Template talk:Infobox video game

License field (2)

{{admin help}} Please add an optional license field. This is useful information and very suitable to be put into the infobox. For example Template:Infobox software has one and since games are a subcategory of software it is only logical this infobox too to include the license parameter. Since the template is protected, an admin is required to perform the edit. Palosirkka (talk) 09:03, 7 August 2012 (UTC)

I've disabled the admin help field in your post. Additions to the Infobox need to be discussed and receive consensus before requesting that an admin add them. The above discussion failed to achieve that, but you are welcome to try and build consensus again. For the record, my opinions haven't changed from the discussion above. The data would be hard to verify. - X201 (talk) 09:49, 7 August 2012 (UTC)

How would the data be difficult to verify? If no data is given, then the game is all rights reserved. It's very simple really. Palosirkka (talk) 06:41, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

Licensing is not an overly relevant item in video games (as it is in software). An infobox should only include the most relevant items about the game. Licensing details are more appropriately listed in the development section of the article. Salavat (talk) 07:07, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

Recommendation: creating Template:Infobox MMORPG

Hello all. I create this note today to ask for assistance, or for a suggestion, regarding this topic and recommendation: the creation of Template:Infobox MMORPG. Why am I asking this? Simple: Template:Infobox video game does not contain a "defunct" or "retired" parameter. The "defunct/retired" parameter could be used to state when an MMORPG servers get retired and the game becomes "defunct". There could be a potential of other uses for a template such as Template:Infobox MMORPG, but that is the only example that comes to my mind (since it's the one that bothered me the most when I was working on a few articles for MMORPGs. Steel1943 (talk) 01:47, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

Or, second option: we could come to an agreement to seek an administrator's assistance to add a "defunct" or "retired" parameter to the fully-protected Template:Infobox video game. Either option could work (since adding another parameter to the existing template, if done correctly, should not disturb the articles that currently use Template:Infobox video game). Steel1943 (talk) 01:51, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

I don't think either are needed. An extra bit of text at the top of the released field would do the job. Like this.

Infobox video game
Release	Service closed EU: 21 August 2012 Microsoft Windows EU: 1 August 2012 PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 EU: 2 August 2012

- X201 (talk) 08:05, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

• This was proposed before and did not gain consensus (Template_talk:Infobox_video_game/Archive_11#Closure_date). So a new separate infobox is unlikely to pass. Regarding the field, my argument remains the same -- the number of games to which this is applicable is very low and infoboxes are generally for fields that appear in many if not most articles. Everything else should be in prose. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 10:11, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

Release Date(s) wrapping

The width of this template, or the left column, needs to be adjusted to prevent wrapping of "Release Date(s)" for particular font/browser combinations. For me this displays as:

Release Date
(s)

Every article I've checked has the problem:

• Gradius (video game)
• SimEarth
• The Sims

I suppose that this may be due to a font rendering issue. I am using the default fonts supplied with Opera12. The heading renders properly using the default fonts of IE9 and Firefox14. aprock (talk) 15:51, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

Add class to the developer/publisher/...

Hello!

I'm using the Wikipedia API to parse some text from video game articles. It would ease me a lot if it is possible to add a class to information about developers, publishers, artists, designers, release date, platforms and such.

A short example how it could look from Super Metroid.

<tr style="">
  <td><b><a href="/enwiki/wiki/Video_game_developer" title="Video game developer">Developer(s)</a></b></td>
  <td class="developers"> <!-- Here's my suggestion -->
    <a href="/enwiki/wiki/Nintendo_Research_%26_Development_1" title="Nintendo Research & Development 1">Nintendo R&D1</a><br />
    <a href="/enwiki/wiki/Intelligent_Systems" title="Intelligent Systems">Intelligent Systems</a>
  </td>
</tr>
<tr style="background:#f0f0f0;">
  <td><b><a href="/enwiki/wiki/Video_game_publisher" title="Video game publisher">Publisher(s)</a></b></td>
  <td class="publishers"> <!-- Here's my suggestion -->
    <span class="brand"><a href="/enwiki/wiki/Nintendo" title="Nintendo">Nintendo</a></span>
  </td>
</tr>
<tr style="">
  <td><b>Director(s)</b></td>
  <td class="directors"> <!-- Here's my suggestion -->
    <a href="/enwiki/wiki/Yoshio_Sakamoto" title="Yoshio Sakamoto">Yoshio Sakamoto</a>
  </td>
</tr>
<tr style="background:#f0f0f0;">
  <td><b><a href="/enwiki/wiki/Video_game_producer" title="Video game producer">Producer(s)</a></b></td>
  <td class="producers"> <!-- Here's my suggestion -->
    <a href="/enwiki/wiki/Makoto_Kano_(video_game_designer)" title="Makoto Kano (video game designer)">Makoto Kano</a>
  </td>
</tr>

I guess this also could be used to help people that uses their own CSS-styles on Wikipedia.

Thank you.

Ragowit (talk) 05:53, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

The idea is sound. Implementation would likely not happen the way you want it, as you're looking at the resulting HTML code, but we're starting from Wikitable syntax, and a complex set of templates to start. It is much much much much easier to do what has already been done on the publisher, in how the "brand" class is set on the span of the value of the publisher. I think this would still do what you want to do, possibly even easier as you should be left with just the HTML Value of what's in that span and don't have to parse a second time.

The only question remains as to how best to name the classes to avoid potential conflicts with other infobox (if that should be a problem). In other words, I wouldn't just have the class name for Developer as "developer" but "vg_developer". But I'm not 100% sure on that. --MASEM (t) 16:08, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

Ah, didn't see the "brand" class. And you are right, this would still do what I want and it would be even easier to parse.

And you are thinking one step ahead, I like that! My recommendation is to do what you said, add a prefix "vg_" so it will be vg_publisher, vg_release_date, vg_developer and so on.

Ragowit (talk) 09:23, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

Not to sound harsh or anything, but I have to ask who else besides you would use this semantic data? There are many different metadata syntaxes, and some are already included in the infobox. Why does this method, that will add lots of additional classes, be helpful to more than a few people? I'm not sure what you are referring to as Wikipedia API, but the API [1] does not produce HTML, that would be action=render [2]. Why don't you parse wiki markup through API? —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 09:57, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

No worries. I have no idea who else would use this semantic data. I haven't asked around. It would be helpful to more people, if I succeed in writing a script/bot/something that checks what's written on the wikipage and what's written on another page (allgame, ign, mobygames etc). Too find any missing developer, publisher, release date and such. I was thinking to use action=parse [3]. But I'm grateful for any tips on how to better parse a game related page on wikipedia. What do you mean by parsing wiki markup through the API?

Ragowit (talk) 18:28, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

I meant do this [4] (which is the main purpose of API) and parse the Wiki markup language, instead of the rendered html. You can retrieve a whole lot of pages this way [5]. I suppose action=parse can work as well, but you cannot get multiple pages and I really wouldn't rely on HTML instead of Wiki markup. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 21:22, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

Thank you, I will look into this!

Ragowit (talk) 06:06, 3 September 2012 (UTC)

Field for price of game

Should we include a field for the price of the game? Based on reader feedback on articles such as Minecraft, it seems people want to know the price. - M0rphzone (talk) 19:00, 15 September 2012 (UTC)

Basically, WP:NOPRICES (#5). The additional subtle context for the last sentence there is: if we start mentioning a price in the infobox, people will compete to find/update the lowest available price, out of either altruism or because it's their job. It ends with tears, every time!

Also: To make it an "encyclopedic" comprehensive coverage, we'd need to provide every historic "official/recommended" price, as well as actual-prices-that-are-usually-charged (if they differed significantly). Eg, imagine the "price" field in the infobox of WoW, or for a Mini Cooper. Or a book that sold 90% of its copies via Amazon during a site-discount.

Hence, not our job. HTH. —Quiddity (talk) 19:41, 15 September 2012 (UTC)

Propose removal of ratings section.

This is not a field with purpose, its a list of ratings that hold relevance only to the host country and say nothing about the game itself in the same way Film Infobox does not carry film ratings. Unless something is notable about the rating, in which case it would be discussed in the body of the article. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 12:59, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

I don't really know how movies are rated, but there are only a few big video game raters and a few smaller/specific ones. {{Video game ratings}} has the ones we use. These are broader than a single country. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 16:30, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Film ratings are exactly the same (to just make sure we are on the same page here I am talking about the age ratings, not critical ratings). They don't say anything about the game, just what a reviewing board decided it would need to be labeled as to be sold. Since the ratings themselves are only meaningful to the country they are used and even then meaningless in an encyclopedic sense, there is not any real reason to retain them. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 16:35, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

I'm a bit lost -- you say "exactly the same" but then you also say "country". VG ratings are broader than just single countries and there are only a few major ones; most games never get rated past PEGI and ESRB. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 16:51, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

I'm still not sure what a rating provided by even a universal body adds to a video game article unless there is controversy about it, such as being refused a rating altogether. Doesn't seem any different than adding a price field, informing on the age restriction of a game in the infobox just doesn't display any kind of tangible benefit, whether there are 2-3 or a dozen rating bodies. And I can point to Batman: Arkham City, Sleeping Dogs and Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception as games that have SIX ratings, seven in Uncharted's case. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 17:26, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

All I was saying is that ratings are not country-specific and are a fair bit broader, so that argument did not stick. On the other hand, their usefulness I won't really comment on, as I don't really care enough about these rating systems to make an informed !vote on this. I won't miss them if they're gone. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 20:47, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

This sounds familiar (similar topic based on the vgratings template). Just because WikiProject Films does it one way, doesn't mean we should as well.

It's specious to argue from exception. Given the fact that most games don't have a large number of ratings, that isn't a particularly valid argument. Arguing that they are not encyclopedic or useful is also a difficult argument to make, and I don't think you've made it, given that it would be trivial to comment on the game's mature content rating in a game's reception section, and that it's not in any given number of articles is not a reason to remove it from the infobox. Additionally, the WikiProject has guidelines on the field's usage to deal with the content, so it's not as if those couldn't be changed to deal with a perceived problem of length. --Izno (talk) 22:50, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Length isn't my issue (ba dum tish) it's relevancy. Unless it is about something being banned or given an otherwise unreasonable high rating due to certain specific content, all of which can be discussed in prose, there is no argument for listing what arbitrary age rating was given to a game in America, Europe, Japan, Australia or anywhere else. It's like knowing how much it cost at release. Was it expensive, cheap? Why is that less relevant? It just doesn't seem to offer any necessary information. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 23:07, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

But you haven't listed what makes it irrelevant. You still haven't argued persuasively against the point that it would be trivial to talk about it in the reception section; it's simply the case that we don't. Simply because we don't talk about it doesn't mean that it isn't relevant, for that very fact. You're providing the same argument that was shot down at the TfD for the VG ratings template, in essence, and that simply isn't the case here. Who ranks what doesn't seem relevant to you because you seem simply to think it so, whether it is or is not so. If anything, you should be arguing that it should come out of the infobox because it isn't covered currently in every single article, which then implies that it's useless. At which point I respond that correlation is not causation and that you can't possibly know what the user is looking for, and that there are plainly articles which do deserve to have that summarized, due to the content in the prose about censorship of some fashion.

You could be raising the same question about the system specs in the infobox, or even the artist or developers. Those people and that information is rarely discussed outside of GA-level articles. Or rather, system specifications basically are not discussed even at that quality of article, yet we provide the information. What makes them worth keeping that are good reasons?

In other words, I'm still not seeing an argument which cohesively argues for removal, and a number of reasons to continue to keep the field. Much as we might want to create processes which force behavior on editors to enable good practice, editors failing to read the guidelines and suggested usage should not be the fault of the field in this case, in my opinion. --Izno (talk) 03:44, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

On the flipside you're not raising a reason to keep it. I'm not saying it should be discussed in the prose in every article, I'm saying if something were notable about it, i.e. it was refused classification in Germany because of violence. I don't mean state what rating it had in prose because the rating would be as meaningless there as in the infobox. If you see that say Portal is a 15+ (I don't know if it is), what does that matter? You raise the artist and developer but those people are responsible for the creation of the product, and I can't handle 4 open discussions at a single time. Other things existing is not an excuse for the existence of something else, if you feel they are irrelevant raise an applicable discussion about them, I don't think the computer specs template is relevant either, we're not a tech support site. The rating only tells you what age a random group of people decided the game would be acceptable to view. And that kind of system has been questionable for a long time. So if I'm told that Portal is a 15+ the only thing that can happen is "Oh...well i don't think anything that bad is in it". Games receiving that rating now will be treated differently than those 5 years from now and 5 years ago based on what random group of people are running whatever organisation and whatever cultural things are going on at the time. So the ratings provide no context, no meaning, no relevance, theyre just a random number that a chunk of the reading audience probably doesn't even understand if its coming from a foreign country. I mean what the hell is CERO? Japan's? How is that useful on the English wikipedia? As I've stated, anything of significance (not the rating itself) should be discussed in prose if tehre was something notable or controversial about it, i.e. GTA:SA's reclassification/higher restriction over hidden content. An M in the infobox and then an AO with brackets stating (after re-release) doesn't tell the reader anything. And in that particular case it just looks a mess. EDIT and looking at that particular infobox with system specs in it, if you were to raise a comment for its deletion, I wold happily support you. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 11:41, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

I've pinged WP:VG. I basically don't agree with what you are saying, but I don't think I'm going to get further than what I've stated. --Izno (talk) 16:37, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

I support its removal, and broadly agree with Darkwarriorblake. This, along with damn near everything in the infobox, frankly, is trivia and a pain in the arse to verify. If it's mentioned in secondary sources, and there's some commentary, it should go in the prose. Otherwise, it shouldn't be anywhere; and one has to go looking for a primary source or something like Mobygames or similar just to include it. Izno said: You could be raising the same question about the system specs in the infobox, or even the artist or developers. Those people and that information is rarely discussed outside of GA-level articles. Or rather, system specifications basically are not discussed even at that quality of article, yet we provide the information. Yes, pretty much: there are a few other things to which this would apply and has applied (the input method was one of them, as was the sizes of the game cartridge). But some people do work in GAs and so forth, and this stuff is a nightmare: if you want a good reason other than redundancy, it's the difficulty of verification. These things tend to just get left without a cite in the assumption that it is uncontroversial or comes from the primary source, and I've seen things get changed as incorrect after years. I've also seen insistence at GAN that these things go in, and one ends up with a long list of non-entity personnel, apparently just because the infobox field exists. bridies (talk) 17:05, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

I also support removal. This field was never discussed during The Great Infobox Overhaul of 2010, but I feel it should have been, and that the principles that Blake and birdies have raised, would have seen it retired back then. Its a nightmare to verify, not least because the Aussies keep changing their website file hierarchy, we end up linking to search results as well, which is not good. The infobox should reflect the prose of the article, ratings are only ever discussed when there is an element of controversy, otherwise they're never mentioned. They're not needed in the infobox. - X201 (talk) 20:11, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

Support removal. The entire infobox could do with a look over tbh, such as the wikilinking of field names like Genre and I agree with Izno that the system information probably isn't necessary either, at least not in the infobox. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 01:11, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

I don't understand the desire to remove this field. While I'm personally no fan of the ratings system which was created largely for reasons of politics but it does exist and every modern console and computer game has ratings now so why not list it for the games which are rated ? There are some people who do care about this information and it is the sort of thing which seems appropriate for listing in the infobox and should take up no more than 3 lines assuming the 3 major ratings systems (ESRB, PEGI, CERO) are listed. Asmpgmr (talk) 00:52, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

Australia and New Zealand are important as well. Excluding them and including the non-English language CERO would seem a bit odd. - X201 (talk) 08:09, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

Didn't mean to exclude them, I was simply unaware of their ratings system. I suppose CERO should be listed in the Japanese edition of Wikipedia. Asmpgmr (talk) 15:57, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

If we were to include the ratings we would have to include CERO as well. This is merely the English language Wikipedia; we don't exclude things from non-English speaking countries, or consider them of less importance. bridies (talk) 17:16, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

Input

What happened to the input parameter? It's filled out in dozens of articles, but doesn't appear in the infobox. Was it removed? Why? It's an important aspect of many video games. — Frεcklεfσσt | Talk 20:42, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

There was consensus to remove it in The Great Infobox Overhaul of 2010. It was only of use when specialist controllers were used, and by that measure if they are special, they need to be mentioned in the prose. - X201 (talk) 07:57, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

While the input parameter isn't very useful for consoles or home computer games it is definitely needed for arcade games, consider:

• 2-way joystick (Galaxian, Galaga, Defender)
• 4-way joystick (Pac-Man, Dig Dug, Donkey Kong)
• 8-way joystick (Xevious, Time Pilot, Bosconian)
• analog joystick (Food Fight, Sinistar, Tron)
• flight stick (After Burner, Thunder Blade, Zaxxon)
• tank sticks (Battlezone, Assault, Vindicators)
• twisty grip (Star Wars, Empire Strikes Back)
• trackball (Centipede, Millipede, Missile Command)
• spinner (Tempest, Arkanoid, Omega Race)
• steering wheel and pedals (numerous driving games)
• handle bars (motorcycle games, Paperboy)
• buttons (anywhere from 0 to 6, some games like Asteroids only use buttons)
• light gun (Operation Wolf, Terminator 2)

Not to mention arcade games which have specialized controls like the beverage taps on Tapper or the rotary joystick on 720°.

The input field really needs to be restored and considered an arcade game field like cpu, display, sound and cabinet. Asmpgmr (talk) 00:38, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Surely this would be mentioned in the actual prose though, if it's necessary to understanding how the game works. bridies (talk) 01:47, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

What harm is it to mention this in the infobox ? Considering that cpu, display, sound, cabinet and arcade system are already there it would be consistent to list input as well. Arcade games use many different controllers as I've illustrated and this is an important aspect of them. Asmpgmr (talk) 02:18, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

You say the input parameter is definitely needed for arcade games, but do not explain why it is definitely needed for arcade games. No understanding is lost and in fact confusion is introduced with some of them. And the majority of them are just variations of any generic kind of input, especially "buttons". The infobox and associated articles are not lesser for the lack of this field. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 02:45, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

There is no confusion introduced whatsoever any more than there is with the other arcade specific fields. Console and home computer games wouldn't use this field and if it is such a big deal in regards to them then arcade games should have their own specific infobox template and the problem is solved. The arcade specific fields could be moved there and eliminated from the general video game infobox. That is a simple and straightforward solution. Asmpgmr (talk) 02:55, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

In my opinion we shouldn't have those fields either. Wikipedia is written for the layman, and it should not have this jumble of technical information with no commentary. I'm not sure if arcade games use the same infobox template as home console/computer games, but if they do: then just having the fields encourages their needless use, as argued above. bridies (talk) 06:03, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia is written for everyone. Just because some people can't understand technical information certainly doesn't mean it shouldn't be there. As long as the information is concise, factual and not subjective it should be there. By your reasoning then articles on inherently technical subjects like particle physics wouldn't exist at all because most people don't understand it and that would certainly be wrong. Currently arcade games use the same template as other video games but I really think they should use their own separate infobox template and it should left to the Arcade Task Force to decide what is listed. Asmpgmr (talk) 15:09, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

"Everyone" being laymen. For some topics, "like particle physics", it may be difficult to describe the basics to anyone at all, but not so with video games. bridies (talk) 11:00, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

Personally I think this falls under the same argument against ratings above as not imparting useful, immediate knowledge about the product. The type of input is not generally a notable thing under any circumstances, but were it somewhat abnormal it would surely be described under a gameplay section anyway, i.e. "The user is required to navigate a race track by tilting their own body on a real world bike frame, with the in-game character responding to their movements". Not a great piece of prose, just an example. Darkwarriorblake (talk) 14:06, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

You can't define everyone as laymen as that's simply not true. Personally I think the input should be mentioned in the infobox for arcade games. As for the ratings, this doesn't apply to arcade games but for console games I see no reason why that shouldn't be mentioned as well. Of course games before the ratings system was implemented wouldn't have them. Anyway I'll take this up with the Arcade Task Force and see about having a separate infobox for arcade games. Asmpgmr (talk) 15:35, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

For most articles, this means understandable to a general audience. bridies (talk) 03:56, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

Well input is certainly easily understandable and is an important aspect of arcade games since there are so many varied controllers and it makes sense to list this in the infobox. As for the technical parameters I see absolutely no reason not to list this information as is currently done for many arcade games. It is useful to those of us who understand it and is easily ignored by those who don't. Also I am very much opposed to any sort of dumbing down of information. Asmpgmr (talk) 16:05, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

I'll agree to disagree then. bridies (talk) 17:12, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

Shutdown parameter

This template needs a shutdown parameter for online games who require server to play (primarily MMOs) when the server is shutdown. Basically this is the bookend to released=. --173.13.177.204 (talk) 21:48, 26 September 2012 (UTC)