Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Final Fantasy/Archive/7

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Merging articles

Hey, guys! I've tagged Shiva (Final Fantasy) and Odin (Final Fantasy) for merging with Summon magic (Final Fantasy). Ultimately, both articles aren't much more than one paragraph of text and an appearance list that is perhaps too detailed (information about how and where to obtain summons is really more suited to a game guide, I would think). I've also tagged War of the Magi for merging with Final Fantasy VI, because it hardly seems noteworthy enough to warrant mention outside of the game in which it appeared (and a number of similar articles dealing with historical battles from the world of Final Fantasy XI were removed a few months ago, as well). Thoughts, anyone? – Seancdaug 21:37, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

I was myself thinking of tagging some articles for merging, and I would probably have tagged them if I had started searching through articles. I agree with you on this.--DarkEvil 21:42, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

I agree completely. Don't forget about the Final Fantasy X-2 characters I mentioned back up in Current issues. ~ Hibana 01:43, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Yep, fair enough. The descriptions in particular of their appearances in each game can be reduced to a simple list of game names. Gamemaker 12:00, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

You guys do whatever you want, though I would prefer it if the summons listed in the general summon article did NOT link to the actual mythical beings. The articles of the different mythical beings can make a small mention of it in a "Fictional accounts" section, but there is no reason to link the summon directly to it, as it would give some the impression that they are much or fully identical, which they are not. Satanael 13:08, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

I think you're right about this, I would personally go more like no link in the name of the summon, but a link later, explaining that this creature is named on this one. Like Ifrit in Summon magic (Final Fantasy)Summon magic (Final Fantasy):

"Ifrit, a fire elemental named after the jinn spirits that embody fire"

I whole heartedly agree Chanlord 07:32, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

Chocobo articles

I recently started stubs for all the chocobo games that weren't wiki'ed yet. First of all, I split Chocobo's Mysterious Dungeon into two seperate articles and I created stubs for Chocobo Collection and Hataraku Chocobo. I also created a stub for Dice de Chocobo and Chocobo Land. My question regarding the latter two titles is, are they the same game? Dice was released as part of the Collection on the PlayStation and is to be re-released on the WonderSwan Color, while Land was released on the Game Boy Advance. Whenever I do an image search for the boxart on either of them, virtually the same images come up. I was also wondering it would be appropriate to have a seperate category since there are about eight games total (i.e. Category:Chocobo games) and if so, should it be a subcategory in Category:Square games and Category:Final Fantasy spin-offs? ~ Hibana 01:43, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Sorry I can't be much help, I never played any of these games yet. I think that if they are Final Fantasy games, let there not be a subcategory, but if they are a series of their own, then they can have a subcategory. Also, I don't know about Dice and Land, but if the same box comes up, maybe they're two separate games put together in one game like Final Fantasy IV and Chrono Trigger in Final Fantasy Chronicles.--DarkEvil 03:08, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

That sounds about right. I've gone ahead and done the recategorization into Category:Chocobo games, and placed it as a subcat of the two you mentioned. This might create a problem should any future additions emerge (since they'd belong under Category:Square Enix games and not Category:Square games), but that's a bridge we can cross when we come to it, I suppose. – Seancdaug 05:01, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Good and as far as I know, I've never heard of any sequels planned for any Chocobo titles in the near future, I don't think they were very popular.--DarkEvil 06:05, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Things to do

Hey guys, I just wanted to announce that I put a new section at things to do that I called: "Articles that should be merged"
It's empty for now but I'm certain that you can fill it, it will be more easy to point out which articles should be merged or are currently tagged.--DarkEvil 03:23, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

• Sounds like a good idea to me. Just a quick apology because I haven't been around as much as I planned to but I've had exams before the holidays, then I'll be back for a couple of weeks — cuaHL 10:22, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
  • When I didn't see you around, that's what I thought. I'm only here so much because I'm on holiday break, after that, I will have a little bit less time. But I can't say school is too demanding for me, I will probably have a lot of spare time even when I'll be going back.--DarkEvil 16:44, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Character articles

So, I've missed some info during my absence. I need to know, what about character articles, do we need to all put them in a list of, or are there some exceptions? Because there still exists FFVII characters and we do nothing about them while were trying to cut FFV and others like that.--DarkEvil 15:39, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

I think that we need to treat each game equally. If one game section has a list of main characters, the other sections should. If we have 50 character articles for FFVII and 2 for FFV, then it may technically fall under POV. That's just my opinion. Deckiller 01:06, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

It actually has to do with policies and guidelines. ~ Hibana 01:10, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

As I understand it, we should be aiming to merge characters in to lists. However if there is simply too much useful and factual information to make that possible (such as characters from later in the series) they may be seprate articles. At least, that's how I've been looking at it. --JiFish(^Talk/_Contrib) 01:17, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

I guess that's true; the basic policies should determine what is merged and what isn't. I was taking a look; some characters have a plethora of information, while others have significantly less. --DarkEvil 22:32, 16 December 2005 (UTC)Deckiller 01:29, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm hard pressed to think of any situation where there is enough significant, notable, and non-fancrufty information worth repeating about a character to warrant a seperate article: I'm not sure we really need to go into the excruciating detail we currently do with characters like Cloud, for instance. I think there are maybe a handful of character articles we can justify in that they have transcended their source material, but then, that's a very limited list (Cloud and Sephiroth are really the only two that spring to my mind). On a related sidenote, I've taken the liberty of merging the individual Final Fantasy XII character articles into a single article. Even if the consensus is to keep individual articles, I think that until the actual game (or at least more information regarding the actual game) is made available, it makes sense to keep everything consolidated. Does anyone agree and/or disagree? – Seancdaug 13:35, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Not totally back from formatting my PC, just leaving this answer. I agree with it, I myself am on the favor of merging each character in a list of characters, but if we start thinking keeping those who got out of their particular game or series like Cloud and Sephiroth, there's also Aerith who got in Kingdom Hearts and even Yuffie. I'm not totally sure we should keep characters as Yuffie as an individual article.--DarkEvil 17:48, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

But where do we draw the line? Yuffie has appeared in five games and a film, as have other FFVII characters. Tifa has appeared in almost every bit of media that Cloud has; does that mean we should keep her article as well? ~ Hibana 21:50, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

I think a solid code to follow would be to have lists for all other characters except for the playable characters and two or three main antagonists. Deckiller 21:58, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

The Xenosaga pages (although still fancrufty, POV, and poor...I'm trying to get some editors together to boost up the quality) have a format for characters. A list of antagonists, protagonists, side characters, and an article for each playable characters. Then again, Xenosaga has an extremely detailed story and features several games, so the style is different. Deckiller 22:01, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

If we follow the policy, for works of fiction, it is said that major characters' info should be in the game article. If there is too much info, then an individual article is create. Major or minor only refers to how much info is available on that char. Minor characters should be in a list of included in the game article or on a list of their own if it becomes too big. One rule to counter them all, it seems that something as minor as a cameo in a work not directly related to the original work in which the character appears is enough to make an individual article about this character. As always, I am in favor of going with the rules, and the rules are not particularly hard to understand I think. But for the best of it, maybe we should start a separate discussion here to discuss what are we to do with current char articles: which have enough info, which should be merged, which deserve to be on their own.--DarkEvil 22:32, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Consensus needs to be reached

I suggest that a consensus be reached upon the famous character articles issue and Seancdaug agreed with this idea. The question may seem simple: Is any character/place worthy of having his own article? If so, which character/location? I earlier talked about it using the page WP:FICT.
It states that characters should be discussed in the main game article. Characters should be talked about in the main game article in a list of. If a character has enough info and takes too much space in the game article, it can then be transfered in a separate article. This is the same for the list if it becomes too big in the game article.
The one rule with more im--DarkEvil 16:06, 18 December 2005 (UTC)portance than the others is this: if a character transcends from the original work, such as appear--DarkEvil 07:01, 18 December 2005 (UTC)ing in a work not directly associated with its original work, or simply making a cameo appearance which would mean the character is kind of renowned, this character seems to automatically deserve his own article.
As the active members should know, character articles are created for no reason, leaving us with the remaining problem of choosing which are to merge. With Wikipedia's policy in mind, we should reach a consensus on what to do with the character articles and exactly knowing what to do with each particular case. Feel free to state your own arguments below, and have in mind that WP:FICT's rules applies also to locations articles, concepts, etc.--DarkEvil 05:56, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

I just wanted to note that WP:FICT is a guideline which authors have agreed with; not an official policy. With that in mind, there is no reason why we can't have individual articles for each character; the guideline helps decide what you could do with them. If we follow the guideline, separating the list of characters from the main article on all Final Fantasy games would be best since both articles could get long. Having the minor characters in the list of characters seems right.

Main characters are more difficult. What if a "cameo" character has little information about them? The guidelines are not the supreme law, so I think it would be best to describe the little amount of information about them in each main article, or list of characters they make an appearance in, rather than waste time creating a new article. It seems wrong to have a minor "cameo" character with an article, and a major character without.

I'm not quite sure if we could ever agree with each other on which major characters deserve an individual article, yet, I'm still thinking of ideas. I could see revert wars happening because of various interpretations of the WP:FICT, but that is why this project is here.

One idea comes to me; what if we had summaries of the major characters in the list of characters (like we already have), and links to the full article (like some already have). If the article for the major character is not long enough (I propose “less than the height of the full screen view” as an idea), then no other article is necessary (the article could be refitted into the ‘’list of characters’’ article). Its kind of what we have already for a few Final Fantasy articles, except I'd use some kind of rule to decide whether or not an article should exist (like "if it takes up 1x or 2x the 1024x768 resolution height").

I joined this discussion because I didn’t want to see all of the individual character pages disappear. I hope what I said makes sense _{(it's confusing to me)}, if not, please ask me questions. _{(I have no regret)} --QubitOtaku(talk) 11:23, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

I understand what you said. I didn't know it was only a guideline (I feel stupid for not reading the obvious notice at the top). I agree with everything you said about character articles being linked from a list, the article gets merged if it has not enough info and if a character expands too much it can become an article. But about judging if it has enough info, that's where I'm not certain. I am at a screen resolution of 1024 X 768, like you suggested for judging the length, but this does not necessarily seem like a good mesuring tool to me, yet I have no other solution. Also, it needs to be good info, not just fancruft because that does not count as enough info to deserve an article. Major characters deserving an article could be, assuming there is enough info about them, the player characters plus the main antagonist (maybe including a major antagonist like Seymour also even if he is not the main in that game).--DarkEvil 16:52, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

Granted, WP:FICT is not policy. However, I don't think that makes it a good idea to ignore it, or the reasons behind it, when there is no compelling reason to do so. The basic problem here is that we need to justify every article we create as notable outside of their origin work, and very few individual characters qualify. If we have four pages written up on, for instance, Quina Quen, then certainly it's long enough to warrant a seperate entry, if we judge by length alone. But that's misleading, because it's highly unlikely (bordering on the impossible, really) that there are four pages worth of information on Quina that would interest anyone besides hardcore fans. Articles devoted to individual fictional characters are a rarity on Wikipedia, and they're uniformly only devoted to major cultural icons (Dracula, Superman, etc.).

I certainly don't think we have to forbid individual articles, but I personally would prefer that we start to work at the problem from the other side: rather than creating stubs for every single character first, create character entries as part of a list, and move them into a seperate article if and when the amount of notable information exceeds that which can be contained within the main article and/or a seperate list. From a practical standpoint, it makes sense to consolidate information: there's nothing to be gained from having twelve articles where one will suffice, and it having that many articles makes imposing editorial control, not to mention accessing information from a user perspective, more difficult.

A word count would be less ambiguous than measuring screen size when it comes to determing length, but I'm not sure such a guideline is going to be practical, really, since its kind of superficial. In the larger sense, I would like to see some sort of standard format for character-related articles/entries, since I think having a sort-of roadmap would aid in decreasing the levels of fancruft that inevitably infest such articles. Start with one introductory paragraph, covering the name of the characters, games in which s/he has appeared, and (if applicable) voice actor. Add a one or two paragraph (max!) section on their backstory, and a one or two paragraph section on their stats/abilities, and maybe a short notes section (where needed). This is the way I went about crafting the current List of Final Fantasy VI characters article, and I think it works well. But the individual character articles seem to suffer from the desire to bulk up their length by adding truly obscure and likely irrelevant information (who really needs to know that Terra's a Libra? Or Cecil's weight? This is the kind of information Wikipedia articles don't give about real people, let alone fictional ones).

In a broad conception, I still feel that we should be able to demonstrate transcendence before justifying individual articles, and we should be able to point to some sort of source to back up that claim (for instance, a website mentioning the character outside of GameFAQs or other game-exclusive sites). Failing that, we should have a compelling format-based reason for it, such as length. Even then, I would think that splitting the article should only happen as a last resort, after a serious attempt has been made to edit the information down to a more managable size. – Seancdaug 18:21, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

I think this is a strong argument, very strong. So, what is suggested, as I understood, is that we should try to merge existing character articles in a list of (most of the existing ones are badly written anyway). If the list becomes too big, after merging, then they can have individual entries, assuming you can validate the notability before picking a particular character. Furthermore, character articles should follow at least what Seancdaug mentioned to stay consistent:

• Introduction = covering the character's name, medias in which s/he has appeared, and voice actor (if applicable).
• Add a one or two paragraph (max!) section on their backstory
• Add a one or two paragraph section on their stats/abilities
• Add a short notes section (where needed).
• Not add obscure unneeded information such as: weight, astrological sign.

The biggest problem, seeing the already existing articles, will be to trim the amount of backstory.

Correct me if I'm wrong about the way I understood it, maybe make it more clear if you suggest merging all existing characters.--DarkEvil 19:07, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

For the most part, I agree with Seancdaug. Filling the screen is hardly an accurate enough measurement for determining whether to make an article or not. Where I used to have the opinion that each character should have their own article and it shouldn't matter how popular they are or not (If Cloud deserves his own article, so does Josef.) However, I'm beginning to do a 180. Virtually none of the characters have enough noteworthy information to be an encyclopedic article. Only a few characters are exceptions. Cloud is likely one of, if not the most well-known video game character outside of Nintendo's cult-followed group of all-stars found in Super Smash Bros. Melee. He is probably deserving of an article. Sephiroth and Squall Leonhart are also fairly popular. Vivi Ornitier is the most popular character from Final Fantasy IX, but is not a main character and is likely of no significance to the casual gamer. Final Fantasy IV's Edward Chris von Muir is often regarded as one of the worst RPG characters ever. Does this make him deserving of his own article? I think the question Do all these FF characters deserve their own articles? can obviously answered: no. The question at hand is where to draw the line between those who deserve their own and those who belong on a list. warpedmirror (talk) 21:48, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

Yeah that's really the next step. That's why I think it'd be best to create list of characters for all games in the series, merge existing character articles with the list then see if it expands enough to have its own article. The guideline is exactly that it needs to be in a list first, then if it expands too much, it can have an article. So, let's keep it basic and deal with characters in a list first. Are there any who might want to oppose to all character articles merging in a list? I think we're ready for the step where someone could say: "I think this character should not be merged because there's enough info". If not, then they should be merged no matter who they are until/if they expand enough in the list.--DarkEvil 22:20, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

I agree with that, but I am a little concerned. When the Final Fantasy XII characters were merged, information was lost for Ashe, including age and character design. I later added some of these into the list of characters; along with references. Other parts I did not re-add because I didn't have a reference for that information. If we merge all of the character articles together in a list of characters, will we make sure to analyze the article to pick out the the useful and non-speculative information? Its harder to go back to a earlier version of an article that redirects to another. Can we keep the articles for a while longer with a notice (quick example. "this article will be merged into the list of characters") so that people who contributed could help move over the useful information. We can make them cite their sources, and give them rules about what type of information is alowed (ie. name, design, age, non-speculative info, etc). Then the article could be redirected to the list of characters when all of useful information has been moved. Also, it would be easier, so one person does not have to do the work all by themselves.

About the screen height thing I mentioned, it was 4:00 in the morning >.> I don't think its enough to decide the fate of an article, but I havn't heard of much else that addresses this. Word count is roughly proportional to height of the document, so I don't think word count is any better. How long is long enough? I have no idea. --QubitOtaku(talk) 00:12, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

I think it's not a bad idea, useful information need to get in the list. If everyone agrees now with moving all characters in a list, we should now give a quick guide on what could be moved of the existing articles and then, they will be ready to be tagged with a merge notice or a custom template. About how long is enough, I just think that this would be when all characters are in a list. There is this thing on wikipedia which tells us something like article size is 32kb, you should think about moving info to a separate article or something similar. When the list gets to the point where wikipedia tells it's too big, then we check the characters on the list. Those with the most info (relevant) or proven to have enough notability could then be transfered to a separate entry, leaving a summary on the list and a link to the main article. But which characters deserve a separate entry can only be discussed about if they are put in a list first. So, anyone thinking of the relevant info which should be moved?--DarkEvil 03:14, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

I thought of: home/birthplace/residence, information about the development of the character (citing interviews with the developers for example), and other specific details that have a valid source: age, race, class, weapon (but not speculation). I only listed a few that I could think of. Thanks for listening to my concers ^-^ --QubitOtaku (talk) 05:51, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

It's always good to see discussions about important things evolve to nearly reach an agreement. I personally see no problem with the information you think should be moved, except maybe weapon. Residence as well as age, race, and class are probably part of a character's necessary description (unless unknown). Weapon is not necessarily important to the reader, this seems more important for the gamer. Information about the development of the character seems good enough to me if you can find sources. Anything else to add? If anyone has something to add, you can try your ideas here. At the end, I'll summarize the ideas, we could maybe add that somewhere as a quick guide to moving info from character articles. Also, if anyone still has complaints about moving character articles, they should state their arguments now before we get too far in the process.--DarkEvil 07:01, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

Do you really think so? It seems to me that, given that we're talking about video game characters, it would be more important to identify their weapon (or weapon type) of choice than it would be to identify their home, or even age. If nothing else, weapon would very probably be a distinguishing characteristic (think buster sword :-) ). – Seancdaug 07:33, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

Oh right, you know, just saying buster sword is a good argument for me, I nearly forgot that one.--DarkEvil 16:06, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

A few months ago, when someone mass nominated every Final Fantasy VI character article for AfD, I quickly put together the List of Final Fantasy VI characters article. I see no reason why we can't keep the individual articles at first, until we're all satisfied with a new list article. A sort of transition process, I guess. Assuming that's the consensus, of course. – Seancdaug 07:33, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

I would like that ^-^ You said it better than I ever could. It would make the process easier in my opinion. --QubitOtaku (talk) 08:58, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

Seems good to me, even if I was saying most of the time that we'd need to merge character articles as we go along, it can be a transition process, which could make it easier. I even like that better, by making the list and keeping separate articles, it'll permit us to see a little better which character should be kept. As long as something is done one day. I think I'll start working on the lists if we want that subject to move.--DarkEvil 16:06, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

I don't have any problem with individual articles for main characters or recurring characters (and big villains). All the other characters can go into Final Fantasy n characters. Dread Lord CyberSkull ✎☠ 10:54, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

Generally, I think the merge should be based on how much factual information is in the article. I would say the FF9 articles could be merged, but other than that, all the characters in games from 7 and later should have seperate character articles. There's no point merging some characters into lists. Either all characters from any one game should be merged, or they all be kept seprate. --JiFish(^Talk/_Contrib) 15:15, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

But FF9 characters are from games later than 7. The whole idea of not keeping separate article for all characters except for some exceptions is because that, even if one character in the game has enough info to be an article who may grow further, some other characters from the same game may have just enough information for a paragraph, that doesn't make it a worthy article on wikipedia. But we need a list first to know if we need a separate article for a character or if they all fit in a list (this probably isn't the case for all games in the series).--DarkEvil 16:06, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

I did say other than FF9 :P. IMO, the FF9 character articles are small enough to be merged in to a list. This is an exception, FF7, FF8 and FF10 character articles are too large to be merged together. But if we, say, kept Vivi Ornitier but merged the rest, I think that's a bad thing. --JiFish(^Talk/_Contrib) 17:45, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

Oops, I did not read carefully! It's not that I am against keeping all character articles, it's more because that, if we keep an article, there has got to be a reason, and while I know that it can be hard to tell, some characters really can't have an article on Wikipedia, even if that means not to have an article for each character in the game.--DarkEvil 19:03, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

I see no reason why it has to be all-or-nothing, myself, and I certainly don't think there's much precedent for that, either. Other fictional works aren't treated that way. Look at Dracula: Abraham Van Helsing has his own article, but Quincey Morris does not. And, again, I think we still have the issue of notability: just because character articles from Final Fantasy VIII and Final Fantasy X are longer than articles from Final Fantasy IX doesn't mean that they're neccessarily more notable. Character entries are probably our most significant source of fancruft, and a lot of the length of the existing articles is a result of the accumulation of information that we shouldn't really be presenting to begin with. – Seancdaug 19:03, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

Exactly right, it does not need to be one of the two all or nothing. Some characters simply are notable while some aren't, keeping all articles simply isn't needed when they can fit in a list and it simply makes it harder to manage them as a lot of separate articles.--DarkEvil 19:09, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

I know that an article should be considered on it merits rather than the popularity of the character. But in reality, this is going to be difficult to maintain. Particually with casual editors that may not be part of this project. Why is there an article for X but not Y? will be a common question. Which is why I suggested an all-or-none per game approach. I say keep all VII, VIII and X PC articles and merge the rest. Some kept many have less merit than others, but this way is simple and not techincally incorrect (as they would almost certainly survive a AfD.) However, if the majority is against this and wants to judge each article one-by-one, so be it. --JiFish(^Talk/_Contrib) 21:06, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

I know what you mean, the problem you mentioned will most certainly appear one day, you're right. But we're here to fix the problems, it'll be easy to answer to a question like this. We should not stop from achieving our needs with the casual editor in mind, after all, the more experienced user is required to correct the errors of the less experienced, and that for all kind of things on wikipedia. Think about the Aerith Gainsborough article, the way the article is named is the right way, they did not think about people who'd name it Aeris, they named it like it should be named and they left a notice about it on the talk page as well as a hidden message when you edit it.--DarkEvil 22:57, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

I fall into the camp of judging each character article on its own merits, though a llittle less stringently than Seancdaug =) Basically, if there is enough unique, valid information on the character that including it in a list would make the list unwieldy (and thats going to be anything more than about 2 decently sized paras) then I think it needs to be kept seperate. Having said that, many character articles probably do need some severe editing. JiFish has a valid point, but whatever we do, the problem of spurious character pages being re-created is going to occur. Fancruft happens because people want to display their knowledge, they aren't going to notice/judge/care whether one game has character articles and another doesn't - if something doesn't exist they will create it =) It just needs to be dealt with as it happens. >Gamemaker 12:10, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, problems like this are bound to happen, but this should not stop us. As you said, it just needs to be dealt with as it happens. If a character as enough info, yeah it could be that the character appears in the list (summary of the main article) with a link to the main character article. As long as there is enough merit, but to judge that, first, we need to arrange the list. I checked through the games, the only missing list was for FFIX but I created a very basic list for it. Now, all the lists need to be worked on until we're satisfied, then we could start judging the character articles.--DarkEvil 15:16, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

On a side note, I just created List of Final Fantasy IX characters (needs some tweaking).--DarkEvil 20:40, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

• About the characters to list of characters thing, I think we should use a template; for the mergable article that little information.
  

For example: (Just an example) {{User:QubitOtaku/FinalFantasyCharacterMerge|List of Final Fantasy XII characters}}

would turn into

(This is just an example, do not start using this template. its in my user article T_T) It has been suggested that this Final Fantasy character article could be moved into List of Final Fantasy XII characters because of its small size. You may help by moving useful information from this article to List of Final Fantasy XII characters. Once all of the needed information has been moved, this article will be redirected to List of Final Fantasy XII characters. (Discuss)

(This is just an example, do not start using this template. its in my user article T_T)

I think it would be helpful, and it will inform others why its being merged. Also, it allows others to send the information that can be salvaged from that page before its redirected. Also, if wanted, a list of things to be moved could be added. As always, before I do something on my own, I want to hear opinions, ideas, or changes. --QubitOtaku (talk) 09:30, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Image sorting

I hate to start another topic with everyone discussing the fate of the character articles, but I was browsing though Category:Final Fantasy media and noticed a healthy number of duplicate images. In my opinion, the larger non-.png (or .gif) files that are not being used should be deleted. Whaddaya think? ~ Hibana 03:31, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

Oh, it's nothing, the image problem could get as important as the fate of the character articles. I was myself cleaning up images in that category before starting this discussion. Yes, they should be deleted. Png are the best choice for screenshots and if they are orphaned, you can put an orphaned template. This is a case for speedy deletion.--DarkEvil 04:23, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

Nothing to add other than a technical point: are PNGs really the best choice for screenshots? I thought PNGs were only of use for indexed-colour images; for RGB screenshots such as those coming from the later games, won't JPGs offer better quality and compression? >Gamemaker 11:47, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Yeah you're right, JPG is better for more than 256 colors images. If you try png for FFVII or later, you're likely to get either large files as a result of RGB image, or losing some details if you still work in indexed color mode for an RGB image (removes colors until there's only 256). This is an important point that I did not point out.--DarkEvil 15:10, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

I just finished listing 24 obsolete and unused images for deletion from the category. If anymore are found, please list them as well. ~ Hibana 20:04, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

I'll list them if I find some more, but I think you made some mistakes in those you listed. First of all, some were already tagged with {{orphaned fairuse replaced}} which already made them candidates for speedy deletion, so I do not think they needed to be listed, but that is not that much of a problem. The real problem is that you listed some currently used images, which I don't think are obsolete, those are: Image:Bcaerith.jpg, Image:Cecil Harvey - Black Knight battle.png, Image:Dragon (Final Fantasy VII) PC.jpg, Image:Dullahan FFVI.png.--DarkEvil 22:01, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

I'll replace those with the smaller size files that I found. Sorry about the Dullahan image; I didn't realize that it was different until I saw it in the bestiary article. ~ Hibana 22:45, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

That's okay, we all do errors of some sort.--DarkEvil 00:21, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Could you unlist the mentioned images? Dread Lord CyberSkull ✎☠ 23:30, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, I think all we can really do is vote "Keep" on those since you're not supposed to removed a deletion template. I can easily find the images again with Google if they do get deleted. ~ Hibana 23:32, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Useless stuff

Categories

Final Fantasy XI locations - Going to be expanding Vana'diel so only one article will detail the locations in FFXI like all other FF articles

Final Fantasy X locations - Ditto with Spira

Articles

Eald'narche - should be merged into a standard List of Final Fantasy XI characters

Beastmen - into Final Fantasy bestiary

Moat carp - listed for Deletion

Any comments before I start working on these (among other) things? Chanlord 05:10, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

You have my blessings Chanlord. :) ~ Hibana 05:14, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Good thing, another editor who wants to move the project a bit! Finally we have someone who knows FFXI (sorry if there were already who had knowledge about this game). I think you're right up to Eald'narche. Then I'm not certain if Beastmen should go in the bestiary or in Races of Final Fantasy. You know better than me, if they are sentient/self-aware, they go in Races, if they are not sentient/not self-aware, dumb monsters, they go in bestiary. Finally, about Moat Carp, don't we have an article for all items of the series, I can't find it.--DarkEvil 05:21, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

• Some Beastmen NPCs are self-aware as interact with them to complete missions and quests. However, the vast majority just wonder the globe killing adventurers aimlessly. I would incorporate those which are monsters in various other FF into their entries (Tonberry) and put new entries into the Bestiary for the others. Chanlord 06:23, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
• Do you mean this? It seems to focus on final fantasy staples like Potions, Ethers ect. Couldn't see where Moat carp would fit in, however we could expand it to include notable items in various FF games although that has the potential to be very large. Chanlord 06:23, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
• It just hit me, moat carp in wikipedia!? If we were to have every item from Final Fantasy XI in Wikipedia, even in a list of items, there would almost no end to it. Other websites have been created to store information about every single item in the game, and they are huge. Same goes for NPCs. Instead, articles should refer to a website that contains that information. Wikipedia is not a Final Fantasy XI strategy guide. -- QubitOtaku(talk) 08:06, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

• Agreed. I'll list Moat carp for deletion.

Is "Fainaru Fantajī" redundent?

I noticed that all of the Final Fantasy articles have something like: "Final Fantasy (Japanese: ファイナルファンタジー Fainaru Fantajī)."　Is it really necessary to write the katakana of "Final Fantasy" in rōmaji? The katakana version is just "Final Fantasy" is supposed to be pronounced the same way (just with a slight accent due to limitations). Also, even when the japanese do write "ファイナルファンタジー" in rōmaji, it is written "FINAL FANTASY". I would appreciate any opinions. --QubitOtaku (talk) 07:31, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

I think they're not really needed either since Fainaru Fantajī is only the japanese word, but it is the same as Final Fantasy. This is more needed for games like Secret of Mana where the japanese name Seiken Densetsu means totally something else, but for Final Fantasy, this is unneeded.--DarkEvil 15:15, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, it's just I saw that FFVI had its Japanese title and I thought that it was required for the feature article drive...just trying to make 'em uniform. ~ Hibana 19:40, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

I don't if it ever came up or not, actually. It's bothered me for a while, but I figured it was more likely that people would complain about it not being there than about it being there. But I'm still not sure. Does anyone know of any non-Final Fantasy related articles that have dealt with this? Otherwise, I can really go either way. – Seancdaug 01:00, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Ashe

What do we do about this article: Ashe. One side wants it to remain because it has enough information, the other side wants it moved to the list of character because it doesn't have enough information. Its been getting reverted back and forth. I'd rather keep it until every one is happy that all the information that could be moved is moved, or if it ends up being too big in the List of Final Fantasy XII characters, then keep it. WP:FICT is too vague, I think its useless. How big is big enough. Seeing it get reverted and redirected over and over is really annoying me. I'd rather it had not been redirected to begin with... (frustrated) --QubitOtaku (talk) 00:37, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

For right now, let's keep it in List of Final Fantasy XII characters, where it redirects to. See the discussion on character articles above. ~ Hibana 00:40, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I have serious issues with the current (unreverted) state of the Ashe article. The "character design" section is riddled with speculation and original research, which has absolutely no place on Wikipedia. And the article, in its current state, is certainly not too long to be merged. In its entirety, it consists of 425 words. By comparision, the length of the Kefka entry at List of Final Fantasy VI characters is 421 words. And I strongly contest your casual dismissal of Wikipedia guidelines. Yes, it is vague, but, as I've said before, that is not a compelling reason to ignore it. If we're going to contribute to Wikipedia, we need to be willing to play by the rules of the community, and to abide by community consensus. – Seancdaug 00:47, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I'd also like to point out that the unreverted Ashe article is still tagged with a stub notice, which further suggests that it lacks the strength to stand on its own at this time. Generally, practice with stubs is to either expand them or merge them, and as has been pointed out previously, there's not much information known about Ashe at this time that would allow us to expand it much beyond its current state (that I'm aware of, at least). – Seancdaug 00:54, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Everything starts off as a stub. It needs work... As for the speculation, how are others to be able to pick out what is and what isn't... You can't just decide that for yourself. I'd rather have everyone work on it. By redirecting it, it makes it harder for people to see what used to be there. They would have to go and look at the history, if they know how to do that. I still rather have it an individual article. Screw the WP:FICT, I wont get banned if I keep the article. By the way, what ever happened to the transition period we discussed. --QubitOtaku (talk) 01:04, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

That it is a stub isn't a problem. The problem is that there are no prospects of destubifying it at this time. Again, no one (that I'm aware of) is suggesting that there can never be an Ashe article on Wikipedia. But with the information currently known about the character, there's no immediate prospects of expanding it past stub form. Hence, the merger. And I hardly think I took unilateral action: even you agreed that we should "wait until the game is released" (from Talk:List of Final Fantasy XII characters). And I hardly think it an imposition to expect that anyone so deeply involved in the debate would be unaware of how to access an article's history (or maybe that's just me). And, no, you certainly won't get banned for "keeping the article." But that's a complete straw man: the idea that anyone is being threatened with a ban for anything is laughable and besides the point. It shouldn't be neccessary to threaten anyone into abiding by community consensus. A substantive problem with WP:FICT is one thing, but I still fail to see what is so "vague" about "if the article on the work itself becomes long, then giving major characters an article of their own is good practice." As has already been pointed out, other articles of pretty much identical length have been merged before, so the case that Ashe is somehow different is a little odd. – Seancdaug 01:18, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

If the character design section is full of speculation/unverifyable info, remove it. Dread Lord CyberSkull ✎☠ 01:33, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I've just done so. May I now make the request that the article be moved (in its current state) to the list article? As far as content goes, it's still clearly a stub, and its shorter than numerous other individual character articles that have been merged into lists previously. I would also like to apologize for any confusion regarding this: I see User:QubitOtaku has just recanted his previous position at Talk:List of Final Fantasy XII characters, which means that the consensus I had thought we had reached was not so consensual after all. Which goes to show the importance of talking these things through, I suppose. – Seancdaug 01:49, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

As of my most recent edit, I copied the text (minus the "character design" subheading) of the Ashe article to List of Final Fantasy XII characters, to give everyone a better idea of what it would look like if merged. Does anyone have any problems with it? This whole mess notwithstanding, I still feel that there's too little information about Ashe to warrant an individual article, so I would still like to see her article merged into the list, though I will endeavor to make sure we're all on the same page (myself included) before actually merging/redirecting again. – Seancdaug 02:15, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

I think it should be merged myself. Yes we talked about a transition process for character articles, but this character is from a game not even out yet, it should be difficult to have enough information on it. Other characters from released game do deserve this transition process, but Ashe should not have been created, it's only that we had not reached a decision about character articles when it was created. So, like I said, let's keep that one in a list for now.--DarkEvil 21:54, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Did somebody recreate the Kefka Palazzo article? ~ Hibana 16:58, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

It wasn't me!PiccoloNamek 17:23, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

Names and characters

Merry Christmas to all! Well, we sure have filled out this talk page again in a short amount of time. I just wanted to bring up a few new issues for the project. 1.) Throughout the various Final Fantasy pages, the casing of the series mascots, chocobos, moogles, cactuars, and perhaps even tonberrys (tonberries?), is not consistent from article to article. Some instances are capitalized, some are not, especially in their respective main articles. 2.) The article List of Final Fantasy characters may need to be changed as each individual game has it to have its own list of characters and this one encompasses every game. This may be a bit redundant, as the template on the right of each game's character list has this article for the original Final Fantasy. Although there are very few notable characters in the original title, it may deserve an article as well. If the game does get a character list, should it be titled "List of Final Fantasy (video game) characters" or "List of Final Fantasy I characters"? Finally, if the series character list is kept, should it retain its title or be changed to "List of characters in the Final Fantasy series"? ~ Hibana 19:09, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Without digging through the archives, I seem to recall that the original idea was to create one character list per game, and that once these lists were all up and running, that the original List of Final Fantasy characters would be dedicated to the first game. I have reservations about calling it Final Fantasy I, because that's not really the title, and I would personally think that the "(video game)" disambiguation would be unnecessary, in light of the template. Plus, we could always add a disambiguation note, similar to what we have at the top of the main Final Fantasy article. But we should probably revisit the issue now and actually make something happen on that front, especially in light of the fact that the LoFFC article is a bit of a mess, at the moment. – Seancdaug 02:59, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Well, until we get that straightened out, I'm going to go ahead and correct the mascot casing in all the articles I can find: I recently saw in FFIX that "chocobo" and "moogle" are not capitalized unless their in a name or at the beginning of sentence. ~ Hibana 03:15, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

I think that Final Fantasy I characters should be created over List of Final Fantasy characters just because this list of characters for the whole series wouldn't be needed after that. We will have separate and more detailed lists for each game with a template which links between them.--DarkEvil 21:57, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

I just think its a bit redundant to a have a master list of characters when there are lists for each subsequent game. It's not like we would have a master list for the locations (although it may have existed at a primitive point). The series main article even has a link to the first Final Fantasy game's locations; why not have one for the first game's characters? We have an easy-to-see template at the top right of every existing list. I'm even willing to break it and make a sufficient list of FFI characters myself if needed. The Chaos article needs a place to go because it's a bit of an eyesore for how short it is (the guy only appears once in the game). While I'm here, I might as well mention that there's a revert war going on in the Kefka Palazzo article if anyone interested. ~ Hibana 19:42, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Exactly what I meant for List of Final Fantasy characters, you're exactly thinking like me. About the edit war, I knew this would happen one day. I guess it should be discussed on Kefka Palazzo's talk page or something to let them know why it is supposed to be a redirect. Maybe put a notice at the top of each character article for a while explaining that they will be merged into lists one day.--DarkEvil 21:30, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Free images for templates

I talked with ZeWrestler on AIM this afternoon, and filled him in on some of what's been going on with the project in the past couple of months. One of the things we talked about was the image question, and the somewhat sorry state of our templates since we've started to abide by Wikipedia policy about keeping fair use images out of the template namespace. We talked about how best to come up with a legitimately free alternative, and, as we were talking, I cobbled together this. It's not necessarily ideal, but I'd like to think it communicates at least some of the most recognizable elements of the series (it's got a crystal, at least). I've dropped it into the project template for a test drive. My Photoshop skills are... meh... so if anyone wants to try and put together some better, feel free to do so. Any thoughts? – Seancdaug 23:36, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

A wiki bug

Not really the most important subject as of right now, but did anyone notice Image:Chocobo.gif being listed as used on a lot of pages, mainly talk pages. This would be true if it were used in the Template:FinalFantasyProject as we place it on every FF talk page, but it's been removed from the template a while ago. It's used on the Chocobo article, but I checked on some of the talk pages mentioned in case they were used somewhere in the page, but it's not. I thought this was a funny bug.--DarkEvil 07:42, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

I noticed something like that some time ago. Some of the pages it links to are now redirects, and I guess when the project's image was that chocobo, the articles were redirected before it was removed from the template. Why it's listing the articles that still exist, I don't know. ~ Hibana 07:48, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Its not a bug, its a feature. The server caches things like what is used where. Those pages simply haven't been updated since the template was changed, hence the old references (live references would be too costly to the server). Open one of those pages and save it without editing. You will see the reference disappear. Dread Lord CyberSkull ✎☠ 03:27, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Then it explains this bizarre problem. I didn't try saving one of those pages, but anyway, the image is getting deleted (not for this but because no longer really used). What you said makes sense to me, anyway, if this thing repeats for another image, it will go off after a while when pages are edited.--DarkEvil 06:34, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

AC/VII

I was planning on adding some more images to the VII Character List, but I can't really decide if it would be a good idea to include screenshots from Advent Children. Should the list just stick to screenshots from the game itself? Eeno 02:56, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

• I would suggest SS from the game, as they can be rationale'd for fair use for critical assessment of the game etc and while the same can be done for Advent Children, as I understand it, it can be only applied to images on the Advent Children page. Just my 2 cents Chanlord 03:01, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

AC could always be used for representing them, but fairuse restricts use of these images a lot. Those images can be used anywhere, not necessarily the Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children article, as long as they are used for critical commentary and also, not more than 15 images in all should be used in one page like this, so the most important characters should have their images and not more than 5 images coming from an individual person such as a character artwork which was done only by one person, let's say Tetsuya Nomura. The most important is that we not abuse these types of images, so if an already used image of Cloud somewhere in Wikipedia could do the job for List of Final Fantasy VII characters, there's no reason to push the law and upload one more different image of Cloud. Of course, if no uploaded images is good for what would be needed in a particular article, then you can upload a different image. But I think that for most important characters, one of the images used in their individual articles is certain to be good enough for List of Final Fantasy VII characters.--DarkEvil 06:47, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

No title

added final fantasy 10 to list of games with black mages in --Madcow 19:20, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

Um, okay. Thanks. ~ Hibana 19:32, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

"You" edits

I have begun searching the articles for any uses of the word "you" in terms of "the player" and/or "one". Making some progress ^_^ Deckiller 23:22, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

I've just seen your edits at list of Final Fantasy IX characters, this is great. All instances of 'you' should be replaced by 'the player' in every game related article.--DarkEvil 03:36, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

Finest Fantasy for Advance

Should an article like that be created, after all, we have one for Compilation of Final Fantasy VII. Unless there is already an article like that, but I haven't seen one. This is the name Square Enix use for their remakes of Final Fantasy IV through VI on Game Boy Advance.--DarkEvil 06:34, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

In principle, I see no problem with adding it (haven't heard the term myself, though). I'm a little concerned that there isn't really enough information floating out there yet to produce more than a stub, but I haven't been following things very closely, so what do I know? – Seancdaug 23:30, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

From the point of view as a Final Fantasy fan who hasn't heard about this yet, I'd probably turn to Wikipedia for information on it. So I think it's a good idea. (omg a post?) — cuaHL 00:19, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Hey Cuahl, good to see you sometimes. Seeing the approval from you two should be enough. I'll work on this when I have the time, maybe tonight. I'll be certain to include official references since not a lot of people seem to be aware of this.--DarkEvil 02:33, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Final Fantasy VI character article renaming

I've just tagged both Celes Chère and Sabin René Figaro with {{rename}} notes (to Celes Chere and Sabin Rene Figaro, respectively). My reasoning is that these names are never presented as accented in the game, and both articles are tagged with notes explicitly stating the presence or absence of such accents is pure speculation. Does anyone feel strongly about keeping the current names, or should I go ahead and move 'em (by listing them at Wikipedia:Requested moves, if necessary)? – Seancdaug 04:42, 12 January 2006 (UTC)