshi's Island" disambiguation identifier for Yoshi's Island pages, even if it is confusing. GuntherBayBeee.jpgGuntherBayBeeeGravity Rush Kat.png 08:39, October 4, 2024 (EDT)

Why do it if it could be confusing? MarioWiki:Naming advises: "When naming an article, do not use game abbreviations. (e.g. use Bully (Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time) as opposed to Bully (M&L:PIT))." Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 09:59, October 4, 2024 (EDT)

What makes this different from the prior proposals is that, officially speaking, there is no game titled "Yoshi's Island" in full; we commonly refer Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island as such, but unlike with SMRPG or the DKC games, this isn't the full title of the game or any of its rereleases. It'd be kinda like calling Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga JUST "Mario & Luigi", you know? ArendLogoTransparent.pngrend (talk) (edits) 03:44, October 7, 2024 (EDT)

SNES Classic lists it as "Yoshi's Island." Which got me confused when I was looking for it in the game list since that changes where it goes alphabetically... Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 12:33, October 7, 2024 (EDT)

@SeanWheeler: If you think me supporting full names is funny, you'll love this proposal. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 08:11, October 7, 2024 (EDT)

@Axii @ThePowerPlayer @Shy Guy on Wheels @Shadow2 @SeanWheeler @Sdman213 @TheFlameChomp @Nintendo101 @OmegaRuby @FanOfYoshi I respectfully disagree. The term "Super Mario World 2" disambiguation identifier is obviously confusing, so I think you should take a look at my comment from above. Anyway, @Hewer, I think I know why there's a possibility to use the "Yoshi's Island" disambiguation identifier for Yoshi's Island pages, even if it is confusing. Because it will match similarly to the Super Mario RPG, Donkey Kong Country 2, and Donkey Kong Country 3 disambiguation identifiers. GuntherBayBeee.jpgGuntherBayBeeeGravity Rush Kat.png 10:33, October 8, 2024 (EDT)

Confusing? No? And even if it was, it doesn't stop it from being an official name, anyway! --Green Yoshi FanOfYoshi 10:38, October 8, 2024 (EDT)
I don't know of any time just "Super Mario World 2" on its own was officially used to refer to the game. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 11:01, October 8, 2024 (EDT)
I already explained how this case is different from those other three in my vote. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 11:01, October 8, 2024 (EDT)
To be clear, I would not support a proposal that truncated the game's name to Super Mario World 2. - Nintendo101 (talk) 18:20, October 8, 2024 (EDT)
We're more of a fan of Super Mario Advance 3: Super Mario Bros. 4 2: Super Mario Bros. 5, ourselves. ~Camwoodstock (talk) 18:50, October 8, 2024 (EDT)

Separate character content for transformations in the Gallery

Do not separate 1-5
The characters are all mixed up in the transformation gallery; Gallery:Fire Mario. Besides Mario, there are times when have to dig deep to find transformations for specific characters. Also, the transformations for characters other than Mario haven't been written enough. As the number of transforming characters other than Mario is increasing, I think the gallery content is necessary to separate them. A specific transformation for any characters on one page, with add content name. 

==Artwork==
===Video games===
(Listing multiple characters)
====Fire Mario====
(Listing focused character)
====Fire Luigi====
====Fire Toads====
==Sprites and models==
====Fire Mario====
====Fire Luigi====
====Fire Toads====
====Fire Toadette====
...
====Fire Mini====
==Screenshots==
====Fire Mario====
====Fire Luigi====
====Fire Toads====
==Merchandise==
====Fire Mario====
====Fire Luigi====
====Fire Toads====

Proposer: Windy (talk)
Deadline: October 15, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Accept

  1. OmegaRuby (talk) The gallery by decade proposal was made for ease of navigation, so this should reasonably pass too.

Decline

  1. Waluigi Time (talk) I can see some merit to doing this on a case-by-case basis, but we don't need it for every one of these pages. For example, Gallery:Propeller Mario is small enough already that there's no need to divide it into smaller sections, and Gallery:Gold Mario would have a lot of sections that are either short or only a single image because most of it is Mario already.
  2. ThePowerPlayer (talk) Per Waluigi Time.
  3. Hewer (talk) Per all, this isn't necessary to make into policy.
  4. Technetium (talk) Per Waluigi Time.
  5. Nintendo101 (talk) Per Waluigi Time.

Comments

This seems like a fine idea for the Fire power-up specifically, but I'm not sure for the other ones if there's enough images to justify splitting it like that. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 17:55, October 8, 2024 (EDT)

Maybe, just for convenience’s sake, I would keep the Toad under one section together, considering also how Toad returned to be blue in SM3DW and SMM --My avatar's face to use in the signature Mariuigi Khed 08:49, October 9, 2024 (EDT)

We should keep colored Toads under one section, listing as "Toads". Also Yellow Toad in the penguin form is named as "Penguin Toad" in Mario Kart Tour. Windy (talk) 02:48, October 10, 2024 (EDT)

Revise how long proposals take: "IT'S ABOUT (how much) TIME (they take)"

Two weeks 14-0-3-8
Currently, the way our proposals are set up, there are two deadlines. On the main proposals page, they last for 1 week. On talk pages, or for writing guidelines proposals, 2 weeks. Now, this is fine. We're not going to claim this is like, some total deal-breaker or nothing. However, lately, there have been a few concerns raised about this inconsistency, and we figured, what the hey, why not put it up to vote?

A few concerns we've seen, both from others and from us, in no particular order;

  • The largest one to us is just that, unless a proposal is really specific, it's just not worth it to make a talk page proposal over a main page proposal, since it'll end faster. The only thing immune to this are writing guidelines proposals.
  • While the proposals themselves are different lengths, the duration before you can make a second proposal on them remains the same. Thusly, if you want to set a policy in stone, you would actually want to make it a writing guidelines/talk page proposal over an ordinary one, as that means it will last for, at least, 6 weeks (4 weeks for the cooldown, and 2 weeks to put it to proposal again.)
  • Lastly, talk page proposals just inherently take longer to happen. This can be an issue if their changes are, overall, quite small (like a simple merge/split or rename), or the consensus is reached very quickly; this stings when an ordinary proposal would happen twice as fast with the exact same amount of votes!

Now, there's a few ways you can go about this, but there's one in particular we've taken a liking to: uh, just make all proposals take 2 weeks, lmao.

"BUT CAM & TORI!", we hear you shout, "BUT YOU SAID 2 WEEKS PROPOSALS TAKE TOO LONG??? WHY WOULD YOU CHANGE THEM TO SOMETHING YOU HATE???", and to that we say... No! We actually like the 2 weeks proposals! They have a distinct benefit to them! The problem is that they're juxtaposed with the 1 week proposals. Let's run through those same bullet points.

  • If all proposals were 2 weeks, well, there's no real loss to making a talk page proposal over a main proposal page proposal, as they'll all last 2 weeks anyways. (Sure, a proposal can take longer if there's a tie, but that just happens for all proposals anyways.)
  • There's also no incentive to make a talk page proposal/writing guideline proposal if you particularly want your porposal to stick around, as again, now every proposal is guaranteed to last for, at the very least, 6 weeks.
  • Now. While it's annoying that all proposals will take 2 weeks, despite the inherent risk of some coming to their consensuses much faster than the deadlines, for one, this is also an issue with talk page proposals as-is. For two, the extra time can offer extra time for new information to come to light or for particularly close votes to make their cases and form a proper consensus, without needing a tiebreaker. Lastly, if it's really that big of an issue, we could perhaps create a rule that if a proposal comes to a particularly large consensus a week in, it'll pass early (the finer details would be created as necessary).

There is, of course, the alternative of making all proposals 1 week. While we realize this does also resolve a lot of things, it does also necessarily mean that some proposals that would want to happen slower, now don't have that time, and are rushed. Even making only talk page proposals take only 1 week means that Writing Guideline proposals will be at a unique disadvantage for how long they take/an advantage for how long they last if they pass. (And of course, we could just leave everything as they are, but that goes without saying.) That being said, we have provided options for these, and you're free to make your case for these.

Proposer: Camwoodstock (talk)
Deadline: October 16, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Make all proposals last for 2 weeks

  1. Camwoodstock (talk) If it's not obvious, this is our primary option; we're a big fan of the idea of global 2 week proposals!. Even with their caveats, in the worst-case scenario, we could make a clause to prevent proposals for lasting too long if they reach their consensus early, or we could simply revert back to the current system. We think the added consistency and preventing of shenanigans is very potent, and it also means that you have to put a bit more thought into your proposal as you make it. Patience fans will be eating good if this passes.
  2. Hewer (talk) Per proposal and what was said here. However, I'd also be fine with an option to just shorten writing guidelines proposals to be one week. I don't really understand the third option here, writing guidelines proposals being two weeks felt to me like the worst inconsistency of the bunch. I still don't see what about "writing guidelines" specifically means they inherently need more time than the other categories on this page.
  3. OmegaRuby (talk) Regular proposals and TPPs are just as visible as one another and should be treated equally, especially when regular page proposals can be the home of very important decisions (such as this one!) and are just given 1 week. Per all.
  4. Waluigi Time (talk) 1 week proposals have always felt a little short to me. I'd rather err on the side of some proposals running a little longer than needed than not having enough discussion time (I don't like banking on a controversial proposal tying). Having to wait an extra week to implement a proposal isn't the end of the world anyway - proposals are rarely, if ever, urgent enough that an extra week with no change would be detrimental to the wiki (and if that were the case, the change should probably come immediately from wiki staff).
  5. Killer Moth (talk) Per all. Giving an extra week to discuss and vote on proposals is a good thing.
  6. Drago (talk) Per Waluigi Time.
  7. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) - Per, I never got why sitewide ones always got less time to discuss.
  8. Pseudo (talk) Per proposal and the talk page discussion.
  9. Tails777 (talk) Per proposal.
  10. Jdtendo (talk) I feel like the inconsistency is not justified, and one week may be too short to make an informed decision.
  11. FanOfRosalina2007 (talk) Per all. I was one of the people who participated in the conversation that sparked this proposal, and my reasons are stated there.
  12. Shy Guy on Wheels (talk) Per all.
  13. ThePowerPlayer (talk) I think that the reason site-wide proposals still get only 1 week is to necessitate engagement so that a decision can be reached, due to their importance compared to talk page proposals. However, that logic is flawed since it incentivizes discussion which is quick and not well thought out, so I think the consistency of 2 weeks for every proposal would be better here.
  14. TheFlameChomp (talk) Per Waluigi Time. Compared to shortening all proposals, I feel like this is the better option if we are wanting to make all proposals the same length, as I would prefer not to cut discussion time on all proposals just because some of them might not need extra time to reach a consensus.

Make all proposals last for 1 week

Make all proposals except for writing guidelines proposals last for 1 week

  1. Camwoodstock (talk) Secondary option. While we like this much less, we do see the merit of making Talk Page Proposals 1 week, and it's not exactly the end-all-be-all. However, we would vastly prefer 2-week proposals, and keeping Writing Guidelines proposals 2-week is kind of a necessary evil to prevent them from being too rushed for their own good. However, compared to truly all 1-week proposals, this is better... though, not as good as all 2-week proposals.
  2. 7feetunder (talk) For me, it's either this or bust. New information coming to light can still invalidate a proposal's entire premise too late and require a counterproposal even with a 2 week deadline, so extending the deadline of main page props to 2 weeks won't stop that from happening from time to time. Most proposals that don't reach a consensus in a week will probably require extensions anyway. TPPs being less "visible" than main page proposals was more of an issue back when no quorums were immediate, but that's no longer the case.
  3. Axii (talk) Voting for this just so the first option doesn't win.

Do nothing

  1. 7feetunder (talk) If making TPPs last 1 week isn't desirable, I say just keep the status quo. While the current system does encourage making main page proposals over TPPs when possible if one wants their prop to pass faster, I'm fine with that. A controversial prop is not going to end in a week, and a prop with unanimous or near-unanimous support probably doesn't need that extra time in the oven. I'd be more open to global 2 weekers if a "early consensus = early pass" sub-rule was already in effect, but it isn't, and there's no guarantee that such a rule would be accepted by the community.
  2. Axii (talk) The solution isn't solving anything. There was never a problem with inconsistency. Talk page proposals last for two weeks because they're far less visible to people. Mainspace proposals page is frequently visited by many, having proposals last for 2 weeks instead of one doesn't change anything. It doesn't help the community settle on anything, one week is more than enough. Proposals that are tied already get extended automatically, if anything, I would argue writing guidelines proposals should last a week instead. I proposed a different solution on the talk page as well. If a user making a proposal (or an admin) feel like one week wouldn't be enough, they should be able to extend it to two. (I specifically added "or an admin", because most users don't want a proposal to last for two weeks.) Either way, the fact that users often choose mainspace proposals over talk page is perfectly fine as well. It's not about the time in the oven but the visibility of the proposal to the wiki community. Writing guidelines (if they remain at two weeks) could instead be clarified. Right now it is unclear what writing guidelines proposals even are, I think this is the main problem that should be looked at.
  3. Waluigi Time (talk) Secondary choice. The inconsistency isn't that bad and I prefer that to all proposals being shortened.
  4. Killer Moth (talk) Second choice.
  5. Nintendo101 (talk) I think it is worth scrutinizing our proposal policies and the issues people brought up are valid, but I do not think setting the same time for everything is necessarily the best solution. I will elaborate on my thoughts below.
  6. FanOfYoshi (talk) Per all.
  7. Sdman213 (talk) Per all.
  8. TheFlameChomp (talk) This is my second choice, as I would prefer to keep the current method over shortening all proposals. However, if this option were to win, I think it might make sense to discuss clarifying what qualifies as a writing guidelines proposal and the purpose for its length inconsistency.

Comments

Something that occurred to me: The time allowed to edit TPPs was originally 3 like main page proposals, but eventually doubled to 6 to go with their extended duration. If TPPs are shortened to 1 week, would the time allotted to edit them be reverted? Dark BonesSig.png 19:30, October 2, 2024 (EDT)

That seems only fair to put them back to 3 days if that option passes--after all, it would be a glaring oversight to retain that and effectively allow for proposals that were en route to pass suddenly being hijacked on the last day, and pivoting from the original purpose, while still retaining the vote. The plan here is to de-jank the proposal time-lengths and make them more consistent--not to introduce even more shenanigans! ~Camwoodstock (talk) 20:18, October 2, 2024 (EDT)
Then I also suppose that, if all proposals are going to last two weeks, then the time allowed to edit/cancel those proposals would also be doubled to six days, in order to reflect with the TTPs, right? I've been worried since this was not mentioned in the proposal either. ArendLogoTransparent.pngrend (talk) (edits) 07:58, October 6, 2024 (EDT)

@7feetunder: Of course there's still a chance for new information to come too late with any proposal length, but longer proposals mean the chance is lower. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 02:44, October 3, 2024 (EDT)

@7feetunder: On your reasoning under Do nothing, the idea of an early-consensus-early-conclusion rule for proposals is intriguing... I feel as if we have 2-week proposals that can end early if everyone has a near unanimous consensus on what to do with the proposal, we'd have an ideal middle ground. --OmegaRuby (talk) 08:55, October 3, 2024 (EDT)

While finding the discussions where this first took place have not been successful (with the closest approximate being tracked down by retired staff here, which alludes to this issue), there was wisdom in having longer time for talk page proposals, because they would often would get overlooked and fail simply due to lack of engagement, not because there was anything wrong with them. That may not be the case today, but I see a different set issues that this proposal does not address.

Personally, I think certain proposals - regardless of whether they are on the main page or a talk page - are very niche and entail a very granular change that probably does not need two weeks of discussion or even one to be implemented. Proposals that have wide and systematic changes for the site, such as a policy revision or something that would change many pages, do benefit from longer discussion time because the impact would be significant and affect a lot of people. Whether a proposal has narrow or broad impact has nothing to do with whether it is on an article's talk page or this main page.

Additionally, while it may seem like there should be some sort of rule that allows proposals that gain consensus quickly to be implemented, there have been concerns among staff that users have raised similar proposals to ones that had failed in the past with the hope of getting the attention of a different pool of users who may agree with them. (To clarify, there is a difference between raising a new proposal based on one that had previously failed using new information and arguments, versus one using essentially the same argument). If we had some sort of rule that allowed the passing of a proposal due to quick engagement and support, I can see it being abused in such cases and resulting in proposals passing that people at large may not have agreed with.

I don't like complicated rules. I believe the best policies and rules are straight forward, clear, and unambiguous. There is not use in having rules that people cannot easily understand and follow, imo. However, in this case, I think applying a blanket term policy for all proposals (be it two weeks or one) is too broad and does not address the issues I have observed, or even some of the ones raised by other folks on the main proposal page's talk page. - Nintendo101 (talk) 16:18, October 3, 2024 (EDT)

If you ask me, "talk page proposals are two weeks, but the ones on the main page are one week, except writing guidelines which are also two weeks for some reason" is an overly complicated rule. Every now and then, confusion about the "writing guidelines are two weeks" stipulation arises in proposal comments, which I think is telling. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 17:54, October 3, 2024 (EDT)

I think my main issue is the difference with writing guideline proposals specifically. Mostly because it's hard to determine what a writing guideline even means, or which proposal should fall under which category. I'm not sure where I'll place a vote yet, but I do at least think there should be consistency between all main proposal types. Technetium (talk) 16:22, October 3, 2024 (EDT)

If this passes, will it immedately affect all ongoing proposals, or just new ones going forward? LinkTheLefty (talk) 14:31, October 5, 2024 (EDT)

I think we should not modify the deadline of ongoing proposals if this proposal passes. Since the deadline is set when a proposal is created, extending it afterwards for an already existing proposal would feel like a retroactive change. Jdtendo(T|C) 11:30, October 7, 2024 (EDT)

Not voting because I think the current setup is "don't fix what isn't broken", but I'll be willing to try something new. I'll just wait and see. Icon showing how many lives Mario has left. From Super Mario 64 DS. It's me, Mario! (Talk / Stalk) 15:52, October 5, 2024 (EDT)

Clarify coverage of the Super Smash Bros. series

Clarify 14-2
I've pitched this before, and it got a lot of approval (particularly in favor of one-at-a-time small proposals), so I'm making it a full proposal:
I have thought long and hard about the "proper" way for us to cover Super Smash Bros. in a way that both respects the desire to focus primarily on Super Mario elements while also respecting the desire to not leave anything uncovered. As such, the main way to do this is to give pages only to Super Mario elements, whilst covering everything else on the pages for the individual Super Smash Bros. games; unless otherwise stated, they will instead link to other wikis, be if the base series' wiki or SmashWiki. For instance, Link will remain an internal link (no pun intended) because he's crossed over otherwise, Ganondorf will link to Zeldawiki because he hasn't. Link's moves (originating from the Legend of Zelda series) will link to Zeldawiki, while Ganondorf's moves (original moves due to being based on Captain Falcon's moves) will link to Smashwiki.
Other specific aspects of this, which for the most part make the game pages' internal coverage be more consistent with how we handle other games':

  1. Structure the "List of items in Smash" to how Super Mario RPG (talk) had it in this edit, albeit with the remaining broken formatting fixed. That page always bothered me, and that version is a definite improvement.
  2. Merge the "enemies" pages to their respective game - they're already structured like any other game's enemy tables anyway. These pages also always bothered me.
  3. Merge the "Subspace Army" and "Subspace Stages" lists to each other to recreate a watered-down version of the Subspace Emissary page (to split from the Brawl page due to length and being exclusive to that campaign); it would also include a table for characters describing their role in said campaign, as well as objects/items found exclusively in it (Trophy Stands, the funny boxes, the metallic barrel cannons, etc... a lot of things from the deleted "List of Super Smash Bros. series objects" page, actually) - once again, all except Mario-derived things will link elsewhere (mostly to Smashwiki in this case).
  4. Section each game akin to how I had the SSB64 page as of this edit, including sections for Pokemon, Assist Trophies, Bosses, etc., and links to other wikis for subjects that we don't need pages on. Other sections can be added as needed, and table structure is not specifically set, so further info can be added.
  5. Leave the lists for fighters, stages, and (series-wide) bosses alone (for now at least), as they make sense to have a series-wide representation on here in some capacity. Also, you never know when one of them is going to cross over otherwise, like Villager, Isabelle, and Inkling suddenly joining Mario Kart, so it's good to keep that around in case a split is deemed necessary from something like that happening down the line.
  6. Have image galleries cover everything that can reasonably be included in an image gallery for the game, regardless of origin. This includes artwork, sprites, models, screenshots, etc, for any subject - yes, including Pokemon, so that will undo that one proposal from a month ago. Just like on the game pages, the labels will link to other sites as needed.
  7. Leave Stickers and Spirits alone (for now at least), their pages are too large to merge and are fine as they are for the reasons that opposition to deleting them historically has brought up.
  8. Include the "minigame" stages (Break the Targets, Board the Platforms, Race to the Finish, Snag Trophies, Home Run Contest, Trophy Tussle, the Melee Adventure Mode stages) in the "list of stages debuting in [game]" articles. For ones like Targets, it would just explain how it worked and then have a gallery for the different layouts rather than describing each in detail (and if we later want to split the Mario-based ones into their own articles, I guess we can at some point). Said minigame pages should be merged to a section in the SSB series article covering the series' minigames. The Subspace Emissary stages will get a section with a {{main}} to the stage section of the Subspace Emissary article (detailed in an above point).
  9. Keep trophy, assist trophy, challenge, and soundtrack pages covering only Mario things, leave the remainder of the images in the game gallery (fun fact: Smashwiki does not have game galleries, nor does their community want them; we can base what we could do on if other wikis do something, but not base what we cannot do from those - nothing forbids coverage just because of that).

People may wonder, "What about Nintendo Land and Saturday Supercade? Why don't they get this level of coverage?" It's simple, really: In Smash, you can have Mario throw a Deku Nut at Ridley in Lumiose City and nobody bats an eye at how absurd that situation is. In those other games, the different representations are very much split apart; all Mario-related stuff is within a few minigames that do not overlap whatsoever with any of the other ones. In Nintendo Land, you cannot have Mario fighting Ridley in the Lost Woods, despite (representations of) all of those things appearing in the game. In Smash, anyone can interact with anything, regardless of origin, so Mario characters can interact with anything, and anyone can interact with Mario things. That's why Smash, the melting pot it is, gets more focus than Nintendo Land, where everything's more of a side dish.

Proposer: Doc von Schmeltwick (talk)
Deadline: October 17, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Support - clarify it like this

  1. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) - Per
  2. Axii (talk) Even though I disagree with points 6, 7, and especially 8 (Mario-themed minigames should be covered separately), I feel like this is the solution most would agree to compromise on.
  3. Camwoodstock (talk) While we would like to do some stuff of our own (cough cough, maybe a proper solution to Smash redirects clogging categories), this is a good start, we feel. If push comes to shove, we could always revert some of these changes in another proposal.
  4. Ahemtoday (talk) This is a great framework for our coverage of the series. I still would like a better handling of smaller things like trophies, stickers, spirits, and music, but I'm not sure what that would look like and we could always make that change later.
  5. Hewer (talk) Per proposal, this is a good step towards cleaning up our Smash coverage.
  6. Metalex123 (talk) Per proposal
  7. Tails777 (talk) I’d like to see where this goes. Per proposal.
  8. SolemnStormcloud (talk) Per proposal.
  9. ThePowerPlayer (talk) I've reconsidered my hardline stance since the previous proposal, and I can now agree with most of the points listed here. However, like others have said, I do want to revisit the coverage of massive lists like those for stickers and spirits in the future.
  10. Superchao (talk) Per the proposal. Hving the itemized list will allow for simpler debate and discussion in the future, rather than our ad-hoc coverage status built over time. Lay the groundwork, then discuss the details.
  11. Arend (talk) Per proposal.
  12. OmegaRuby (talk) Per proposal.
  13. Pseudo (talk) The idea that other series' relevance to the Mario franchise within Smash compared to other examples like Nintendo Land resonates greatly with me. Per proposal.
  14. Killer Moth (talk) Per all.

Oppose - don't clarify it like this

  1. SeanWheeler (talk) We might actually need to reduce the Smash coverage a bit more. We especially can't undo that proposal that reduced Pokémon. And those sticker and spirits list really should have been reduced to Mario subjects like the trophy list. The fact that the middle spirit list doesn't have a single Mario spirit is absurd. And maybe those fighter lists should be split back into their own character pages again. Most of them had appeared in Super Mario Maker. I have a different idea of how we should handle Smash.
  2. SmokedChili (talk) This wiki really doesn't need to cover every series that appears in Smash Bros. extensively. Would be better to limit full coverage to both Mario itself and Smash since that's the host series while minimizing exposure to others if there's some connection to Mario, like, which stickers boost tail damage for Yoshi. General info on all of the modes (Classic, collections, settings), that's fine. Characters, stages, items, Assist Trophy spawns etc., just list the Mario content, mention the totals and the proportions from Mario, and include screenshots of full selections if possible.

Comments - clarify the clarification?

(I was gonna name the options "Smash" and "Pass," but I thought that might be too dirty) - Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 15:38, October 3, 2024 (EDT)

@Axii - I wouldn't say any of the minigames are really innately Mario-themed, though. If any were, I'd have them stay separate. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 16:02, October 3, 2024 (EDT)

As I mentioned on your talk page, Break the Targets and Board the Platforms have Mario-themed stages Axii (talk) 23:57, October 3, 2024 (EDT)
Yes, and as I mentioned in the proposal, those can be separately split later if it is determined to be acceptable. The minigames themselves, however, are not Mario-themed. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 00:19, October 4, 2024 (EDT)
Why not leave them out of this proposal though. Why should we merge Mario content? Axii (talk) 09:29, October 4, 2024 (EDT)
The current articles don't actually describe the individual stages anyway, just an overview of the mode. Also, those list pages already include the Mario stages, just with a "main article" template. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 13:56, October 4, 2024 (EDT)
It just means 4 more weeks before it can be split. I just don't see a need to decide on these in this proposal. Axii (talk) 04:41, October 9, 2024 (EDT)

@Doc von Schmeltwick I know you are familiar with my crossover article draft using Zelda as a base, but I do not think I clarified some of the intents I had with it, which I shared here with Mushzoom. I do not think it intersects with what you layout above, but I just wanted to let you know. (I also welcome other folks to check it out.) - Nintendo101 (talk) 16:45, October 3, 2024 (EDT)

I think both can coexist dandily. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 16:56, October 3, 2024 (EDT)

@SeanWheeler: Though the middle spirit list has no spirits of Mario characters, it's not irrelevant to Mario because Mario characters, stages, items, etc. appear in many spirit battles. In fact, the very first spirit on that page (Jirachi) has Mario relevance (you need Luma and Starlow to summon it). Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 18:09, October 3, 2024 (EDT)

@SmokedChili - What about non-Mario characters that we cover anyway due to them crossing over outside of Smash, like Link, Isabelle, and Banjo? Surely their presence in another crossover deserves to be acknowledged. That's one of the main issues that arises with the "nuclear" mindset. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 13:32, October 4, 2024 (EDT)

What about those? Them crossing over in Mario isn't the same thing as crossing over in Smash. That's where the complete selection screenshots come in, make them image maps where crossover subjects with Mario Wiki articles get image map links with necessary notes. That way lists don't have to bleed over to include anything else but Mario.
On another note, shouldn't you have just waited four more weeks? You posted here your concern over those two proposals stalling you further with this if they passed, but that's not how rule 7 works. It says 'any decision'. That means voting to keep status quo is also what can't be overturned for 4 weeks. SmokedChili (talk) 09:28, October 5, 2024 (EDT)
My understanding is that, because those two proposals failed, neither of this proposal's outcomes would contradict that. The coverage that they were trying to remove is kept either way here. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 11:25, October 5, 2024 (EDT)
Honestly, I think all those points should be in their own separate proposals. I would support #1 if it was a talk page proposal for Talk:List of Super Smash Bros. series items, but combined in a wiki proposal with other things I don't want, I had to oppose. @Axii is that month really worth having #6, #7 and #8? @Camwoodstock, sure we can revert some of these changes with another proposal, but the proposal rules state we have to wait four weeks before we have a counterproposal to a part of this proposal. And if Hewer is right about failed proposals not counting, then would opposing this be the better choice of action when you disagree with just one thing? Oh, and @Hewer, if I make a proposal to reduce the Spirit List, I would definitely want to keep the Spirit Battles that involve Mario fighters and stages. And with stickers, I would get rid of the non-Mario stickers that don't specifically boost Mario characters. And, I definitely do not want Smash 64's page in that way. It should be as focused on Mario like how Bulbapedia's Super Smash Bros. series game pages focus on the Pokémon content, and how the Sonic Wiki Zone's page on Super Smash Bros. Brawl was more about Sonic. #4 is going to make our Smash game pages more comprehensive than Smash Wiki's game pages. If we're really that worried about losing stuff in our reduction of Smash coverage, why don't we talk to Smash Wiki's admins about merging the pages we don't need into Smash Wiki's articles? There's got to be some cross-wiki communication if the Donkey Kong Wiki merged into us. SeanWheeler (talk) 01:11, October 6, 2024 (EDT)
My long term goal is only having non-Mario Smash content on the game page itself. If it means compromising to get more people on board, I'm all for it. I'm going to make a prediction that in 5 years the idea to cover Smash like a guest appearance won't be much controversial Axii (talk) 02:04, October 6, 2024 (EDT)
As I said in the proposal, "we can base what we could do on if other wikis do something, but not base what we cannot do from those - nothing forbids coverage just because of that." Also Sonic is a bad example since he was only introduced in the third game, while Bulbapedia is built around the very rigid structure of the main Pokemon games anyway. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 02:12, October 6, 2024 (EDT)
I think folks engaging with this proposal should think critically about what type of titles the Super Smash Bros. games are in relation to Super Mario? Are they:
A. Proper Mario crossovers on par with Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games and Itadaki Street DS? or
B. Games that have some Mario material in it on par with Punch-Out!! (Wii), NES Remix, The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening, and NBA Street V3? or
C. Neither or something in between?
I think part of the issue with this in particular is not only that Smash Bros. articles had seen full support on the wiki for a very long time, but many of the characters and elements in it do appear with Super Mario in completely other contexts. Almost none of the Fighter lists we have on Super Mario Wiki exclusively cover the Smash Bros. title of their respective articles and it is just odd to organize information that way. Super Mario also represents the greatest percentage of material in every Smash Bros. game.
I do not know if it is worth holding on to any spirit, sticker, or trophy lists, but if we did, and restricted to to ones that are not only of Super Mario subjects, but things that can be applied to Mario fighters, I would personally find lists like that so fragmented that the articles would basically be useless. What's the point of having intentionally fragmented articles and lists that no one is going to read? - Nintendo101 (talk) 02:22, October 6, 2024 (EDT)
The trophy lists already got trimmed to just Mario ones, which is easier to do there because the non-Mario ones don't interact with Mario characters like stickers and spirits do. I wouldn't want to remove Mario-relevant information, but I also agree with your "fragmented articles" comment, so I think not trimming the stickers and spirits is the best choice. Plus, in the case of spirits, they can all be used by Mario characters, so you can justify it similarly to the list of items. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 07:01, October 6, 2024 (EDT)
To be clear, failed proposals do count for the four-week no overturning rule, I was just saying that the failed outcome of those two specific proposals doesn't contradict either of this proposal's outcomes. If this proposal were to fail, it'd still be four weeks until a proposal to only do some of its changes could be made. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 06:43, October 6, 2024 (EDT)
I'd say Smash should be something between a guest appearance and crossover. Smash is the biggest crossover ever, but to cover it as fully as Mario & Sonic, we'd be competing against Smash Wiki. But we can't treat Smash as a guest appearance because Mario is more overrepresented than Fire Emblem, and because Link's Awakening is not covered on Link's page despite having a page for it. If we could merge with the DK Wiki, then maybe there could be some cross-wiki discussion to merge pages not relevant to Mario into Smash Wiki. Maybe we should get the CrossWiki Team involved? I don't know how this works. I don't see the DK Wiki merge in the proposal archive. SeanWheeler (talk) 00:47, October 7, 2024 (EDT)
I do not think this is the same situation because DK Wiki was consolidated with Super Mario Wiki due to low community activity, maintenance, and attention. (It should be noted that Super Mario Wiki was covering the Donkey Kong franchise concurrently at the time anyways, even for the many years when DK Wiki existed.) It was the Donkey Kong Wiki's admins that sought consolidation with us. Both Super Mario Wiki and Smash Wiki are in the good fortune of having dedicated communities, so there isn't exactly the same kind of pressure.
At this point, I do not think there are any Smash Bros. articles on Super Mario Wiki that are not also already on Smash Wiki. In my view, what differentiates some of these articles is "tone" and how subjects are covered. - Nintendo101 (talk) 01:13, October 7, 2024 (EDT)
Well, of course there wouldn't be any Smash Bros. articles on Super Mario Wiki that isn't already on Smash Wiki. And there weren't any Donkey Kong Wiki pages that weren't already on Super Mario Wiki was there? What did we do in that merge, cut-and-paste text from DK Wiki into the Donkey Kong related pages here? I would want Smash Wiki on board so that they don't accuse us of plagiarism when merging like that. And if our tone is not compatible with theirs, or if their pages are better than ours, I wouldn't mind if we straight up delete content here. Admins can undelete them if we ever need them later. I definitely do not want this proposal to undo the Pokémon proposal. SeanWheeler (talk) 15:06, October 7, 2024 (EDT)
Where did this whole idea of us "competing" with SmashWiki come from anyway? Even besides the fact we don't have to base what we do on other wikis, the two wikis here have vastly different coverage from one another despite some overlap (SmashWiki has a lot of separate pages that this wiki no longer does, coverage on the fanbase and players, etc., while this wiki covers the whole Mario franchise, obviously). This isn't like Donkey Kong Wiki, where the entirety of its scope was also covered by this wiki. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 15:51, October 7, 2024 (EDT)
Up until this proposal, Super Mario Wiki fully covered the Super Smash Bros. series per the MarioWiki:Coverage policy for crossovers, meaning that for a significant amount of time, the Super Mario Wiki covered about as much Smash as Smash Wiki. In fact, before Smash Wiki joined NIWA, Bulbapedia linked the characters without a NIWA wiki to Super Mario Wiki. Here's the edit to Brawl that relinked characters from Super Mario Wiki to Smash Wiki in 2010]. It's actually a good thing that we're reducing Smash coverage. Doc's proposal that is going to bring back more Smash content would actually be regressive, especially when it undoes the reduction of Pokémon content. Why does Doc want the Pokémon stuff back? Other than Pikachu appearing with Mario characters in the Smash 64 commercial, Mario fighting Charizard in Greninja's reveal trailer, Rayquaza grabbing Diddy Kong in the Subspace Emmisary, and of course the gameplay of Smash allowing Mario characters to fight Pokémon and pick up Poké Balls, Pokémon has nothing to do with Mario. If someone were to write an article on Maggie Lockwood from Chicago Med on the Super Mario Wiki, with so much detail about her history in the episodes of Chicago Med, Chicago Fire and Chicago P.D. without plagiarizing the Chicago Med Wiki article and written well according to the manual of style, of course we'd delete that article because we don't cover the Chicago franchise at all as those shows are not even remotely related to Nintendo. And if it's written so professionally that the only rule broken is the Coverage policy, it wouldn't be funny enough to make it to BJAODN. Unless someone finds it funny that a non-Mario article was written so well on the Super Mario Wiki? But, if the user were to admit that the article was made for BJAODN, that's a real dealbreaker. Sometimes we have to permanently remove content. And in the case of Super Smash Bros, it would be better for use to focus on the Mario, Yoshi, Donkey Kong and Wario series content in the Smash game instead of acting like another Smash Wiki. Do not bring back the unnecessary clutter. SeanWheeler (talk) 01:52, October 9, 2024 (EDT)
Except that the proposal isn't about adding articles on Pokémon, it's just to keep all the information about the Smash games on the games' own pages, which I think is reasonable as a middle ground between guest appearance and full Mario crossover. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 03:50, October 9, 2024 (EDT)
But it wants to add more irrelevant images to the galleries. Honestly, maybe we should treat Smash more like a guest appearance. Sure, the Super Mario franchise has been overrepresented in Smash to the point of getting more series symbols for spinoffs, but when there's a NIWA wiki, it's best to let Smash Wiki handle Smash. We don't need the list of Pokémon on the game pages. I'd check Bulbapedia's version of those pages instead. We shouldn't cram everything about the Smash games. There's a reason why we're splitting histories and galleries of major Mario characters. There is MarioWiki:Article size to consider. Other NIWA wikis would focus on their series in the Smash games. When a majority of NIWA wikis handle Smash a certain way, it might be a good idea to follow their example. And I think those lists of Smash content should be reduced to Mario-relevant information. And the lists that only include stuff that don't have their own pages should be deleted. Characters who cameoed in Super Mario Maker and other Mario-related appearances outside of Smash should be split from those lists because we would have some information that Smash Wiki wouldn't cover. SeanWheeler (talk) 00:06, October 10, 2024 (EDT)
As I said in the proposal, "We can base what we could do on if other wikis do something, but not base what we cannot do from those - nothing forbids coverage just because of that." Also "irrelevant" is entirely subjective. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 00:33, October 10, 2024 (EDT)
Relation to Mario should be a major factor for relevance to a Mario wiki. There's a reason why Mario cameos are given less coverage than the half-Mario crossovers like Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games. In Smash, Mario's the most overrepresented series, but is one of many series in Smash. SeanWheeler (talk) 04:01, October 10, 2024 (EDT)
Bringing up an extent of coverage we have that I feel is super important--SmashWiki does not do game galleries, and, to my knowledge, they do not want game galleries. Our coverage of Smash provides some images that would otherwise not be seen in places other than, say, The Spriters Resource, which in my opinion is more difficult to navigate for a few images than a wiki such as this. Thinking specifically about the proposal passed to remove "excessive Pokémon lists and images"--to my knowledge, those images are not present (or are not present for the most part) on SmashWiki. --OmegaRuby (talk) 11:43, October 10, 2024 (EDT)
Smash Wiki has gallery sections for each game. Maybe not gallery pages, but still. And besides, the images from that proposal were deleted weren't they? SeanWheeler (talk) 02:04, October 11, 2024 (EDT)
You said it yourself. "Admins can undelete them if we ever need them later." That's what this is. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 23:52, October 11, 2024 (EDT)
But that proposal passed for a good reason. Those images and those lists of Pokémon aren't much use for a Mario Wiki. And besides, the individual Pokémon pages on Smash Wiki is full of images of those Pokémon in Smash. I can't remember what Pokémon images we had here, but I don't think they really have any more value than what's on Smash Wiki. Also, not everyone who voted their support actually supports your entire proposal. Axii doesn't support #6, #7 or #8, and Camwoodstock is thinking of reverting some of these changes with another proposal. So are we going to undo that Pokémon removal proposal only to redo it next month? Wouldn't it be kind of counterproductive to delete them for a month, restore them for another month, and then delete them again? That would look like a deletion war, which is more insane than any edit war because only admins could delete and restore pages. Guys, if you don't want #6 enforced, please oppose this proposal. It would be better to wait and then propose the changes you want individually than it is to undo a proposal you just supported. Would you really want that back-and-forth with the Pokémon content you got rid of? SeanWheeler (talk) 01:06, October 12, 2024 (EDT)
We will have to wait four weeks regardless if this proposal passes or fails, at least some positive changes can be implemented now. It doesn't hurt to take our time and get the rest of the community on board. Axii (talk) 01:14, October 12, 2024 (EDT)
"Doesn't hurt to take our time"? You tell that to Doc. Going back to that subject, what gets me is why would he react like those last two proposals would hold him back (if they succeeded, as he thinks)? That implies there is something in those proposals that he saw overlapping with this, and he's keeping mum because a) he thinks others have already answered that, and b) given his track record, the more invested he becomes in wanting to pass his favored changes, the more likely he is to sidestep the rules. SmokedChili (talk) 17:34, October 12, 2024 (EDT)
What? Those two proposals were about removing content from the pages on the games, and that goes against this proposal because one of its main goals is to keep the pages and galleries on the games comprehensive while trimming on other pages. There's no mysterious conspiracy to "sidestep the rules" here. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 20:23, October 12, 2024 (EDT)
You have to wait four weeks to do something that contradicts a passed proposal or re-proposes a failed proposal. If a proposal fails, there's nothing stopping you from making a counter-proposal immediately, since that indicates community consensus may already be mostly on-board with the opposite of the original proposal. Since those two proposals failed, it ended up not mattering - what I was complaining about then was it pushing it back further if they passed or went into overtime. Also, as it is, I normally play the long game and had been doing so on this subject for years until these past several proposals spurred me into action (if you look seven years ago, I was the one complaining about an omnibus proposal for Smash coverage, so things change... and also that one resulted in a lot of the half-baked oddities of the current system that this one aims to address). Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 12:27, October 15, 2024 (EDT)
Still not how the rule works, if a proposal failed then any proposal following it, a counter-proposal included, is bound to wait those four weeks. Nothing about community consensus there. SmokedChili (talk) 14:06, October 17, 2024 (EDT)
False. The only rule on the subject (rule #7) says "No proposal can overturn the decision of a previous proposal that is less than 4 weeks (28 days) old." Also, no one complained when I made a proposal to split the "truck" page immediately after my "merge all traffic" proposal failed, since that was doing the opposite. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 14:19, October 17, 2024 (EDT)
@SeanWheeler personally, without getting into semantics, having curated and organized galleries is just nice to have and I do not think it has to be the big deal it is being laid out to be. One of Super Mario Wiki's strengths as a historical and artistic reference is its preservation of important assets, artwork, and material, and organizing them. Applying that muscle to the Super Smash Bros. series is, in my view, just objectively wonderful because it is such an important game series and there is not support for this anywhere else. For contrast, this is Smash Wiki's gallery section for Super Smash Bros. Brawl. And here is ours. For many years, these galleries were the primary Smash Bros. material I would engage with on Mario Wiki because Smash Wiki, for as thorough as it is, just does not support them and the community there has a more utilitarian philosophy. There's nothing wrong with that, but it does mean Mario Wiki is supporting something that Smash Wiki just isn't, and unless there is a future where they decide to support this type of infrastructure themselves, I personally think having complete galleries for the Super Smash Bros. series on Super Mario Wiki is an objective good. Maybe I would feel differently if the discussion was that we should be building up these galleries from scratch. But given they are already on the site and have been for years, little is gained from stripping them of material. A fair bit would be lost. - Nintendo101 (talk) 12:54, October 15, 2024 (EDT)

Cite relevant proposals and discussions on policy pages and guidelines

Cite 7-0
Despite how restrictive these pages are to editors below a certain rank, there is truth in saying they are just as community-driven as other pages--often, it's through a consensus among people like me and you that certain rules are implemented or removed. To those who peruse the wiki's policies, it may be helpful to know how the community came to such an agreement on a certain matter, i.e. seeing precisely what arguments lay behind it in a way that the policy page itself may deem excessive to elaborate. Even in the case of a policy that fully reiterates what a discussion put forward, or a proposal where the only one who employed any arguments was the proposer themself, with other users unanimously supporting it through a mere "Per all", there's still value in knowing that there was consent from the community in implementing what was proposed.

The wiki could satisfy this need by citing, as one does in mainspace articles, the discussion that led to the policy change. Said discussion doesn't need to be a proposal (i.e. where the consensus is quantifiable through votes); it could be any kind of user exchange, on this wiki or even on the forums, that thrusted the change into action. Citations could be added to any guideline specifically laid out in aid of editors on this wiki, so not just on pages that are part of the "MarioWiki:" namespace, but also formatting templates or Help pages.

Here is how I propose this is put into action, using snippets from policy and guidelines. I suggest collating these discussion links in a dedicated "discussion" ref group to set them apart from miscellaneous citations that may be present alongside.

MarioWiki:Manual of Style#Non-fiction

Future tense should be avoided when referring to subjects appearing in upcoming media; as trailers and screenshots show said subjects to have already been incorporated into and are thus presently in the game, present tense must be used.[discussion 1]

Template:Rewrite-expand

A specific reason must be added as a parameter (e.g., {{rewrite-expand|Give more detail on the difference between Red and Green Koopa Troopas}}) and it needs to be a clear, actionable point (i.e., simply slapping the template on a page with "bad writing" as the reason is not sufficient), otherwise the template will be removed from whatever page it was applied to.[discussion 2]

MarioWiki:Naming#Shared titles

If there are four or more pages which could be reasonably associated with a particular title,[discussion 3] [...]

  1. ^ MarioWiki:Proposals/Archive/53#Ban_certain_cases_of_future_tense_from_the_wiki
  2. ^ MarioWiki:Proposals/Archive/61#Discourage_drive-by_templating
  3. ^ MarioWiki:Proposals/Archive/70#Lower_the_requirement_for_a_disambiguation_page_from_5_to_4

Note that should this proposal pass, not every bit of policy will require some retroactively-made discussion to be cited. A lot of them just happened to be, either out of common sense or through internal talks. This proposal strictly targets policies and guidelines that already have a relevant discussion available somewhere publicly in the community.

Proposer: Koopa con Carne (talk)
Deadline: October 17, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Support

  1. Koopa con Carne (talk) per proposal.
  2. OmegaRuby (talk) Fantastic idea that supports the community just by way of making it known that we can make big changes.
  3. Arend (talk) Actually not bad of an idea at all. Per proposal.
  4. ThePowerPlayer (talk) Per proposal.
  5. Pseudo (talk) This would be very useful and is something I have often wondered about while looking through policy pages historically.
  6. Camwoodstock (talk) While you could argue this is redundant in the face of just, manually updating the links to proposals, we don't see any harm in trying to standardize that process like this.
  7. FanOfYoshi (talk) Per all.

Oppose

Comments

Was this proposal not just made? How come it's due by tonight? --OmegaRuby (talk) 08:05, October 10, 2024 (EDT)

Corrected. I'm sorry. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 08:26, October 10, 2024 (EDT)

I have a list of proposals that decided coverage status for every guest appearance title, maybe it could help. Axii (talk) 13:55, October 15, 2024 (EDT)

Recreate Smash Bros. DOJO!!

Do not recreate 4-9
As far as I can tell, this proposal won't contradict the big ongoing proposal. 17 years ago this proposal removed Smash Bros. DOJO!!, an official website for Brawl that contains some cool content about the game. The website is still accessible, which is really surprising for Nintendo. The proposal decided that all website articles should be deleted, something this wiki no longer does (just look at Play Nintendo, Wario's Warehouse, and Nintendo Kids Space). Smash Bros. DOJO!! contains plenty of Mario content (mostly in the form of articles similar to Wario's Warehouse) that should be covered on its own page.

Proposer: Axii (talk)
Deadline: October 22, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Support

  1. Pseudo (talk) Per proposal.
  2. Tails777 (talk) Per proposal
  3. Camwoodstock (talk) We're surprised this was deleted given we're currently the last line of defense for Wario's Warehouse nowadays--talk about a change of heart! We wouldn't be opposed to greater documentation of Nintendo's promotional websites, frankly, and this'd be a good starting point for that. Smash DOJO is one of the most famous examples of one of these promotional sites, and while we are a little shaky given it's Smash and not Mario outright, there's nothing preventing us from doing something similar for more Mario-related websites down the road.
  4. FanOfYoshi (talk) Per all.

#Koopa con Carne (talk) Per proposal.

#OmegaRuby (talk) Per proposal.

#Axii (talk) A proposal to reinstate a deleted Smash page, unbelievable

Oppose

  1. Ahemtoday (talk) The Dojo is the same as the Smash 4 or Ultimate websites — all three of them, like most official video game websites, are basically advertisements for their respective games. We're not the Smash Wiki — I see zero need for our coverage of the Smash series to go so deep as to begin to cover its promotional material.
  2. EvieMaybe (talk) we don't need to keep eating smashwiki's lunch. if there's enough exclusively mario-centric content to warrant making a page out of, i'll change my vote, but for now i'm firmly on the camp of "smash stuff is not mario stuff"
  3. SeanWheeler (talk) If we have the official website for Brawl, will we create pages on the Smash 4 and Ultimate websites, the SmashBoards forums and every website Smash Wiki has?
  4. Shy Guy on Wheels (talk) Smash Bros. DOJO!! is the website for Super Smash Bros. Brawl, and I don't know of any instances of this wiki actually making a page for a game's official website, so this would just be incosistent. I'm fine with the general idea of covering the posts on the website, but this would also be inconsistent as neither the posts on the Super Smash Bros. Ultimate website, or Super Smash Bros. 4's "pic of the day" series, have pages here. I want to stress that I don't take issue with either of these concepts as a whole, I'm just not a fan of making a change to create an article on this one topic, and would prefer a bigger proposal that allows coverage of similar topics as well.
  5. Mario (talk) Not relevant to MarioWiki's goals.
  6. Sparks (talk) Per all.
  7. ThePowerPlayer (talk) Super Smash Bros. ≠ Super Mario. SmashWiki already covers this website well, and even if we're talking about a Mario game, there's no precedent on the Mario Wiki to give a game website its own article, as Shy Guy on Wheels brought up.
  8. Power Flotzo (talk) Per everyone.
  9. Super Mario RPG (talk) Per Ahemtoday, EvieMaybe, Shy Guy on Wheels, and others.

Comments

I'd suggest that the website's (textual) contents not be entirely copied and pasted here, though. I understand why this was done with Wario's Warehouse, as that site pretty much disappeared without a trace, but Smash DOJO's still officially up and has been backed up on Internet Archive (thank god Wayback Machine's at least read-only now). I envision its wiki article having a summary of each section of the site and a list of blog posts with relevant links for each section. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 14:22, October 15, 2024 (EDT)

Unless Nintendo takes it down, that's the plan. Axii (talk) 14:29, October 15, 2024 (EDT)

"We wouldn't be opposed to greater documentation of Nintendo's promotional websites, frankly, and this'd be a good starting point for that."
Play Nintendo, Nintendo Kids Space, SMBPlumbing.com, and Welcome to Greedville are a joke to you??? :'((( -- KOOPA CON CARNE 16:47, October 15, 2024 (EDT)

We know this was probably a goof, but honestly, those articles are a very nice basis for what we're talking about! We mostly mean we could also add stuff like the old flash-based NSMB website that had a boatload of downloadables and even hints for the game itself (the former have an incomplete list on that game's gallery, the latter seem to be entirely AWOL), or maybe even stuff like the Japanese Paper Mario site that had pre-created lists of badge setups for the player to try out, complete with descriptions of their strategies. ~Camwoodstock (talk) 16:55, October 15, 2024 (EDT)

@SeanWheeler why are you implying fan websites would get covered? This is not Smash wiki. This is a Mario wiki that should cover everything Mario, and Smash Bros. DOJO!! contains just that. Official Mario content published by Nintendo. Axii (talk) 02:25, October 16, 2024 (EDT)

@Shy Guy on Wheels there is really nothing stopping people from making a page about other official websites if they have enough unique Mario content on them. SMBPlumbing.com is a good example of that. If anything it would be inconsistent if we didn't cover major websites when there's official Mario content on them. This proposal specifically targets DOJO because it has a unique name, historical significance, and plenty of content about Mario. Axii (talk) 09:50, October 16, 2024 (EDT)

@EvieMaybe why are you opposed to covering official Mario content on the Super Mario Wiki? Axii (talk) 09:51, October 16, 2024 (EDT)

@Ahemtoday so, the same as SMBPlumbing.com? Why should we avoid making a page for a website that contains Mario content released by Nintendo just because it's related to Smash? Axii (talk) 09:53, October 16, 2024 (EDT)

Rescinding my vote because, honestly, having browsed the website quite a bit, I'm left wondering what type of content there justifies treating it as a work separate from the object it promotes, in a way that other promo websites aren't. DOJO is definitely more insightful than your average Nintendo game microsite, doubling as a blog where the director himself spills much ink on Brawl's intricacies, but it's not that different in principle--its purpose is still almost solely to give you information on the elements you can expect in a potential future purchase, along with the fringe player-centric content such as fan-submitted snapshots and world records in minigames. Portals like Play Nintendo, SMBPlumbing.com, Welcome to Greedville, and The Lab, while indeed also built entirely in service of one or more products, provide experiences in and of themselves, either by being a hub of activities or by supplementing the fiction within said product(s) and therefore expanding Mario's universe (i.e. SMBPlumbing.com is a make-believe business site for the Mario Bros.; of course it would have an article, it's meant to exist within the Mario movie).
I understand the... let's say, cultural importance of Smash Bros. DOJO, that it represented the bells-and-whistles of Brawl prior to its release, and the fact that it provided direct and constant communication from the game's director, so, yes, it is a special product in its own way. Heck, the title itself is unique and suggests a departure from the average promo site, as opposed to a more generic "Official Super Smash Bros. Brawl(TM) Website". However, it is also inextricably linked to the game. The best course, IMO, would be to summarize the website in a section of Brawl's article and limit it to that, especially against the backdrop of all these attempts to restrict Smash Bros coverage. To be honest, I think Super Mario Maker Bookmark deserves more to have an article. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 12:38, October 16, 2024 (EDT)

I don't know if the Bookmark site should get a page. There's just nothing to write about, no extra information, just a search and bookmarking function. DOJO, on the other hand, contains news publications. It's not an interactive website, but it doesn't devalue all the posts on it. Anything Nintendo puts out online is inherently an advertising material, but, given that Nintendo published articles on it for a year, it should be covered on this wiki. The opposition has mentioned that this proposal would open a can of worms of its own, namely which websites should we even cover, and I think it needs to be addressed by a different proposal at some point in the future regardless of the outcome of this proposal. But for now, I see no harm in making a page for a website with historical significance, unique name, and Mario content exclusive to it. Axii (talk) 12:53, October 16, 2024 (EDT)
Koopa con Carne makes a good point. Rescinding my vote as well, but not switching to oppose, as I wouldn't really mind if we had an article for it anyways. --Small Luigi doing the V-sign in the Super Mario All-Stars remaster of Super Mario Bros. OmegaRuby [ Talk / Contribs ] 14:13, October 16, 2024 (EDT)
The fact that not every Mario website gets an article here would be a strong point against DOJO's return. Why should a Smash official site get an article when not every Mario site has one? Not even Nintendo.com has a page here. DOJO has even less Mario content than Brawl itself. And Smash Wiki has an article on it if you want to read it on a wiki. What is even worth having that article here? Is it going to focus on the Mario content, or would it focus on details that were too unnecessary for the Smash Wiki page? Could someone who undeletes pages check what was on the page the proposal is trying to restore? Was the page a stub? How similar was the page to the Smash Wiki page? Well, even if it was a good article, I think we should give all Mario websites pages before we consider crossover websites like the Smash Bros. Dojo pages. Yes, even the Super Mario Wiki should get a page on itself that isn't the Main Page before we do Smash websites. SeanWheeler (talk) 01:55, October 17, 2024 (EDT)
The quality of the original article is irrelevant, what matters is how much Mario content there is to cover. As I said above, this wiki should have guidelines on website coverage, but it's not for this proposal to decide. And no, this wiki shouldn't cover fan websites. Axii (talk) 03:26, October 17, 2024 (EDT)
In terms of Mario content, it wouldn't be much. It would be almost like having a page about Smash Wiki focusing on their Mario pages. Except that there's even less Mario content on that than there is on Smash Wiki because it is focused on Brawl which has less Mario stuff than Ultimate. The home page shows a wider version of the game's cover art which has Mario, Wario and Peach on it along with eight non-Mario characters. The character's gallery has only Wario and Diddy Kong out of the twelve characters in the newcomers section; Mario, Bowser, Peach, Donkey Kong and Yoshi out of the thirteen veterans, and the only secret character who is Mario-related is Luigi. The Mario universe doesn't even take up half the roster. Now, let's look at the stages. Delfino Plaza, Yoshi's Island, Rumble Falls, WarioWare Inc.; Mario Circuit and Mushroomy Kingdom are the 6 Mario stages out of the 23 visible stages in the Stages category not counting the links to the two lists of Melee stages. Well, I guess the first part is not much of a list because it only has the Temple from Zelda. But in Melee Stages Part 2, there is Yoshi's Island and Rainbow Cruise as the two Mario stages out of the list of five. Not even half of the stuff on the DOJO is Mario related. I don't see how it could warrant an article when a purely Mario official site like the Super Mario Maker Bookmark doesn't. SeanWheeler (talk) 23:30, October 18, 2024 (EDT)

For everyone's information, I added a section about the site on Brawl's article. I don't believe the outcome of this proposal has any bearing on the manner this subject is currently handled, seeing as the sole goal of the proposal is to give it a separate page. I also disagree with the idea that the site is irrelevant to the wiki, for the simple reason that, much like the game it advertises, it has lots of Mario content on it and is official. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 11:04, October 18, 2024 (EDT)

Most of the opposition has valid takes, but I still don't understand why @SeanWheeler brought up the SmashBoard forums in his oppose vote, as well as all websites covered by the SmashWiki, which in turn includes websites like Source Gaming and Anther's Ladder/Smashladder. Those are fan websites. The Super Mario Wiki does not cover fan content at all, let alone fan websites. In fact, I'd argue that this wiki would sooner give the Smash Bros DOJO its own article than, say, the Mario Fan Games Galaxy, despite the latter befitting the Mario theming better; because the DOJO is at least an official Nintendo website. It feels a little weird to include sites like Smashboards among the official Super Smash Bros websites in your argument as if they're all on equal footing, when they're clearly not. ArendLogoTransparent.pngrend (talk) (edits) 16:09, October 21, 2024 (EDT)

My own issue with this proposal is that there is no policy on website coverage we could refer to. I also recognize that other official Smash websites contain news articles similar to DOJO. I still believe that this website should get its own page, mainly because of a unique name assigned to it that makes it stand out among other websites from the same series and the amount of Mario content featured on it.

I believe this wiki needs proper guidelines for website coverage, because right now it feels like an inconsistent mess. Play Nintendo's coverage is so excessive that everything from opinion polls to cards and prints gets covered, but then something like DOJO gets the short end of the stick. It's not like this proposal wants non-Mario Smash content to be added, but the criticism of "it's Smash, so it's not our job to cover it" is still being made. This proposal is flawed to the core, in the sense that it has no legs to stand on. I'll see you in four weeks! Axii (talk) 16:34, October 21, 2024 (EDT)

The first two Smash games also had uniquely named websites, albeit Japanese-only. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 13:38, October 22, 2024 (EDT)
@Arend I had no idea what our policy was about fan content. I mean, it's obvious that we don't cover fanon, but in terms of websites, I didn't even know what kind of websites we cover. It's only now that I've discovered the Internet category here, and that's from trying to look up "Category:Websites" after reading your comment. Also, please do not refer to me by the singular they. I am a he. Your comment was more correct before you added that pronoun. SeanWheeler (talk) 19:01, October 22, 2024 (EDT)
The wiki makes a point of not covering fan content, why would websites be an exception? Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 02:46, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
What Hewer said.
Also, I use "they" whenever I'm uncertain about one's gender, so I'm sorry about the potential misgendering. I'll quickly correct it for you. ArendLogoTransparent.pngrend (talk) (edits) 05:45, October 23, 2024 (EDT)

Forbid negative criticism of other NIWA wikis

canceled by proposer
Recently I've been concerned over the criticism of our affiliated wikis in NIWA, particularly in proposals. This proposal will not affect the style of our wiki (i.e. we don't start using tabbers just because other wikis do so). It's just encouraging other users to be friendlier to other NIWA wikis. We all feel strongly about the same endeavor of being independent. To quote the front page, all NIWA wikis are united by the following values and highlight the values that will back my proposal:

We are driven by our focus on our fans:

  • Fan communities should be run by the fans, and not corporate entities that don't put the community first.
  • Fan communities should be run for the fans, by people who will always think about how they can continue to enhance the enjoyment of everyone in the community.
  • Fan communities should be run together with the fans, embracing a spirit of co-operation and camaraderie.

To give one example of what won't be allowed if this proposal passes, you cannot say "I don't think WiKirby is a good example -- of anything." WiKirby is a different experience from this wiki, as is any NIWA wiki, but everyone in the WiKirby community is friendly people who are trying their best at giving the best Kirby coverage on the internet.

To back up my reasoning behind the above paragraph, the about page says "Each maintains their own unique designs, values and traditions. We are bound together by our common desire to better ourselves (and each other) while retaining our own identities and autonomy." Putting other wikis down, like the example above, goes against the very principles of what it means to be part of NIWA. The Courtesy policy states that it is not in one's place to pick at the shortcoming of others. Why should we limit that treatment that treatment to only users on our wiki, especially when editors from other wikis edit here all the time? We're all in this battle against Fandom together, and we've made marvelous progress that no single wiki community alone could do.

Why be rude to other wikis, even? I've seen great nods to this wiki like with the WarioWare pages on Fire Emblem Wiki and Zelda Wiki. I love the franchise and series pages that @Nintendo101 is working on (and it's helping with my pet peeves with excessive coverage), since I think it could resolve a lot of coverage issues here, and reciprocate nods back over to our friends on other NIWA wikis.

If this proposal passes, the Courtesy page will be updated to address this, accordingly.

Proposer: Super Mario RPG (talk)
Deadline: November 6, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Support

  1. Super Mario RPG (talk) Per
  2. Killer Moth (talk) Per proposal. Keeping this place a positive and healthy community is only a good thing, so making sure we don't alienate other NIWA wikis is important.

Oppose

  1. Axii (talk) Criticism of other wikis is a good thing. Community discussion and pointing out flaws isn't "being mean" to other wikis, neither is using them as an example of what we should avoid doing. "...Everyone in the WiKirby community is friendly people who are trying their best at giving the best Kirby coverage on the internet." I'm sure they are, but discussion of other wikis' flaws has nothing to do with it. Nothing says camaraderie like discussing issues openly. There is no harm in comments like "I don't think WiKirby is a good example -- of anything". Silencing it only risks people avoiding mentioning other wikis in anything but a positive light in fear of getting a reminder or a warning.
  2. Hewer (talk) Being openly rude to other people is already forbidden in the courtesy policy, so having a specific ruling about this feels redundant. At best, it's an extra rule that doesn't serve much of a purpose, and at worst, it's limiting people's freedom to say what they think. No wiki is infallible, whether we're in an alliance with them or not, and I don't think one person making a small remark about what they feel are shortcomings of another wiki indicates disrespect to that wiki's community or undermines the alliance in any way.
  3. Nintendo101 (talk) Forgive me for the strong language, but this is absolutely outrageous. Good-faith criticism is an intrinsic component of any communal creative project, as well as an important freedom of the people involved. There are not many things that I would consider being more disrespectful to our NIWA affiliates, or the SMW userbase, than stymying what people can say about our fellow wikis in good faith. I would be disturbed if any of our NIWA affiliates had a similar policy about Super Mario Wiki.
  4. LinkTheLefty (talk) Let's make one thing very clear: criticism and flaming are not the same thing. Some users are, on an individual level, more opinionated than others, but none of it affects the wiki as a whole or its aims.
  5. Sparks (talk) Per all.
  6. Koopa con Carne (talk) Per Axii and Hewer. Self-righteousness and fake positivity are some of the most insidiously harmful traits that a community can foster anywhere. Whether you're one person or a community, one of the most important things you should do if you seek to improve your work is to be open to criticism, be able to pick it apart, and internalize the constructive parts. I was here to witness it when the phrase "oddly enough", a tentpole of Mario Wiki writing in the late 2000s and early 2010s, slowly went the way of the dinosaur, which I heard owed to the ridicule of fellow Mario fansite TheMushroomKingdom.com. There could be more examples of such undertakings I'm not aware of, but as someone who's long been involved in this project I actually welcome any and all criticism coming my way or our way with great radiant warmth.

Comments

Question: Do the other NIWA wikis have similar rules in place about us in kind? LinkTheLefty (talk) 14:45, October 23, 2024 (EDT)

I kind of thought it's a given, based on the front page of niwanetwork.org, but there's no harm in clarifying it on wikis themselves. Super Mario RPG (talk) 14:48, October 23, 2024 (EDT)

@Axii Pointing out flaws of other wikis isn't our role, nor anything this particular wiki and its endeavors can do anything about. To give the tabber example, others can still criticize what they don't like about it, but without pointing fingers at other wikis. Super Mario RPG (talk) 14:50, October 23, 2024 (EDT)

It isn't this wiki's role, and the wiki doesn't do it. Criticizing an aspect of something isn't being mean to it. When an editor says "SmashWiki's coverage is poor for a casual player", they don't mean "SmashWiki is terrible". They mean "this specific aspect of the SmashWiki isn't good". Criticizing something isn't insulting, it's bringing up an issue to light. Noone on this wiki goes around badmouthing other wikis. It only comes up as an example of what should be avoided. If other wikis' editors happen to read it, they can consider if it's worth bringing up to their own community. It harms noone, it only benefits everyone in the long term. Axii (talk) 14:56, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
Yes, but we are a wiki on Super Mario. Saying things (like the SmashWiki example) is counterproductive to this wiki's goals. And when I said "criticism" in the proposal title, I was not referring to it as "constructive criticism." There is no way to spin "WiKirby is not good at anything" as something that's intended to come across as positive, constructive, and supportive. Super Mario RPG (talk) 15:01, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
Using another wiki as an example of what should be avoided isn't counterproductive, as I said already, noone here goes around badmouthing other wikis. Even small comments like "WiKirby is not good at anything" are opinions of individual editors that harm noone. Sure, not everything is constructive, but I believe it's better not to introduce it as a rule anyway because all it does is make people avoid mentioning other wikis. Not to mention, it would be hypocritical to criticise Fandom and pretend like NIWA should be given a special treatment. I believe this rule would only hinder discussion. If users feel the need to use another wiki as an example of what should be avoided, they should be able to. Axii (talk) 15:08, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
If pointing at another wiki as an example of what to be avoided, it may upset others from that community if they read it. Super Mario RPG (talk) 15:31, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
Why do you say it "isn't our role" and "we are a wiki on Super Mario" as though we're putting criticisms of other wikis in mainspace? This is a proposal about limiting what people can say on discussion pages. "We", the Super Mario Wiki, don't criticise other wikis at all. Individual people might in discussions where it's relevant, but they don't speak for the whole wiki. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 15:32, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
I didn't mean to suggest mainspace. I was trying to suggest, for example, "being concerned over how Kingdom Hearts character pages look on the KH Wiki shouldn't be a concern of this wiki as a whole. Super Mario RPG (talk) 15:35, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
As I said though, it's not a concern of this wiki as a whole. It might potentially be brought up by a user on a discussion page if it was relevant in some way, but that user doesn't speak for "this wiki as a whole". Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 15:39, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
Criticizing another wiki could be tantamount to saying how we want them to do things. What if our wiki was the recipient of such a remark from one of our affiliates? Super Mario RPG (talk) 15:45, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
I don't see such criticisms as coming from "the wiki" or "us", they come from individual people who, once again, don't necessarily speak for the whole community of the wiki they happen to edit on, and don't necessarily speak against the whole community of a wiki they happen to have an issue with. There's nothing wrong with individual people having or expressing their own opinions. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 16:22, October 23, 2024 (EDT)

@Hewer Does the courtesy policy mention being rude to people on this wiki or in general? Super Mario RPG (talk) 15:31, October 23, 2024 (EDT)

It only explicitly talks about people on this wiki, but it's common sense that you shouldn't be rude to people on other wikis either. I don't agree with characterising any criticism of another wiki as being rude to that wiki, though. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 15:39, October 23, 2024 (EDT)

@Nintendo101 It's okay if you oppose, of course, though I updated the title of the proposal to get rid of the suggestion that this wiki is aiming to ban good-faith criticism. Super Mario RPG (talk) 15:49, October 23, 2024 (EDT)

While appreciated, it does not seem like the aims of the proposal have shifted. If the goal is to ban "bad-faith" criticism, then I don't feel like any of the examples provided reflect that. The one exception is the comment about WiKirby being a little rude, but it comes from a proposal where all of the other remarks were substantive, so it was really the exception, not the rule. Similar with the remarks about ZeldaWiki's adoption of tabbers. Additionally, our courtesy policies already promote good faith because it is the right thing to do.
In my view, we should not be controlling expression and speech in our userbase. All we ask is that comments are courteous, substantive, good faith, and not rude. Criticism is not in opposition to those aims. I also think criticism is sometimes at its best when it comes externally. If WiKirby were critical of some of the choices made on Super Mario Wiki, I would embrace that, especially since all NIWA wikis share a common set of tools. It's one of the ways we can improve ourselves. - Nintendo101 (talk) 16:09, October 23, 2024 (EDT)

Prioritize sprite/tile uploads that have their original file parameters (or clean divisions of them)

canceled by proposer
This proposal relates to the above, and like it, the only direct change it will bring is an addendum to the image policy.

Most sprites in games are coded so that their parameters are divisible by 8 (though ones that don't follow that exist, particularly in later machines, they are still highly rare). This is due to the same binary-based system that gave us things like "8-bit," to make a long story short it's easier for computers to understand. In sprites, this is not always filled in; for example, you might see a Boo sprite that's only 14x15px filled in rather than 16x16, but that blank space making up the remainder of that 16x16 area is still part of the sprite as it was drawn and programmed in-game. Aside from putting it at the same resolution of the other sprites, odds are the hitbox is still 16x16 pixels, so it still effects the game.

Donkey Kong's icon in Mario Kart: Double Dash!!

If anyone is still confused at what I'm talking about since I am primarily talking in a spriter-based mindset, see the blank areas to the right and top of DK? That is hard-coded in the game's graphic data so it's 64 pixels by 64 pixels, so it is absolutely meant to be there.

Basically, I want to reflect that as much as possible. Aside from the hitbox and resolution thing, this also makes them easier to animate and is just a neat little "visual" bit of trivia that can only be seen by accurately displaying their parameters, including the small amount of blank space some may have. I don't know if it will make it easier for the wiki's storage or not, but if it does, that's an added bonus.

Now, this is not attempting an across-the-board shift towards this; the key is feasibility for each image. An image from an NES game or a mugshot icon for a large-cast game will invariably be simple enough for this, but then there's convoluted things like Roger the Potted Ghost or Air Bag that are mishmashes of distorted sprites and models. There's no way to follow this guideline for them to the letter because of that, and those are hardly the only weird things - or even edge cases - out there. Essentially, if an image can be displayed in a manner that is true to its internal parameters while still resembling how it appears in-game, it's better that it does. If it can't, then just don't worry about it, it's a non-issue. Uploading one that does not follow it is also not an issue, but if a replacement can be uploaded that follows it, then it will have priority. If an image has an utterly ridiculous amount of blank space disproportionate to its size or the size of related images, then it can be cut down to a still 8x8-numbered smaller size if it covers them all; for instance, according to the TSR rip it is sourced from, thisMedia:DKP03 health Donkey Kong.png sprite was from a 64x64-sized tile that only had the graphic in the 16x16 section of the middle. Granted, it may just not have been cut down during development since it was canceled, or that may be artificial on Ragey's part, but the point is that there's a point where it's unnecessary, but there are better ways to deal with it than purely cutting down to the visible portion's size. Additionally, the course map for GCN Dry Dry Desert could be cropped by half while keeping 128px parameters and not affecting the vertical positioning on center-aligned displays (like consistent-sized galleries and table rows), so that is an example of a cropping-to-save-space that does not really lose anything - and the kind that this proposal would still consider within reason to cut down by.

TL;DR: Cutting down big images with large amounts of blank space is fine as long as the final image still has dimensions at a factor of 8x8, as that is generally how tiling and computer systems work. Weird graphics that are assemblies of distorted sprites or inconsistent tilings are not bound by this whatsoever. This is more focused on small sprites, icons, and fractalled textures.

Proposer: Doc von Schmeltwick (talk)
Deadline: November 6, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Support-by-sixteen

  1. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) - I'm tiled of the confusion
  2. Super Mario RPG (talk) Per proposer.
  3. Hewer (talk) Doesn't hurt to be more accurate to what's official, per proposal.
  4. EvieMaybe (talk) supporting this primarily for smaller 8/16 bit sprites that actually stick to tile rectangles (ie, no DKC). i'm not sure if we should do this on texture-type assets

#PnnyCrygr (talk) I'm supporting this so that we can have consistent display resolutions of sprite. Consistency always is great. Per Doc

Oppose-by-seven

  1. Nintendo101 (talk) I think sometimes the display and formatting demands of our articles entails adjusting the empty space around some assets, and I do not think that is inherently a wrong thing to do. We have animated and assembled sprites to reflect their in-game appearances in ways that do not reflect how the assets are stored in the game's files in order to reflect how they actually look to the player during gameplay, and I view narrowing the empty space around an asset as the same type of revision. If folks truly want assets displayed as the raw materials they appear in the files, without any curatorial adjustments, the Spriters-Resource is available to them. (For clarity, I am not opposed to folks wanting to hang onto the empty space around an asset, but I do not think there should be a blanket rule mandating we "must" do it.)
  2. Waluigi Time (talk) Per Nintendo101. As a wiki, the main reason we have sprites is to illustrate a subject, not to show the hitbox or archive a particular asset exactly as it was programed into the game. Sometimes there's a good reason to have some empty space on an image (all playable character icons being the same size is nice, for example) but other times preserving it is arbitrary or even makes them look worse when in use.
  3. PnnyCrygr (talk) Per all. Best leave the spaces filled especially when theres a great deal of space around the graphic. I have seen Mega Party Games asset dumps of character sprites from my Dolphin, and boy they look small with all that big, wasted space around Mona, Crygor, Kat, etc..
  4. Arend (talk) It's optimal at times, but I don't think it needs to be enforced, especially if there's loads and loads of empty space. Take File:DryDryDesertMap-MKDD.png for example. When I reuploaded the file back in 2023, I decided to crop the thing in a 128 x 128 square (keeping it divisible by 8) instead of keeping the original ratio of 128 x 256, because, quite frankly, at least half of the image's height is empty space. You restored the original ratio because that's how it was stored in the data, hereby recreating the bulk of unnecessary empty space again.
  5. OmegaRuby (talk) Per all. Better to be able to see the contents of an image without having to zoom in and view.
  6. Ray Trace (talk) No. Images such as this and this have been cropped from their original dimensions because the extra space is worthless space. The only reason textures even have blank space like this to begin with is primarily programming-related: back then, it's much easier for computers to compute image dimensions in powers of 8 hence why textures are at resolutions with 8, 16, 32, 64, etc which is not useful for image display purposes on this wiki, and modern computers don't need to abide by these restrictions any more (esp Switch titles, which can have widely varying dimensions in their textures). I do get in certain cases, consistency is key such as the Donkey Kong portrait in Double Dash having minimal amounts of empty space, but for my aforementioned examples, crop to content would serve a much better purpose, leaving this better off using individual discretion wherever to leave empty space or not.
  7. Sparks (talk) Per all.
  8. Jdtendo (talk) Per all, keeping extra space or only cropping to 8x8 tiles is not beneficial to the wiki.
  9. ThePowerPlayer (talk) This is completely empty space that only obstructs the presentation of an image. As Nintendo101 mentioned, The Spriters Resource is the place to find sprites as the game stores them.
  10. Scrooge200 (talk) It's unreasonable to expect uploaders to be able to know the original data-stored parameters of a sprite they upload, given the different ripping methods and how some games might be difficult to rip from. And as someone who usually downloads images from the wiki for projects, I like having them cropped to content.
  11. Mario (talk) There are times where padding space or keeping dimensions the same as ripped helps but in plenty of cases, there's no need to maintain game engine limitations on the wiki. If we are going to insist that a a small sprite in a 128x256 asset of blank space needs people to know it originated in that dimensions officially why not list other properties of an image such as mipmap count or compression being dxt5 (and not rgb888) with a positive boolean value for texture clamp? If a game engine corrects a gamma but the texture itself is actually much darker than it is, should we upload it with an gamma fix or not?
  12. UltraMario (talk) Per all. This is getting insanely ridiculous lately. The space isn't at all needed and the gallery page can just be adjusted to fit the new space.
  13. Sdman213 (talk) Per all.
  14. TheFlameChomp (talk) Per all. It makes to try to keep uploads accurate to the official appearance, but I do not see the benefit of keeping unnecessary empty space.

Comments-by-64

@Nintendo101 - TSR doesn't always have that either, though, and I don't think it's really our place to wholesale rely on other websites for this sort of thing. Besides, this also looks better and makes things easier when using the multiframe and multiple-image templates since the boxes are at a consistent size and both match each other and don't need to have their sizes checked individually when adding the template in. Also, I'd like you to read the last paragraph of the proposal and tell me where that "must" came from. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 17:30, October 23, 2024 (EDT)

Again, if folks choose to do that for individual assets or articles, that's fine. But I would not support a blanket rule. Speaking for myself, I have put a lot of careful thought into how sprites and models are displayed on things like Template:Icon or the tables for the mainline games. The removal or presence of space around an asset is largely deliberate, and is part of the curatorial craft of presenting information. I know I would find contributing to the site a lot less enjoyable if I had to undo much of that work for something like this. - Nintendo101 (talk) 17:37, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
Again, where are you getting the idea of a "blanket rule?" The proposal says that this is done case-by-case, doesn't need enforced, and involves no punitive measures. It's more of a general suggestion. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 17:41, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
I guess I just don't understand why this proposal was enacted, or how it would be substantively realized if it passes, if it does not necessitate any actual changes. From your perspective, how would things be different if the proposal were to pass? What would actually happen that is different from how things are handled now? If I uploaded a sprite that was narrowed to the visible parts of a sprite with deliberate intent, and it was replaced with a version that retained the empty space around it with this proposal cited, would I have the freedom to change it back? Because if that is the case, then it does not really seem like this proposal is very necessary unless we had a rule that insists we "must" crop to content. To the best of my knowledge, a rule like that isn't on the books. - Nintendo101 (talk) 17:50, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
Again, they would be prioritized so they'd be reverted to the non-narrowed version, but this isn't a call to enact a sweeping change. This is more to clarify if that should be done. As a sprite-ripper, I think it absolutely should. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 18:02, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
So for clarification, I would not have the freedom to change it back if this proposal were to pass? - Nintendo101 (talk) 18:04, October 23, 2024 (EDT)
Why would you want to? What benefit does 14x14 have over 16x16? Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 01:03, October 24, 2024 (EDT)
Because sometimes retaining the empty space around a sprite knocks it out of alignment with other assets when displayed in a table, gallery, or template (or renders it completely unusable for something like a template), and because the visual material we have is meant to be illustrative it seems needless to retain that when there is nothing visual informing the reader. I value the freedom to exercise discretion, and I suspect I am not alone in that. - Nintendo101 (talk) 13:04, October 24, 2024 (EDT)
That empty space is the alignment, though. And I have yet to see a 16x16 image become less useful for a template or table than an artificially shrunk 14x14 one - if anything, consistent image sizes make that easier because they don't cause table cells to become inconsistently sized (AKA OCD's biggest nightmare). Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 13:50, October 24, 2024 (EDT)
In your view, it is alignment. For others, it may not be and that is not inherently invalid. If you want examples, I can point out that Template:Icon was developed to integrate icons alongside text, similar to Template:Button and Template:World, and so it is important that those icons match the same scale as text. That is not always possible if the surrounding space is retained, rendering icons smaller next to text than they should be. There are sprites displayed alongside artwork and models for subjects in the Super Mario 64 and Super Mario Odyssey articles, and they are all unified to be displayed at 100x100px resolution for unified display. If some of those assets were amended to retain the empty space around them, they would needlessly be display at smaller size than the subjects around them. But fundamentally, I do not think I needed to have provided any examples of why. My point is that users should have the freedom to exercise discretion, and I don't think that should by taken away.
You may say this is not a "sweeping change." To you, it may not be. But if I (or anyone else) cannot retain an asset displayed at specific dimensions, regardless of the reason, because of this proposal (which is the impression imparted from our exchange here), then I think it has bigger ramifications than you say and I don't think it is something I could support. I would feel similarly of a proposal that mandates we "must" crop to content, because I don't think users should be hamstrung to things like that. - Nintendo101 (talk) 14:26, October 24, 2024 (EDT)
If you look at my conversation with Arend below, I explain some more examples of "good" types of discretion, like with maps where they're still in 8x8 multiples and the vertical positioning is kept. Meanwhile, platformer sprites in a grid-based game (so basically any Super Mario Bros. or Super Mario Land game) do not need to be cropped down to below their smallest raw amount unless there is a literal fully blank tile involved. For instance, I cannot see any benefit provided by this changeMedia:SML2 Sprite Cannonball (Space Zone).png. It may be your discretion that it made sense to do, but it's my discretion that it helped nothing and should be changed back. As such "discretion" is not really a good argument to say that the current system (or lack thereof) is better. I wouldn't use this to enforce anything involving the DKC or DKL games (like Evie said), because their sprite tiling is all over the place and inconsistent even within the same animations, but those are the exceptions, not the rule. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 14:48, October 24, 2024 (EDT)
I noticed the SML2 cannonball sprites looked smaller than their neighbors in Gallery:Cannonball when I included them on the page, and I thought the size uniformity would look nicer. That was the only reason I cropped to visual content, and I think that was substantive and harmless because it did not compromise the asset. If you did not like that, there was nothing stopping you from reaching out to me.
I don't think you have really said anything yet that has made me feel more comfortable with this proposed policy revision. This is a communal craft and space. I still do not think users should be hamstrung and should have freedom to exercise discretion. - Nintendo101 (talk) 15:59, October 24, 2024 (EDT)
And again, my discretion is the opposite of yours, so that's another issue with just saying "keep it as available to discretion," because that could lead to its own endless series of debates. In regards to this, though, remember the "rawsize" proposal. That combined with this should solve both issues that gallery might have. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 16:31, October 24, 2024 (EDT)

@PnnyCrygr - "If an image has an utterly ridiculous amount of blank space disproportionate to its size or the size of related images, then it can be cut down to a still 8x8-numbered smaller size if it covers them all" Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 18:32, October 23, 2024 (EDT)

@Arend - The issue there is that for the gallery to work right the images - all the same ratio in the data - need to be at the same size. If they were all different anyway (like MK64's maps), that edit wouldn't have been an issue, but since they are all equivalent in size, the gallery ought to reflect that. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 12:20, October 24, 2024 (EDT)

The MKDD map sprite galleries all seem to be preset with widths=128px heights=256px anyway, meaning that the galleries wouldn't suddenly change size or look all wonky: the worst that could happen is if the original image was off-center and that being no longer reflected, but I don't recall that being the case with Dry Dry Desert's map (even then, the maps being off-center was something I tried keeping in mind when cropping them). And in my upload, the width was unchanged anyway, too. ArendLogoTransparent.pngrend (talk) (edits) 13:25, October 24, 2024 (EDT)
Well I mean, I guess as long as the height's not off-center, there's no harm, no foul, as long as it doesn't screw up the course tables on the main page. I've gone ahead and reverted it and the similar ones; that's an example of a "good" crop, akin to the Diddy Kong Pilot icons or the Count Down background. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 13:42, October 24, 2024 (EDT)

Abstaining for now, but we wonder if there should be like, an option for a more case-by-case approach; NES and SNES games get the full aspect ratios, but N64 onwards are fine to crop. Or, alternatively, NES, SNES, and N64 get the aspect ratios, and the GameCube is the cutoff point. ~Camwoodstock (talk) 13:16, October 24, 2024 (EDT)

The current one is intended to be case-by-case; see the discussion I had with Arend above. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 13:45, October 24, 2024 (EDT)

@Ray Trace - Again, note the thing about the MKDD maps. As long as the result is accurate to the 8x8 tiling, it's a non-issue to remove that amount of empty space. This focuses on small amounts of empty space. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 16:32, October 24, 2024 (EDT)

@ThePowerPlayer - And as I mentioned, TSR doesn't have them in most rips, particularly older ones. We shouldn't rely on other sites, and I fail to see how a row or two of pixels obstructs anything. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 13:51, October 26, 2024 (EDT)

One thing I do want to ask the opposition: if we obtain an asset, wouldn't it be more accurate, or dare I even say honest, to portray it exactly how it was made or displayed, without cutting it down? The obvious exception being music due to the legal issues those could cause. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 18:45, October 26, 2024 (EDT)

Not in my view, because we (or at least I) upload assets for people to look at them, and the empty space around an asset is invisible. - Nintendo101 (talk) 19:16, October 26, 2024 (EDT)
I believe that it acts as a sort of "visual trivia" to them that can't really be explained in words, but isn't hurting anything to include in some capacity. It also does marginally affect gameplay visuals particularly in older games, where only a certain number of sprite tiles can horizontally overlap at once before they start disappearing - and that includes blank space overlapping and causing actual visible pixels in other sprites to start disappearing. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 20:16, October 26, 2024 (EDT)

@Scrooge200 - as I said, prioritize, not outright ban uploads that don't have them. As previously stated, there are no punitive measures involved (also several fan projects, notably fan animations and fan games, would be better served with the space there - the main reason I haven't animated the Mario Power Tennis audience, for example, is the sprite rip on TSR lacks that spacing completely, so I have no idea how they cleanly go together). Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 11:09, October 27, 2024 (EDT)

@Mario - Imitating in-game corrections is fine on both counts (though there's no reason both can't be uploaded in separate capacities, as some are simply results of ambient lighting; plus, ones with normals applied in-game should obviously have said normals applied on here, and that currently takes priority over ones without the normals - like the NSMBU-styled SMM sprites - so I don't see why this shouldn't too). This is strictly for x-y parameters. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 13:07, October 27, 2024 (EDT)

I don't think so, it's just recommended we include a gamma fix via Switch Toolbox or something similar so you know the asset has been color corrected. I don't think normal maps (normals themselves are a component of a model; normal maps govern how light interacts with red and green channels of this map is put on a model) are same deal as a texture dimension especially for a UI graphic this proposal focuses on. As stated, these textures are in particular dimensions due to design constraints, vs normal maps which are intended to be applied on top of an asset. Normal maps drastically change how an asset looks, not so much with padded space around a texture, in my opinion. Icon showing how many lives Mario has left. From Super Mario 64 DS. It's me, Mario! (Talk / Stalk) 20:50, October 27, 2024 (EDT)

On the proposal above this one, there seems to be a general consensus that we should do things more as TCRF does them, since they're documenting which specific tiles are unused. This proposal would also align with that as they also use full tiles.... as do most of our "unused sprite" rips. It seems odd to hold the unused sprites to a higher standard than the used ones. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 02:03, October 28, 2024 (EDT)

Going ahead and cancelling, since I considered to myself that this would technically cover the in-game "artwork" for MKT and the spirits in Ultimate, both of which are ridiculously large and can't be shown at raw size on a gallery page anyway. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 12:56, October 28, 2024 (EDT)

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