MarioWiki:Conjectural names
A conjecture is an opinion, statement or name formed on the basis of incomplete, undisclosed or doubtful information. Here at the Super Mario Wiki, we strive to keep all articles as close and as accurate as possible to the complete Super Mario franchise of games, books, TV shows, etc. However, there may be times where a particular subject that is worthy of an article on the wiki has never been given an official, disclosed title by Nintendo (or any other publisher, developer, etc.). This page explains the best things to do in these situations, and how to correctly use conjectural templates to give acknowledgement of a speculated article title.
Conjectural titles
- See also: MarioWiki:Naming § Conjectural names
When a situation arises where an article's subject was never given a known, official title and a user is unsure of what to name the article prior to its creation, then they are entitled to choose themselves the most appropriate name to fit the subject. Wherever this is done, the article must be tagged with {{conjecture}} at the top of the page, which will include the page in the dedicated maintenance category. The template also shows that the page's title is unconfirmed and speculated, and not adding it can result in confusion between what titles are official and what has been decided on a matter of speculation. Also, please note that conjectural-titled pages should only be created if the subject is notable enough to have its own article. It is unnecessary to create a conjectural page for every minor subject, such as most unnamed non-playable characters in RPG games (see MarioWiki:Minor NPCs), or most generic subjects (see MarioWiki:Generic subjects).
There is also a similar template called {{part conjecture}}. Its purpose is to show when a subject is given an official name in one appearance, and then in a later appearance a similar subject is found and worth noting in the article, but there is no confirmed name for that appearance. It can also work the other way, where a subject was not given a confirmed title and then a later appearance of a similar subject is given an official title. It is important to remember that this does not confirm the title of the previous appearance. In either situation, {{part conjecture}} is used instead of {{conjecture}}.
Conjectural subjects within articles
When a speculation-based name is mentioned on an article and indication is needed to show that the name is conjectural, the template {{conjectural}} is used for the first mention of the name, excluding headers. This template is recommended to be used on glitches pages in particular, as a vast majority of in-game glitches went unnoticed through development and were discovered through public use. Therefore, Nintendo themselves have not given official names for many glitches. Since most glitches are not given their own article, but merged into one article to the game it appears in, it would be considered inappropriate to just tag the top of the glitch page with {{conjecture}}, since the template refers to the title of the article, not its content.
To avoid unsightliness and problems with linking, headers themselves do not use the template, however the first line of each section should repeat the name in boldface and using {{conjectural}}, in the form: {{conjectural|Glitch name}}. On an article, it would appear as: Glitch name (hover your cursor over the text to see the effect of the template).
If an official name is found
If an official name is found after any period of time prior to the creation of the article, it may be moved to the new, official title and the {{conjecture}}, {{part conjecture}} or {{conjectural}} template(s) can be removed. A source of the new name should be added as a reference in the article. Make sure you have found an acceptable source to name the article. When the page has been moved, all other mainspace articles, navigation templates, categories and files linking to and/or mentioning the conjectural name should be updated.
