Talk:StarCraft: Brood War/GA1

GA Review
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Initial comments
A quick glance at the article did not reveal any major problems; over the next few hours I'll review it more carefully. --N Shar (talk · contribs) 03:26, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

More comments
I'll add my assessments of the article under the various criteria below as I finish them.

Style (criterion 1)
There is one major concern: the Plot section only partially complies with the guide to writing about fiction. While the first paragraph is very good and in compliance, the second and third paragraphs are not so good. Specifically, they take a more in-universe style. This is not appropriate for a computer game, because an important part of the genre is player control of the action. Notice that the first paragraph tells the story as the player sees it (for example, "the player joins Zeratul and Artanis in an operation to recover two key crystals necessary to operate the temple".) In the second paragraph, the player's role is only mentioned at the beginning, and particularly during Duran's betrayal it becomes unclear where the player is involved. (The player doesn't help Stukov rebuild the psi disruptor, for example, but does help Duran take over it, and then turns against Duran again. All this needs to be clarified.) In the third paragraph, the player is not mentioned at all.

To fix this, basically just rewrite paragraphs 2 and 3 in the style of paragraph 1.

Nothing else really serious here. The article seems to comply with the MOS. The section Plot does have three moderately long paragraphs, but on the whole I'd say it's of a reasonable length. The three-paragraph organization makes sense, given that there are three campaigns, so I don't think this should really be changed (and indeed, doing so would interfere with the resolution of the above complaint). Perhaps if another good image could be found and introduced on the left-hand side there, that would break it up a bit visually. Not a huge concern.

The final paragraph of the article (Legacy) has a few short sentences in a row, making it a bit choppy. I may fix this myself, but anyone is welcome to beat me to it.

Overall, On Hold pending more complete WP:WAF compliance. As I noted above, the guideline is very important here. The offending paragraphs would probably be fine in the case of a movie, but since there is interactivity here, we need to be a little bit more explicit about that. --N Shar (talk · contribs) 04:33, 24 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I'll give it a try tommorrow if I have the time; unfortunately I'm a little busy at the moment. -- Sabre (talk) 20:15, 24 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm going to have to argue against this on the basis of length and style. In comparison to StarCraft, this plot section is already long enough (too long in my mind), and I can't add more information without increasing the length even further to unacceptable levels. The actual activities of the player characters in Brood War have even less of a significance than they did in StarCraft, and in the StarCraft article the actual activities of the player are only sparsely referred to: they simply take up too much room when the focus of the game is not on what the player characters are doing, but what the other characters are doing, there's not as much interactivity with the plot as you might think. Personally, I've tried to cut down, rewrite or otherwise improve the plot section several times over now, to get it to the level of the plot section in StarCraft, but even with the opinions and help of other editors who are far better than me at this stuff (User:Silver Edge, User:David Fuchs, User:Giggy and User:Larrythefunkyferret to name a few), I've not had the luck I would like. I'm afraid I cannot do anything further with the plot section and still make it read decently. If anyone else wants to have a try, they're more than welcome to, but I've unfortunately reached my limit for that particular section. -- Sabre (talk) 09:56, 25 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, I gave it a shot. I'll probably come back and revise. For the most part, it still reads all right, but there are a few sentences that I think got a bit clunky. I'll go back and fix them, or someone else can. Anyway, I'm just about ready to pass the article. --N Shar (talk · contribs) 22:14, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Attribution/Verification (criterion 2)
This looks good. Although the Plot section has no citations (well... one), that should be okay. The only real question I have is about the Cincinnati Inquirer review. Is that paper known for having high-quality gaming reviews? And, if not, why exactly was this review chosen for inclusion? I'm not saying that it shouldn't be in there, but I'm just wondering whether there might be an even better source available.

Overall, pass. Citations check out. --N Shar (talk · contribs) 04:56, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Coverage (criterion 3)
Coverage is fine. Good summary style. Comparing this article to StarCraft, which is an FA, the breadth of coverage is the same but the level of detail is less. This is fine, because SC:BW is only an expansion, and not a full game. If the article is to be improved to FA standard it might be desirable to add a little bit more detail, but for GA this is perfectly fine.

Overall, pass. --N Shar (talk · contribs) 05:12, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Neutrality (criterion 4)
Neutrality in an article like this comes in two types: first, reviews must be fairly selected to represent the diversity of views, and second, the article must not read like an advertisement. The article passes on both counts. The only potential issue here is that the only negative review included is bundled in a paragraph with a positive review. This, to some extent, hides the negative review, because someone skimming based on the first sentences would miss it. I'm not very worried about this, but when I finally get around to making my improvements to the article, I may deal with that.

Overall, pass. --N Shar (talk · contribs) 05:25, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Stability (criterion 5)
Looking at the edit history, User:S@bre has largely controlled the article. Under some circumstances this might be considered a problem, but that user's changes seem productive (as do the changes of other recent editors, with the exception of some blatant vandalism). I don't see any edit wars going on at this time, and I don't expect one to develop during this review process.

Overall, then, pass. --N Shar (talk · contribs) 05:53, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Images (criterion 6)
The first thing I noticed when looking at this article was that all the images were fair-use images. This is okay for a Good Article, and the images have accepted fair-use rationales. Additional images are not necessary to pass this review process, but might improve the article -- for example, an image of a Korean SC tournament, or of some people playing a casual game (perhaps along the lines of Image:Go_pros_and_amateurs.jpg, which is from the GA Go (board game)). On the other hand, such an image might be better placed in the StarCraft article.

The captions are also good.

Overall, pass. --N Shar (talk · contribs) 05:53, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Final notes
This article still needs the changes listed under Criterion 1. As a result, this nomination will be placed On Hold until those changes are completed. At that time, I will pass the article. Questions/comments/suggestions are welcome. --N Shar (talk · contribs) 05:53, 24 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Okay, I think we're good to go. --N Shar (talk · contribs) 22:21, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Merge discussion of two expansions: Retribution_(StarCraft) and Insurrection (StarCraft)
Found at: Talk:Retribution_(StarCraft).

travb (talk) 00:29, 5 January 2009 (UTC)