Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Diamond Trust of London/archive1

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was not promoted by GrahamColm 00:42, 23 July 2013 (UTC) [1].[reply]

Diamond Trust of London

Featured article candidates/Diamond Trust of London/archive1

Nominator(s): hahnch e n 21:07, 23 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This is a video game article, but be not afeard! There are no monsters or aliens, you do not have to trudge through stupid convoluted plots or clichéd character profiles. It's a fairly short article about how one guy managed to manufacture and release a diamond smuggling game for the Nintendo DS. Instead of slaying dragons with your beard, you bribe UN inspectors with dirty money. This article is the most complete overview of the subject available. - hahnch e n 21:07, 23 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved comments from Red Phoenix ^{build the future...}_{remember the past...} 14:32, 13 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

*Comments - Looks very nice. Short, but I'm not sure the article warrants any more content. Here are some things I'm seeing as I review the article:

- Checklinks shows all references are active, no dead links are present.
- Per WP:SELFPUB, "Self-published and questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves, usually in articles about themselves or their activities, without the self-published source requirement that they be published experts in the field, so long as: 5. the article is not based primarily on such sources." We're pushing awfully close here with so many self-published sources, though notability is established in the reviews. If there's any more third-party reliable sources that can be added, it would strengthen the article's case.
- The article reads fairly choppy at some points, and could use some copyediting.
  - Many sentences start with "Players" in the Gameplay section, including two paragraphs. This should be reworded a little bit to make it less awkward to read.
  - "Rohrer disagreed with this move, believing that the smaller DSiWare market would limit the game's audience, Majesco on the other hand were not willing to invest in the manufacturing of cartridges without strong pre-order numbers." This is a run-on sentence, perhaps a semicolon would be more appropriate between "audience" and "Majesco", or separate them into two sentences.
  - "And so, Rohrer turned to crowd funding platform, Kickstarter." Awkward way to start a sentence in an encyclopedic article.
- As it reads, the Reception section paragraphing does not properly illustrate why they are separated as such. For example, one paragraph appears to be focused on the reviews for the music, so make sure to think of the reader and state the obvious. This again will also help with sentence fluency and how the article reads.
- The lead paragraph in Reception is a little short. Can it be expanded more to talk about the general qualities reviewers noted?

I wouldn't say this is all-comprehensive at this point, but this should get you started. Red Phoenix ^{build the future...}^{remember the past...} 02:16, 24 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Some of your comments have been addressed by JDC's edits. The main point I wanted to address was WP:SELFPUB, it's something I thought about while writing the article.

I use primary/self published sources. Where possible, I have doubled up the references with secondary sources, such as the gameplay section. The entirety of that section could have been sourced from the manual/game alone.
There are some small sections where secondary sources were not available, I think where it stands out most is the third paragraph of the development section describing the procedurally generated music. There are secondary sources which mention the music, but none that discuss Rohrer's thinking behind this approach. But I thought it was interesting, relevant, and non-controversial.
I used this reference to backup the claim that it was the first crowd funded DS game.
No other claims supported by primary sources are controversial. They're usually used to specify dates, to give readers a more structured understanding of the timescales involved.

hahnch e n 14:33, 24 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I don't have an issue with using self-published sources and can see they're used well and appropriately. I'm not saying it's too much; in fact, it does well to source the article, but it is pushing a large amount of self-published sources for an article. That being said, I've reread it over and I'm fine with it as it is for now, noting that there is pretty significant coverage across the board (I had failed to note the IGN article that was not a review the first time around). Everything else looks pretty good, but I will note one more quick comment, and that's that in the review section, most of the sentences start the same way, with the name of the reviewer. Some potential fixes for this could include varying the sentence structure and adding lead sentences to the two paragraphs other than the lead in the Reception section that illustrate the main idea of that paragraph, i.e. things that were criticized or things that were praised, etc. Red Phoenix ^{build the future...}^{remember the past...} 20:53, 1 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Support - Fantastic! Comments have been resolved. Now I'd say it's ready for FA status. Red Phoenix ^{build the future...}_{remember the past...} 14:32, 13 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by JDC808

In the lead, you may consider merging the first two paragraphs.
I've went through and done some copy-editing. You should seek someone else as well, preferably an experienced copy-editor.

~~I'll return later with more comments.~~ --JDC808 ♫ 04:03, 24 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I prefer the lead as is. I'm not sure if it needs the exact date of release in the lead, but I don't mind. I've taken some of your changes on board, but also reverted and tweaked some others. You can see the diff here, and the explanations in the article history. - hahnch e n 00:38, 25 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I figured since there is only one release date, might as well put it there. Read through the article again and have no problem with the other stuff. Like I said earlier, you may want to find a copy-editor more experienced than myself to be on the safe side. With that being said, I Support as I don't see any major issues, or any that can't be easily taken care of. --JDC808 ♫ 05:59, 25 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Crisco 1492

Addressed comments from Crisco 1492 moved to talk
Images are fine, see review on talk page.
Support on prose and images. Good read, interesting concept, wish I had a DS. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 04:11, 3 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Source review - spotchecks not done

Compare formatting of FNs 14 and 16
I see someone has raised the issue of WP:SPS above. It's fine for gameplay, but I feel it might still be a bit much in Development. Nikkimaria (talk) 16:28, 23 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- 14 is the main Kickstarter project page. 16 is an update on that project. Let me know if you have a better format. - hahnch e n 22:54, 23 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by Hahc21

Support — ΛΧΣ²¹ 04:42, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved comments from — ΛΧΣ²¹

The article is amazignly written. However, I have a few comments:

I think that the claim about the first successfully crowdfunded DS game should be cited in the lead
- Done. - hahnch e n 19:53, 6 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Both Inside a Star-Filled Sky and Sleep is Death wikilink to Jason Rohrer; I find t a bit unnecessary, don't you think?

I'd think those could be Redirects with possibilities, so... — Crisco 1492 (talk) 23:49, 4 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, well. I agree. — ΛΧΣ²¹ 01:59, 5 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- As per Crisco. These are notable subjects that could have their own article. I would have kept the links had they been red. - hahnch e n 19:53, 6 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"alongside his limited edition, postage stamps and a coin from countries featured in the game, and four actual diamonds." why not rephrase to " Jason Cipriano at MTV Multiplayer received postage stamps, a coin from countries featured in the game and four actual diamonds alongside his limited edition."?
- It's been a while since I wrote the article, but I probably chose that sentence construction so that it would end with the phrase "four actual diamonds", which is surprising and memorable. - hahnch e n 19:53, 6 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
And according to the quote above, there is more countries than Angola. This is not explained in the gameplay section. Any reason why?
- The countries are the UK and Belgium, the home of the competing companies. - hahnch e n 19:53, 6 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
In the reception section, it is better of you write "Person X from GamesTM" rather than GamesTM only, to achieve proper attribution of comments. In my FAs, I use "An editor from..." if the name of the author is not available :)

I generally name the publication, the writers are attributed in the citations. There are very few notable critics in the ames industry, readers generally follow publications, not the writers. If the critic is notable, I would have mentioned it in the text. I think using language such as "a reviewer from...", or "The Edge review..." is redundant given how obvious it should be. - hahnch e n 19:53, 6 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Everything else looks fine. I enjoyed reading this article. Good job. — ΛΧΣ²¹ 22:46, 4 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the review, comments above. - hahnch e n 19:53, 6 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by DragonZero

I find the inline citations to be disorganized. An example would be the last sentence in the development section. Only the final source backs up that sentence, the other two did not. The sources should also be in numbered order so reorganize them.
I'm not sure if the structure for the reception is the best. The first paragraph is all the positive reception, followed by music reception (two sentences), then negative reception by the same reviewers of the positive reception. DragonZero (Talk · Contribs) 03:32, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- I generally prefer my citations at the end of paragraphs rather than after every sentence or even in the middle of sentences, earlier versions of the article followed this even closer. The three references at the close of the development section are to show that he was packaging the units manually, the date of release, and an example's contents.
- You could move the music paragraph down one, but I don't think it makes any difference. The general structure was gameplay-music-negatives-themes. - hahnch e n 21:09, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose, 1a. This prose is not up to FA standards—I found way too many simple grammatical errors. Some random pot-shots:

"It was published by indiePub, and following a Kickstarter campaign, was released for the Nintendo DS on August 28, 2012." This reads like it is meant to be chronological. It was published, then it had a Kickstarter campaign, then it was released?
- Indiepub struck a publishing deal, but didn't have the funds for manufacturing. Rohrer launched a Kickstarter campaign for the manufacturing, and it was released in August 2012. Despite having to crowdfund the manufacturing costs, Indiepub remained the publisher throughout. - hahnch e n 22:36, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Awkward: "played between two players"
"Set in 2000, before the implementation of the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme to curb the blood diamond trade, the player's aim" The player's aim is set in 2000?
- The whole thing is set in 2000. - hahnch e n 22:36, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
"In order to extract the most diamonds and win, players resort to a combination of bribery and deception." The phrase "in order to" can almost always be replaced with simply "to"; the term "resorted" implies that other things are tried before finally "resorting" to what's stated. Is that accurate?
- Removed all "in order to"s. You can play the game without deception and bribery, but you'll probably lose. The reception section describes the gameplay as "one that encourages and maybe even requires misdeeds". - hahnch e n 22:36, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Maybe link the term "crowdfunded". I'm not sure how colloquial it is yet, and whether it's made its way into global English.
- I considered this when writing the article, but I assume that readers are more likely to click on the Kickstarter links and find out how the campaigns work. - hahnch e n 22:36, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Again the misplaced modifying phrase: "Set in 2000, the aim is to extract diamonds"
- The whole thing is set in 2000. - hahnch e n 22:36, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Another: "Consisting of nine turns, the winner is the one" The winner consists of nine turns?
- "The winner is the one who finishes the game with the most diamonds after nine turns." - hahnch e n 22:36, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Another "in order to": "Competing agents can be bribed in order to reveal inside information"
- Removed all "in order to"s. - hahnch e n 22:36, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Please get someone to copyedit this. --Laser brain (talk) 17:38, 9 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the review, comments above. - hahnch e n 22:36, 11 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the fixes thus far, Hahnchen. Your responses to the items about modifying phrases indicate that you may not understand the underlying grammar—I encourage you to get an independent copyeditor. --Laser brain (talk) 14:19, 12 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Closing note: This candidate has been archived, but there may be a delay in bot processing of the close. Please see WP:FAC/ar, and leave the {{featured article candidates}} template in place on the talk page until the bot goes through. Graham Colm (talk) 18:06, 13 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.