Talk:FreeSpace 2

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Good article FreeSpace 2 has been listed as one of the Everyday life good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can delist it, or ask for a reassessment.
November 16, 2007 Good article nominee Listed
Famicom style controller This article is within the scope of WikiProject Video games. For more information, visit the project page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion.
Good article GA This article has been rated as GA-Class on the assessment scale.
Mid This article is on a subject of Mid priority within gaming for inclusion in Wikipedia 1.0.
VG To-do:

Contents

[edit] Plot information

I will be deleting a lot of the plot points with respect to WP:NOT#GUIDE and WP:NOT#INFO. Cheers. Ong elvin 12:23, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Eh, that's fine, really. We'll even go as far as to help you maintain that. -- Altiris Exeunt 13:09, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
I believe you took a bit too much out, to me you wrote more a prelude to the main plot by leading the reader into the 2nd Shivan war, but not explaining what happens during it. It does not mention the plot resolution. Unless you have any objections, I will go about lengthening it slightly tomorrow.Darkcraft 13:18, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
I normally kill the plot resolution when it comes to shortening a plot synopsis. My reasoning is that you can tell how the story ends (ie, happy ending), although how the story progresses to that point is the fun part. But sure, if you want to expand a bit, go ahead. As long as the length isn't monstrous, I won't bite. (Way too many high profile games dedicate pages of text to every last plot and subplot and character bios etc.) Ong elvin 03:13, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
I agree. Revealing the setup, major conflicts, and ending in a plot synopsis is fine, but as you say, an encyclopedia shouldn't include every single plot point, character action, etc. It just weighs down the reading, and doesn't constitute a synopsis. Xihr 04:01, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] 2007 Rewrite

FreeSpace 2 is no doubt a great game, but the current article is more of a "FreeSpace 2 Source Code Project" page than one talking about the award winning (though market failing) game. I am going to re-write the article to talk about FreeSpace 2 in the standard game article format in the Wiki. The first draft to this space will likely be up in the next few days.

  • Lead
  • Gameplay
    • Summary on how to control the starfighter, mission structure, control and starfighter customization.
  • Plot and setting
    • FreeSpace 2 background, world, characters, and story
  • Development
    • From the time Silent Threat was finished till the starting of FreeSpace 2 Source Code Project, decisions made on how to develop the game, what affected it including marketing, and future
  • Reception
    • Reviews, awards, the fan community
  • References
  • External links
    • Only links relevant to the game itself

To boost this article further, I am requesting for images showing off the capital ships dueling each other with beams and with fighters in the foreground for size comparison, as well as images of the nebulae. I believe with the age and the "no longer on sale" status of the game, 1024x768 screenshots can be justified with fair use. Jappalang 05:49, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

The licence agreement of Freespace 2 is pretty close to "Freeware" if you look at the section about its licensing. Keep that part on Licensing by the way, that's definitely notable amongst games and licensing. As for it being something of a "FS2:OpenSource" article, I agree. The mention of the Open Source project should be reduced, although make sure to mention it in External Links. Ong elvin 09:09, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Rewrite is now in place. Putting up images next, as well as clean-up. Information relevant to the FreeSpace 2 Source Code Project have been moved into its own article. Jappalang 03:30, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Should probably delete the FS2 Source Code Project article, and keep it as a small section of the FS2 article. Also, I think that you should restore the Licensing information in some form, possibly as a subsection of Development. Ong elvin 06:04, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
I split the Project off as I am trying to keep FreeSpace 2 as an article on the game itself (which remains a proprietary software in Interplay's ownership - see ending paragraph of Development, and the FS2 SCP page - despite its problems), and FreeSpace 2 Source Code Project as the mod project which created the FS2_Open game engine (open source, non-commercial engine) and the sub-projects taking advantage of it. The size of the current FreeSpace 2 article is abundant (which did surprise me midway whilst conceiving it - I initially thought there would be a lack of material for such content). For the SCP article itself, I hope the SCP participants will be able to add to the article in the way Doom_WAD is done in accordance to Wiki guidelines. Merging the current SCP with the current game article might result in one bloated article, as I see it. Jappalang 07:22, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Y Done as per original list. Images added, refined the language (script & text). Now submitted for assessment. Jappalang 02:13, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WP:VG assessment

Wow, this is definitely a B-class article, and so close to GA-class. Broad in coverage, stable, neutral, images... currently, I think the only thing holding this article back is the occasional lack of an in-line citation thingy. On the whole citing is good, and what citations there are have great formatting. But some sections of the article lack citations. Most frequently, this appears to be at the end of the paragraphs, where one or two sentences lack citations (or, I'm missing the obvious possibility that maybe the citations are further down, in the next paragraph). The last paragraph of the Story section is the most obvious example, but have a look through the whole article to find any holes. Once you've done that, send it off to WP:GAC!

I also noticed that this article doesn't have an importance rating. I think this is Mid-importance, though I rate it as such without the same degree of certainty as I rated it B-class. Hope this helps, Una LagunaTalk 16:05, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. Regarding the inline citations, my style is to set the citation directly at the end of the first line of reference. The following sentences refer to the first line unless the following sentences are referred by another article. This allows me to be more specific in reference, without having too many citations lumped together at the end of a paragraph/bunch of sentences. Jappalang 22:49, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
Providing the citations are there, you should be fine for GA. Una LagunaTalk 07:01, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
I forgot to add this, but you are correct in that the last paragraph of the Story section is lacking in a referred source. The finale is only alluded to in those reviews which makes it hard to insert the reviews in as a reference for the details in that paragraph. I have read various assessments (and the discussion surrounding them), several which said Story citations can be ignored. However for sake of completeness (in case references are insisted on in the future), are published on line game guides viable Wikipedia references? Jappalang 08:09, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
Providing they're published by reliable sources, for example IGN and GameFAQs, then yes. Una LagunaTalk 16:43, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
I forgot that we can use in-game information for Story. Put that up plus a Interplay official hint section, and a game guide. Would that be enough? Jappalang 11:16, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
Yep, that should be fine. Una LagunaTalk 16:20, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
Ditch the Interplay official hint section and the game guide. WP:NOT#GUIDE and WP:CVG/GL#Scope_of_information. Ong elvin 00:22, 16 November 2007 (UTC)
Hmmm, I understand Wikipedia is not a game guide, the hint and game guide are used here to back up the mention of the ending and its two possibilities (the article FreeSpace 2 itself remains clear of game guide intent). It might be possible to use in-game material but as is evident from the other three in-game citations, FreeSpace 2 tends to be verbose. :-P Anyway, Wiki's policy is not to have a game guide as the article, but is it also prohibiting use of official game guides as material for research?
(re-read the article) ...then again, the mention of 12 minutes is a bit too much, and the prose of the final two sentences is... I will try to rework the two sentences. I will look into the possibility of using in-game material to cite, but I will not be back at my gaming PC till some time later. Jappalang 01:20, 16 November 2007 (UTC)
Y Done Can't believe I missed out this wonderful succinct quote in-game! Jappalang 05:58, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WP:GA assessment

It's a good article, the only issues were so minor I fixed them myself. (We really want to use as little non-free content as possible, so I removed a couple of images. Also the vocal talent needed a brief mention in the WP:LEAD.)

On the plus, plus side; the beam combat .gif does a lot to enhance this article. Anynobody 05:41, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

Thank you! On a side note, regarding the nebulae, I believe FS2 was the first game to implement nebulaes as environments which can be flown in. WC III and IV (as well as a fair number of sims) only had them as backgrounds. Is this viewpoint in error? Jappalang 05:58, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

Really? Have you seen some footage of Freelancer? -- Altiris Helios Exeunt 13:59, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

Is this directed at me? I find the "O RLY?" reference misused if your intent was in jest (note what it says in the reference). Please check what I have written "I believe FS2 was the first game to implement nebulaes as environments which can be flown in". With Freelancer being released in 2003, I fail to see how it can supersede FreeSpace in having nebulae as interactive environments. Jappalang (talk) 21:10, 17 November 2007 (UTC)
Yes, Freelancer long postdates FreeSpace 2. Xihr (talk) 22:14, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

Oh. I wasn't looking at the release dates (I always thought Freelancer was released earlier than FreeSpace 2). I'm not removing that link to O RLY? though; it really was there for some light humor and nothing else. -- Altiris Helios Exeunt 06:11, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Finding Capitalisation Problems

Here's a little tip: you may find problems with title capitalisation by using the CTRL+F function. I just did and found one. However, there shouldn't be any more problems with FreeSpace typed as Freespace, excluding the references. -- Altiris Helios Exeunt 13:57, 17 November 2007 (UTC)