Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dream Pod 9


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus. ‑Scottywong | gossip _ 16:28, 25 July 2019 (UTC)

Dream Pod 9

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This article on a company that makes a WWII game has been sourced entirely to its own website for the last 14 years. Maintenance tags were placed on the article six years ago and have yet to be acted upon.

A standard BEFORE (JSTOR, newspapers.com, Google News, Google Books) fails to find any RS. The only sources uncovered in BEFORE are a press release, an incidental mention on a Finnish blog , and an incidental mention on something called vg247.com. Per WP:GNG, notability must be demonstrated, not simply declared or asserted. In the absence of any reliable sources of any kind (let alone significant coverage) the article fails the GNG. Chetsford (talk) 00:10, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Canada-related deletion discussions. Chetsford (talk) 00:12, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Companies-related deletion discussions. Chetsford (talk) 00:12, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Military-related deletion discussions. Chetsford (talk) 00:15, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Video games-related deletion discussions. Chetsford (talk) 00:12, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Games-related deletion discussions. Newimpartial (talk) 01:58, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Science fiction-related deletion discussions. Newimpartial (talk) 01:58, 8 July 2019 (UTC)

For reference, the original !vote text follows - in addition to the substantial discussion in Appelcline's Designers & Dragons (a parennial reliable source in this field), Dream Pod 9 is also cited in Chandler & Chandler's Fundamentals of Game Development (2011), Mogensen's "Dice-rolling systems in RPGs" (2007), Williams and Rooney's "From book to field" (2018), the company has also been discussed on gizmodo, guildcompanion.com, gamemonkeys.com and Pyramid, and that's without even looking for the print reviews that were dominant in the 1990s when the Pod came to prominence. Therefore, snow keep. Newimpartial (talk) 01:51, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Snow Keep Merge and Redirect to Heavy Gear - I am changing my mind, because now that we have improved sources and content, it would make sense to consolidate them to the best-known product until we have time to document the company itself more thoroughly using the dead tree sources. Plus, ideally, I would like to expand the author/game designer articles more than I would emphasize the publisher itself, though I know that's a personal choice and goes against some traditions in the field. Newimpartial (talk) 16:02, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Source review:
 * -Morgensen's "Dice-rolling systems in RPGs" (2007) Can we get an OCLC number on this? Worldcat doesn't seem to think this book exists (see: ).
 * -Chandler & Chandler's Fundamentals of Game Development (2011) The only reference I can find to the company in this book is the following: "Heavy Gear is a trademark of Dream Pod 9". Proof of existence is not proof of notability.
 * -Williams and Rooney's "From book to field" (2018) ... according to the publisher it is "an online publishing imprint that makes books and games available as PDF ... as free downloads"  - this book (ebook?), according to Worldcat, is not currently held by any known library in the world. While I appreciate not every publisher is a Springer or Taylor & Francis, I question if a publisher with no office, no employees, and which creates PDFs it hands out for free (but no library will accept for cataloging) is a reliable source as we generally understand the term.
 * -"the company has also been discussed on ... http://www.gamemonkeys.com/reviews/g/gearkriegrpg.htm gamemonkeys.com" - "gamemonkeys.com" is an anonymously written site (see: )that doesn't show evidence of a gatekeeping process and has not been sourced by other RS, ergo, is not itself RS
 * -"the company has also been discussed on ... gizmodo, guildcompanion.com... Pyramid" - No, I believe that's incorrect. These are WP:PRODUCTREVs of specific products which already have WP pages and are not discussions of the company itself; per WP:COMPANY and WP:NOTINHERITED companies do not inherit notability from the products they manufacture
 * Thanks, Chetsford (talk) 02:08, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I have fixed the Pyramid citation. For Mogensen, Chandler & Chandler, and Williams and Rooney, perhaps you would have more luck using Google Scholar?
 * As we have preciously discussed, Chet, NOTINHERITED does not apply to the relationship between creators and their works; in particular, creators do indeed inhetit notability from their works. In the case of Dream Pod 9, many of their creations, including their four most notable games, are creations of the studio as a whole and in some cases, such as the Silhouette system, these works have exclusively corporate ownership without being the product of one or more individual authors. The production of notable games and other intellectual properties does indeed grant notability, just as Disney would be notable for the IP it has created, bought or stolen (q.v. the birthday song) even if its corporate shenanigans did not occupy our business pages. Newimpartial (talk) 02:32, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * "... perhaps you would have more luck using Google Scholar?" No, I'm afraid I didn't. Chetsford (talk) 02:44, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * That is strange to me, as it is how I found those sources. Have you had trouble searching using Google Scholar before? Newimpartial (talk) 03:03, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * That's great. So, what is the OCLC number to "Dice-rolling systems in RPGs"? Or a DOI number? Honestly, at this point, just anything to prove it exists. Second request. Chetsford (talk) 03:14, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * If you can't use Google Scholar for yourself, how does it become my responsibility to do it for you? Newimpartial (talk) 03:26, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * While it's unusual in an AfD to repeatedly refuse to provide an OCLC, LOC, or DOI number — or, indeed, any information by which one could verify that an offline source actually exists — I'll AGF it does. Chetsford (talk) 05:06, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * "creators do indeed inhetit notability" Can you demonstrate this is a WP policy by linking to it? Per WP:PRODUCT "a specific product or service may be notable on its own, without the company providing it being notable". Chetsford (talk) 02:48, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * WP:NCORP specifically excludes "entertainment groups [and] co-authors ... covered by WP:Notability (people). The latter specifies that creators may demonstrate Notability by having created "a significant or well-known work or collective body of work. In addition, such work must have been the primary subject of ... multiple independent periodical articles or reviews." This precisely describes the case of Dream Pod 9. Newimpartial (talk) 03:03, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * "WP:NCORP specifically excludes "entertainment groups [and] co-authors covered by WP:Notability (people)" I regret to inform you that "Dream Pod 9" is not a person. Chetsford (talk) 03:14, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Dream Pod 9 is the corporate form for a group of creatives ( designers and authors) to which NCREATIVE applies. If you were to read the entry in Designers & Dragons, this would be clear to you. Please try not to engage in Straw Man argumentation or to be facetious. Newimpartial (talk) 03:26, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * "Dream Pod 9 is the corporate form for" Yes, that's correct. Therefore, WP:NCORP applies. WP:NBIO applies to natural, not juristic, people. Chetsford (talk) 04:09, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Chetford, the carveout from NCORP applies to groups of "natural" people, regardless of their "juristic" status, e.g. "groups of inventors". Please try to keep up. Newimpartial (talk) 11:55, 8 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Neutral/Keep? The way I see it, if Dream Pod 9 truly are notable, then having made multiple notable games makes that game maker notable. However, none of those games are greatly sourced (Heavy Gear being an exception, that one clearly is notable), so they are possibly all deletable. It's also possible that everything, as standalone entries, aren't notable, but could be merged together and as a whole attain notability. &#32; Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 06:52, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for participating in the AfD. Just for full disclosure, I plan to sequentially nominate each of Dream Pod 9 Inc.'s products (except Heavy Gear, for reasons you noted) for deletion after this closes as they all seem to be advertisements that fail WP:N. Chetsford (talk) 06:59, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Chet, you can do what you like, but as all of the Dream Pod games with articles were extensively reviewed, they will all pass the GNG, and so you will simply ending up wasting your own time. Would you not rather take up another hobby, like billiards? Newimpartial (talk) 11:55, 8 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Keep At this time, I have heard of them, so suspect they may be notable. The problom is it was all in gaming mags I no longer own.Slatersteven (talk) 09:00, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Keep per Newimpartial, although I will see what I can do to improve this article this week given my limited time. BOZ (talk) 12:05, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I added one source that includes several pages of discussion on the company and its games; I will see if I can find anything else, but the coverage is likely to be print sources rather than online coverage. At minimum, if this does not go to "Keep" then I think it should be merged somewhere - perhaps to its most well-known game Heavy Gear, or to a list of game publishers, or something. BOZ (talk) 20:20, 10 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Additionally, there is a product review from Dragon magazine which discusses the company's Silhouette game system; the system does not have its own article, so I believe it should be discussed in the company page, and I believe that the review does help since it discusses the system. BOZ (talk) 16:58, 11 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Delete - Eh. Saw this mentioned at WP:RSN. WP:NOTINHERITED seems pretty straightforward here. We need significant coverage of this subject in reliable independent sources. So far every single source I've seen is a brief mention of the company in an article that's about one of it's properties. E.g. "published by Dream Pod 9". Even if we lump a pile of those together, we still don't have notability. A corporation isn't an artist or a band. Companies aren't "creative professionals" even if the people who work for it are creative professionals. None of the links above are to significant coverage of this subject, and "go Google Scholar it" with strange evasiveness about particulars is not reassuring. I went ahead and did so, finding e.g. Dice-Rolling Mechanisms in RPGs. The only mention it has of the subject is this line: "One of the simplest is to roll a number of dice equal to the ability and then pick the highest result, as is done in Dream Pod 9's 'Silhouette'." Again here there is nothing at all about this subject, and its product only given as a quick example. &mdash; Rhododendrites  talk \\ 13:39, 8 July 2019 (UTC)
 * The relevance of the citation is that it is a scholarly author writing within their area of expertise, and the die-rolling system in question is referred to and cited as authored by "Dream Pod 9" as a collective author - it is an IP that cannot be attributed to an individual within the studio, and is therefore a perfect example of how the developers work. This is directly equivalent to the "groups of inventors" discussed explicitly in the carveout from NCORP (who may also operate legally as a partnership or LLC) to which NBIO also applies. If this is not clear, the chapter (!) on Dream Pod 9 in Designers & Dragons Vol. 3, an impeccable RS in this field, should be sufficient to explain. Newimpartial (talk) 14:36, 8 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Delete, based on google searches the company does not appear to meet WP:GNG, and I am not finding any significant coverage, to show that the subject meets WP:NCORP. The subject isn't a White Wolf Publishing, or a TSR, at least at this point. Perhaps it is WP:TOOSOON?-- RightCow LeftCoast ( Moo ) 01:31, 10 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Dream Pod 9 peaked in influence and commercial appeal in the 1990s, so these internet searches are not beside the point. Please remember that notability is not temporary, and the Pod was covered reasonably extensively in print publications in the 1990s. Newimpartial (talk) 02:55, 10 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Keep per Newimpartial. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 11:11, 12 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Keep per Newimpartial. Also the addition of mention from Applecline strengthens the article. Guinness323 (talk) 17:52, 12 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Good work on finding more sources, Guinness. BOZ (talk) 16:02, 13 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Guinness - one of the sources you've added returns a dead link and the other doesn't appear to actually mention the name "Dream Pod 9" in it. Can you clarify if you meant to add these? Chetsford (talk) 16:50, 14 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the heads-up, I've repaired the deadlink with a link to an archived copy. The first link does not mention Dream Pod 9 because is a citation for the claim that Protoculture Addicts is the oldest surviving mecha magazine in North America. I've also changed the exact wording of that statement from "the first" to "one of the first", since the source notes five older mecha magazines which have ceased publication.Guinness323 (talk) 17:17, 14 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Understood. Just to clarify, while these may or may not be fine sources to use in the article and you've used them appropriately in a "background" section to cite specific claims, they don't contribute to establishing WP:N if they don't even mention the thing about which the article is about. And "colonydrop.com" appears to be (or was, since it's offline) a blog (see WP:SELFPUBLISH) written by "Sean" (no last name) and "Todd" (no last name). Chetsford (talk) 17:33, 14 July 2019 (UTC)

 Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus. Relisting comment: Previously closed, but backed out as WP:BADNAC. See also WP:Deletion review/Log/2019 July 16.
 * is the source discussed above. Probably self-published, but the author is reasonably well published in the field of CS math.  It's certainly independent and probably meets WP:SPS.  I tend to favor keeping articles about companies with multiple notable products, and that appears (for now?) to be the case here.  Call me a weak keep. Hobit (talk) 23:02, 14 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Hobit, here is a RS review that dedicates several paragraphs to discussing the Silhouette core system, which is a Dream Pod 9 IP that could not be tied to any one individual author/creator. This review discusses Dream Pod 9 explicitly (rather than relying on NBOOK/NAUTHOR rules for Notability), and may prove helful for this relisted discussion. Newimpartial (talk) 22:08, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, -- RoySmith (talk) 21:54, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Comments after DRV and relisting: Note that the product review from Dragon was added after the first Delete response above, and although it was added before the second Delete response (which seemed to misunderstand that the company is still actively producing products the way it once was, although I am not sure if they are even active at all to be honest) and I do not think the user took that source into account. The relevance in my opinion of that source is not so much that it includes reviews of the games, but that it comments on the Silhouette system, which does not have its own article, and is the core element of the company's games, and I believe that an independent source such as that is necessary to include in the article so that we have more about the Silhouette system.  I added the source Designers & Dragons after both delete votes, which contains several pages of information and commentary on the company.  I will AGF from Hobit's response that the self-published "Dice Rolling Mechanisms in RPGs" comes from a reliable author in the field of CS math.  I believe that the commentary from "Next Generation" magazine – an independent reliable source from the video game industry – is most useful in its contrasting the smaller DP9 with the much larger FASA, as the video game publisher at the time had gone from licensing FASA's BattleTech to DP9's Heavy Gear.  I have not seen the "PC Gamer" source to know what it says about the company.  I believe that the above is enough to meet the minimum for the WP:GNG, and thus I affirm my initial Keep, although if consensus ultimately disagrees with me, then I think we have enough to show that rather than deleting it should be merged somewhere.  Meanwhile, I will see what else I can do to find more sources for this topic, which are likely not easily found online due to how long ago this company was at its peak. BOZ (talk) 22:14, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I'd strongly suggests adding something based on The Alexandrian piece I cited just above. Newimpartial (talk) 22:17, 17 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Delete Came here from a closed DRV. Can a company be notable for having products which were reviewed given WP:NOTINHERITED? The only potentially significant coverage of the company I've seen are the two Lien Multimedia articles published within four days of each other, unfortunately require a subscription to view completely, and I'm not sure that's a reliable source, or whether the articles are PR. Many of the links provided above are links to reviews of the company's products and are not of the company themselves. Even if we're going to start accepting self-published academia, Dream Pod 9 is only mentioned once and as a throwaway, which may be a good source for the article but not to demonstrate notability. Even assuming Designers & Dragons is a good offline source for WP:GNG, there's still not enough here to pass WP:NORG. If anyone has offline sources which discuss the company and not the company's products, please let me know. I also don't mind if the game-specific prose gets merged into its respective game. SportingFlyer  T · C  22:38, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Sadly, this is still not a policy-compliant reading of NOTINHERITED in relation to CREATIVE. Also, the reliability of 'Designers & Dragons' has been previously affirmed, and multi-paragraph discussions of Dream Pod 9's Silhouette Core system are not "trivial mentions" per policy. Newimpartial (talk) 22:50, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * User:Guinness323 apparently has access to Lien Multimedia as he just added it to the article; you may want to ask what is in there? BOZ (talk) 01:17, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Le Lien Multimedia (The Multimedia Link) is a respected Quebec-based French-language on-line magazine that focusses on modern media, everything from movies and TV to video games, cellphone apps, animation, the music industry, etc. They are a news organization with independent reporters, not a PR firm. Recent articles include artificial intelligence in the creative industries; Minecraft as a social learning tool for kids; the LabLabLab Project about Game Studies at Concordia University; the Montreal band Off with Their Heads; headliners for the Aboriginal Presence Festival; etc. Their articles about Dream Pod 9 are not trivial.Guinness323 (talk) 02:53, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Sadly, Chetsford does not read French, so he is likely to remain from Missouri on this source, contra WP:V. Newimpartial (talk) 03:22, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Engadget is presumably also a WP:RS, no? Good work, Guiness323. :) BOZ (talk) 03:43, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * ICv2 as well, great work! BOZ (talk) 04:26, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Engadget is certainly RS but the article is not about Dream Pod 9. It's about one of its products. ICV2 is RS but as a trade outlet should be treated like we do Business Journals ... fine for facts, not N. I know many people !voting here are almost exclusively involved in RPG articles, but speaking as someone who is not I hope you are able to empathize that the frustration some of the other delete !voters seem to express originates out of the unique situation we find ourselves in having to continuously reiterate these points throughout this thread since they're not ones that typically require explanation in most AFDs. It is most certainly not personal nor does it represent more stringent standards being applied to the topic of fantasy role play. It's wonderful we have so many editors here on both sides of the fence genuinely interested in improving WP. Chetsford (talk) 07:56, 20 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I likewise hope that you are able to empathize with the frustration on the other side of the argument, that people are doing their best to find the best sources we can, while it seems like you put your best effort into striking down everything we do. If your current deletion campaign against RPGs continues, then understand you are going to be seeing the same people commenting about a lot of the same things, which is not going to change just because you feel we are being repetitive and frustrating your attempts to delete these articles. I'm going to disagree with your self-assessment that you are not applying more stringent standards than at least most other editors do; take for example this recent thread on your talk page about a draft you rejected by User:Zxcvbnm, a user whom I consider from past encounters to be more in favor of deleting articles that don't prove their notability than not. You rejected that AFC and poo-pooed most of the sources he provided, yet just as soon as you rejected it another user quickly moved the article into mainspace and more sources were added; would you reject those sources as well? The video game WikiProject is a huge and successful one, and I think if you saw some of the articles there which are in as bad shape if not worse than the average tabletop RPG your head would spin - and there are probably ten times as many VG articles as there are RPG articles! So if you want to experience less frustration in life, my advice would be to lighten up. Otherwise, if you prefer to fight it out with a WP:BATTLEGROUND mentality just because other editors disagree with you, or maybe you are trying to prove some kind of WP:POINT with this slew of deletions, watching people scurry around gleefully like ants running away from a kid with a magnifying glass, then we will continue as we have been. Yes, we are genuinely interested in improving Wikipedia, or we would not bother. I advised you sarcastically in the DRV on this article to go after the low-hanging fruit instead of articles that might actually have a chance like this one, although I really did mean it. I see every RPG AFD that you start; some I do not even respond to, and some I give a half-hearted response to because I am letting you have those. If you see me fighting instead, then know I really do believe in that topic's potential, and I do believe that this one deserves the Keep vote I gave it. Understand that I am probably not alone when I say I do not find it wonderful that you are pursuing deletion in this subject area so heavily, nor would I consider deletion or redirection of this article an improvement to Wikipedia, when I feel that the article has room for improvement. I don't think I have anything more to add to this AFD than I did before, and I think we should leave it to any new respondents to add their take on what has already been said and done. BOZ (talk) 11:38, 20 July 2019 (UTC)
 * people are doing their best to find the best sources we can I think that's wonderful and do empathize. I have written hundreds of articles and understand it can be a challenge to find good sources. Sometimes I've even had to abandon a draft before moving it to Mainspace upon coming to realize I did not have the minimum threshold of quality sourcing. I assure you I'm not on any type of "campaign" with RPGs. I'm actively involved in WP and specifically seek out articles other editors have slapped refimprove tags on so as to either improve or, if not possible after my best efforts, AfD. It just happens a huge percentage of articles I come across are RPG stubs. The situation is so acute that it is almost impossible to avoid. Chetsford (talk) 17:58, 20 July 2019 (UTC)
 * So... it's simply coincidence that you have sent about 10 RPG articles to AFD within the last month alone, when I had not seen any AFD activity from you in this area for several months? You are not specifically looking for RPG articles to see if they were something that should be deleted? It was just a coincidence that when you first declined the AFC draft for Xanathar's Guide to Everything (which was not written by me, but I requested the AFC review because the new editor was having trouble doing it so it was my name you saw on the AFC review request) and then saw that same new user improve it enough where you changed your mind and accepted the article, that it was only after that when you started sending RPG articles to AFD again? I'm perhaps misinterpreting the fact that when I look on [] and see your name starting 36 AFDs between Aug 13 2018 to Nov 26 2018, and then absolutely nothing at all until June 24 of this year when it started up again; I am just imagining that long gap between two bursts of continual AFD nomination in the same area, just a coincidence instead of an actual pattern? Somehow when you were looking at articles to see whether they could be saved or should be deleted, you only saw RPG articles that you perceived as deletable in those two periods of time and you just happened to spot a lot of them all together like that? You didn't just forget about deleting after RPG articles towards the end of last year or get distracted with something else, only to be reminded of it when you saw my name a month ago on an AFC review for an RPG article? I'm just trying to understand your comments, and how I should interpret your suggestion that it is "almost impossible to avoid" this "huge percentage of articles" you come across all being from the same area for four months, then none at all for seven months, and here we are back again like nothing happened. Maybe it's not for me to understand. If you see all these RPG articles in your efforts to improve sources, can you come up with one single example where you have added any source at all to any RPG article? I can't recall one, but it would help ease my mind a bit if you could think of one. BOZ (talk) 20:28, 20 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Just to clarify, I have no power to delete articles on WP. When articles on fantasy role play are deleted, it's the WP community that has made that decision. Beyond that, I'd suggest the rest of your comment, which seems to address issues not directly related to this specific article, would be more appropriate for a Talk page and would be happy to continue it there. Thanks. Chetsford (talk) 20:01, 22 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Comment - Reaffirming my delete !vote. The Dragon source is, like basically everything else, about the games and says practically nothing about the company. For those curious, though it's not yet linked from the article, it's available here. As far as I can tell the keep rationale rests entirely on Designers and Dragons, which I'm unable to find even a preview of. All I can find of it is that it's a Kickstarter project, which doesn't instill me with confidence. May be perfectly reliable, but since I'm still yet to see even one other source that provides more than a brief mention, I'm still on the side of delete. These sources about the games. &mdash; Rhododendrites  talk \\ 22:39, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * FYI, the RSN discussion of 'Designers & Dragons' is here. Also, I wouldn't see a multi-paragraph discussion of the Silhouette Core system, a major IP created by and consistently attributed to Dream Pod 9 in the RS, to be a trivial mention. Newimpartial (talk) 22:46, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Also note that Rhododendrites' !vote preceded the addition of French-language business press to the article, and should be weighed accordingly. Newimpartial (talk) 03:26, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Can we forgo the sneaky AfD tactics to undercut !votes of people who disagree? I left a comment literally a few hours before you posted this. If a source is added and you want people to update their !vote, ping them. Leaving a comment on the source below. &mdash; Rhododendrites  talk \\ 13:47, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Comment on newly added sources and "creative carve-out" argument: In reaffirming my delete !vote I examined all the newly added sources (or those mentioned in the AfD, such as the personal Wordpress blog/online resume of an aspiring actor named Justin Alexander "TheAlexandrian.net" ) and found that, in each case, they amounted to single line mentions of the company or were in objectively non-RS outlets, therefore, did not meet WP:SIGCOV. I also found CThomas's and Masem's arguments here to be compelling, in which they examined whether a "creative carve out" for companies of this type exists. Beyond that, I don't believe the interests of civil discussion are served by WP:DHCYCLEing every comment so will probably leave my input on this subject at that pending this AfD's eventual closure. I very much appreciate the time and valuable input both sides of the debate have put into this interesting discussion. Chetsford (talk) 23:07, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Note that those esteemed editors also held that game publishers with four or five Notable works to their credit should be treated with a more relaxed Notability standard than NCORP, and you agreed, so perhaps that should also be taken into account by the closer.
 * Also note that acting credits do undermine anyone's reliability as a game reviewer, as Wil Wheaton can attest. And Chetsford, your rather restrictive and FRINGE views about self-published RS have been repeatedly repudiated in the past and should (evidently) carry no WEIGHT here. Newimpartial (talk) 23:23, 17 July 2019 (UTC)
 * You don't mean Whil Wheaton, do you? BOZ (talk) 23:27, 17 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Comment - So this is the source being highlighted as a discussion-changer to the point that Newimpartial is trying to undercut other people's !votes for not factoring it in. It's a weird single-paragraph promotional bit that seems to exist only to say "here's a quote from this guy". Could it be reliable? Possible, I guess, but the website takes user submissions and seems to be by/for the industry. Regardless, the basis for it is a quote from someone who works with Dream Pod 9, so even if it's not promotional it doesn't do much for significant coverage in reliable sources independent of the subject. &mdash; Rhododendrites  talk \\ 13:47, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure, but I think you would have to log in to see more? BOZ (talk) 14:14, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Right, BOZ; those are teaser blurbs rather than the stories themselves (there are more than one). I don't have a subscription either. Newimpartial (talk) 14:26, 18 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Merge and redirect to Heavy Gear – Also here from the closed DRV. The article fails to meet NCORP/GNG per source analysis. Appelcline's chapter (if it's an WP:RS; I don't have confidence in that RSN thread) focuses on DP9's predecessor Ianus, and on DP9's product line, but not on the company DP9 itself. Moby Games is user-generated content. Liem Multimedia is a local trade publication interviewing the president of a local company in the trade. The Alexandrian (assuming it's a valid WP:SPS), ICv2 and Engadget are product announcements. Dragon is a product review. All the other links in this AfD are brief mentions, mostly in product reviews. Notable products don't make a company notable. We don't have even basic information about this company, such as it's incorporation date, ownership, management, number of employees, units sold, revenue, distribution, and so forth. The company's notable products already have articles, like Heavy Gear. The company's Silhouette game system a.k.a. SilCORE is already covered at Heavy Gear. "Dream Pod 9" is probably a useful search term, though, so it should be kept as a redirect to the company's main product, Heavy Gear. What little is known about the publisher can all be included in a section at Heavy Gear. – Levivich 15:40, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Actually, a merge and redirect to Heavy Gear would be fine for now, and the company article could be rebuilt after the other game like articles have been fleshed out and the corporate info has been properly document. I have changed my !vote accordingly.
 * However, Leviv, the RSN thread on Applecline was started and canvassed by the source's most hostile skeptic, so the fact that it does find the source reliable should be considered a good baseline. And I don't know what version of the source you read, but the chapter in Volume 3 dedicates most of the page count to post-1995 Dream Pod, with only a couple of pages for pre-1995 Ianus. Newimpartial (talk) 16:02, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * The first page or so of Appelcline's chapter focuses on Ianus for about the first page, and then the remaining pages do focus on DP9. It does give the founding of Ianus as 1985 by Claude Pelletier, and that DP9 split off from them in 1995.  In my experience, smaller game publishers like this rarely if ever report things like number of employees, units sold, revenue, or distribution figures publicly; I don't even know if bigger companies like Wizards of the Coast do that. BOZ (talk) 16:06, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks to both of you for your comments. The version of Appelcline I'm reading is this one (pp. 116–124). Going through it page by page: 116–118 are about Ianus. DP9 discussion starts on page 119 with Meanwhile, the now fully independent Dream Pod 9 kept the majority of Ianus’ dozen employees, overseen by Pierre Ouellette. They kept the roleplaying titles too, of course, including the brand-new Project A-Ko. The newly independent Dream Pod 9 didn’t ever supplement Project A-Ko. Instead they created a second Silhouette game, Heavy Gear (1995). The rest of 119–120 is about Heavy Gear. Jovian Chronicles on 120, Tribe 8 on 121, some other games and Silhouette on 122. Granted, page 123 is mostly about DP9's transitions around 2004. Page 124 is half a page about DP9's future products. All in all, these nine pages mostly cover Ianus and DP9's games, with only about one page being spent on DP9 itself, cumulatively. Call that SIGCOV and it's still just one example, and we need multiple. We'd need at least another one like Appelcline, which we don't have. As for that RSN, I don't have confidence in it because of who closed it, and because it looked like it was closed based on a counting of votes (note the table of votes). I thought the 120 fact checkers point was rather persuasive, though, and there were good arguments both for and against independence, but I think that source would benefit from a new RfC with a better close (the result may be the same, I'd just have more confidence in it if it were "cleaner"). I think if you compare the information available about DP9 with what we have on TSR or Wizards of the Coast, the contrast is very strong; there is rich detail (about the companies' employees, layoff numbers, units sold, etc.), sourced to multiple independent RSes. I agree that this level of sourcing doesn't exist for smaller RPG publishers, and I think thats because they're not notable. :-) In fact, I think lack of sourcing proves that they're not notable. Heavy Gear is notable; Silhouette may be notable in its own right; but DP9 just isn't. Outside of very few examples (Appelcline and maybe Lien), all of which come from within the industry (as opposed to "pure", non-RPG-publishing media like Boingboing.net or Gizmodo), nobody has ever really paid attention to this company, as far as I can tell. If additional examples of SIGCOV are uncovered, the redirect could always be turned back into an article, as Newimpartial suggests. – Levivich 16:54, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the link to the book--I don't think I'd ever seen a copy online. I'd say the chapter on DP9 is pretty solid.  Yes, it starts on Ianus, but it would be more than reasonable to include that history in this article and redirect Ianus to here.  While it was more than just a name change, it appears to have been the same company.  And yes, how their products were designed and received is really coverage of the company.  I mean the chapter is called "Dream Pod 9" after all.  So the author clearly felt he was writing about the company.
 * I personally think the book chapter has great coverage. It appears to meet all the requirements of an RS.  The sum of all the other sources, IMO, meets the requirement for "multiple".  One good source (and it's rare to find this good of a source on a smaller company) and lots of weaker ones is certainly enough to write a solid article.  Hobit (talk) 20:43, 19 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Keep per BOZ. I know Chetsford mentioned putting other DP9 properties (Jovian Chronicles, Tribe 8, and Gear Krieg, etc) up for deletion. Should those be merged with DP9? I don't think merging DP9 & all of its properties with Heavy Gear makes the most sense. Sariel Xilo (talk) 21:16, 18 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Comment - all of these games meet NBOOK and the GNG (even if the current articles may not) so in my view it would be better to make sure each of them holds two reviews plus Alpelcline citations, as a miminum, so that each article transparently meets GNG. Chetsford is going to continue with his "from Missouri" attitude and his incompetent BEFORE practices, so the solution is to produce a situation like the current Jovian Chronicles AfD, where the delete argument is laughable and IDONTLIKEIT is utterly obvious. Newimpartial (talk) 10:56, 20 July 2019 (UTC)


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