Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Paper Mario series characters


 * 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. The keep "votes" far outnumber the deletes, but are often laden with weak arguments. On the other hand, the nominator and subsequent participants pushing for deletion mainly cite notability issues, which is a valid concern, but overall I see no strong consensus either way. – Juliancolton  &#124; Talk 17:57, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

List of Paper Mario series characters

 * ( [ delete] ) – (View AfD) (View log)

List-cruft, describes a whole bunch of *minor* characters. The game's protagonists each have their own articles, and all other pertinent characters could be discussed in the plot summaries of each article. ZXCVBNM (TALK) 18:36, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions.  -- – Juliancolton  &#124; Talk 23:05, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Fictional elements-related deletion discussions.  -- – Juliancolton  &#124; Talk 23:06, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Tend to agree with delete. If they were recurring minor characters throughout the series, then yes, but these are safe to contain in their respective articles. --M ASEM (t) 01:11, 26 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep appropriate list-- the default way to handle these articles.  These are minor characters, and clearer presented here than in the plot summary.  If we don't accept compromise on articles such as this, we're not being realistic. DGG (talk) 03:10, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure if you are saying there is a default way to many list characters from a game or a default way to combine mostly one-off characters from various games in a series into one list. Either way, can you please link to the guideline to explain your position? —Ost (talk) 18:05, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

"Excessive fictional details: A concise plot summary is appropriate to cover a notable game, character, or setting. Information beyond that is unnecessary and should be removed, as articles should focus on the real-world elements of a topic, such as creation and reception."
 * Keep per DGG. Jclemens (talk) 06:22, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep, in the past information from this page was merged elsewhere and this was turned into a redirect. Then the relevant information was removed from other pages, thus giving this page a purpose once again. Still, either way, whatever happens do not redirect., I know that this has alot of page history and that there are complex copyright issues, but there is nowhere suitable to redirect to. If the result is to delete, but the page cannot be deleted, please move it to project space rather than turning it back into a redirect. --Taelus (talk) 08:04, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Striking keep, as it is not really clear on my stance. My point is, whether the result is keep or delete, please do not turn this back into a redirect. There is no list on the wiki. So why trick users into thinking there is one by having them redirected when they type into the search box? If copyright issues are a problem to stop deletion, why not just move this into project space? WP:IAR, even if moving an article to project space is rare, in this case it could be a good solution. I mean, without a disclaimer on the redirect target, (which I suspect many would disapprove of), users could end up following links for quite some time trying to work out where this list is buried, before realising there is no list. If redirecting is the favoured path, perhaps we could at least make this page disambiguate between games of the series to allow users to navigate to find details on the characters they are looking for? --Taelus (talk) 17:27, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * NoteI would encourage someone with GFDL experience to read the previous deletion discussions (AfD1,RfD1, RfD2) and determine if there is indeed an attribution issue at hand. —Ost (talk) 18:05, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of video game related deletion discussions. Taelus (talk) 08:07, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Redirect to Mario role-playing games. There is no need for a list where less than ten characters actually appear in more than one title. If anyone feels like digging it up, I initially took the six recurring characters from the list, and merged them to the original Paper Mario series article before it was merged. It could probably be placed in that article. TTN (talk) 13:57, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep as per DGG. Edward321 (talk) 15:14, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep per DGG. I have to wonder why so much energy is concentrated on cleaning up material relating to characters who don't exist and so little (relatively speaking) to much more damaging BLP content. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 19:05, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment – the material here could easily be covered in their respective articles (all three game articles are well-under 30KB in size). I am also aware of the copyright issues present (and brought up at the two recent RFDs). I'll have to research this better before I make a decision about anything, but I should at least point that out. MuZemike 23:23, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment - From the Wikipedia guideline at WP:GAMECRUFT


 * This article is a detailed plot summary of non-notable characters. There is still no legitimate reason presented about why the article does not violate this guideline.--ZXCVBNM (TALK) 01:18, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Per WP:ITSCRUFT never being a valid reason for deletion. Sincerely, --A NobodyMy talk 02:20, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * In this case, I am not just pointing at the guideline as the sole reason for deletion. The truth is that the content is not notable either, nor are there any reliable sources or any real world information to justify its inclusion. All the characters are already described in the parent games' articles. DGG said himself that the article contained "minor characters", and the guidelines state that minor characters shouldn't merit an article without notablility. I don't see how it's based solely on my opinion that "it's cruft".--ZXCVBNM (TALK) 03:18, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * "Notability" is a subjective term, perhaps not as nonsensical as the made-up "cruft," but again, not a really valid reason for deletion. If the content is verifiable and appears in a familiar game series, then that is good enough for our purposes.  Best, --A NobodyMy talk 04:49, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * "Cruft" is a valid term on Wikipedia and is not something I just made up one day. Also, with no real world information the entire article is still plot summary, which is not enough for form an encyclopedia article from.--ZXCVBNM (TALK) 06:16, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
 * "Cruft" is not a word any serious academic would ever use. Its use is the kind of thing that makes us look like a joke rather than a valid encyclopedia.  Sincerely, --A NobodyMy talk 15:57, 28 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Comment – there is a Paper Mario (series) page that redirects to Mario role-playing games currently. If we could turn the redirect into a short series article covering the three games in brief, which would leave us with a logical place to redirect and keep the history intact; combine with my recommendation above, the content, properly GFDL-attributed, could be placed in the three game articles. MuZemike 05:03, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * This would be a good alternative solution if we cannot move this page elsewhere to preserve history. --Taelus (talk) 08:26, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete - The important characters are duplicated elsewhere and most of the information is WP:GAMEGUIDE information written in a WP:INUNIVERSE style. Player characters, main adversaries, and some minor characters—all of which are largely non-recurring—are already on in the main articles.  I would be much more inclined to see a List of recurring characters in Paper Mario series or to redirect to List of the Mario series characters than to maintain this list that throws together various one-off characters from different games into a common list.  If kept, this article should be trimmed to characters with their accompanying descriptions that have established WP:N from third party sources.  —Ost (talk) 16:15, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Per communication above and at least a very minimal support of it. I recommend to split content back into their respective game articles and, when done, redirect page to a newly-created Paper Mario (series) page, which I think can be done and still be GFDL-compliant. This will leave character descriptions/plot coverage upon editorial discretion wrt the game articles as well as provide more complete articles for those games. Otherwise, I don't see why different content about the same game has to be in several different spots rather than one spot. MuZemike 16:53, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * This looks like, WP:SNOW here. I'm going to make a proposal to split via the talk page. MuZemike 21:04, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * A list of recurring characters would be basically the same as a list of Mario characters, since the characters are usually the same in all the games. As for the splitting, the content would probably be removed anyway because it's in general disarray and needs a rewrite. If it comes to making a series page, I think it should be located at Paper Mario and the game moved to Paper Mario (video game).--ZXCVBNM (TALK) 06:26, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
 * It doesn't matter. The article rescue squadron has effectively hijacked the article and this AFD (as with many others), and they get to determine what goes on here as opposed to what WP:VG does because the members of WP:VG are apparently inferior Wikipedians who don't know crap but to delete stuff (which is not true). I've tried to make WP a more reliable encyclopedia with good content which included trying to keep what I thought was good content or removing what I thought was unverifiable, unnecessary content; but apparently that's not what some users are going for, and some still insist on slapping others for trying to make content better. I was completely wrong. All content is good content. On that token, all articles are good articles, so leave them alone, because you didn't create it. Hooray for mediocrity! Let's all go home! MuZemike 06:40, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep as DGG has mentioned. This is standard. --Kaleb.G (talk) 17:30, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment Per WP:OTHERCRAPEXISTS, the argument that it's "standard" holds no merit.--ZXCVBNM (TALK) 06:15, 28 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep Nothing wrong with this list that warrants any piece of it to be destroyed. All significant characters in the popular game should be listed.   D r e a m Focus  22:58, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment As said before, they are minor characters not significant enough for their own article.--ZXCVBNM (TALK) 06:15, 28 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Comment I've looked over this list and this debate and I don't have a magic solution for this case, so I assume that would default to keep for now, since further discussion is needed. Although this is the way we usually handle these lists, I don't find this particular collection of characters "appropriate", to use DGG's word, at all. Looking over this list, I don't see a need for a good 90% of the material on here, as it is just way too detailed, or "crufty" as some say, for a general encyclopedia article. Also I'm not sure that most of this can be cited from reliable sources without having to use original research. The content and scope of this list are out of whack: read over entries like "Jolene" and you'll see what I mean when I say this article has major OR and plot issues.  I imagine a possible solution would be to merge this to the main article and there we can create an encyclopedic understanding of the characters. Perhaps an article on this topic would be appropriate if we tightened up the standards of inclusion (such as only writing about major characters). Anyway, I highly recommend some further course of action be taken with this article after the conclusion of the AfD, and as MuZemike was getting at, I think this should be taken to the talk page as it is apparant that there is no consensus here to delete the article.  Them  From  Space  07:30, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep standard list that is verifiable and notable. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 19:31, 28 July 2009 (UTC)
 *  Keep It's very notable.Pedro thy master (talk • contribs) 21:10, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete. Literally no assertion of notability. 100% unsourced. Is there a magic guideline that protects this article from basic quality guidelines as those? Also, to Richard - verifiable? I see no verification of ANYTHING in the entire article. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 00:50, 29 July 2009 (UTC)
 * If you need to verify any of it, you just check the manual of the game. I'm sure someone would notice if the information wasn't valid.   D r e a m Focus  04:32, 29 July 2009 (UTC)
 * So your answer to an incredibly big problem is a solution that's not okay in any sense? "Look it up for yourself" is the worst way to show that you even care about this article reaching the most basic standards of quality. - The New Age Retro Hippie used Ruler! Now, he can figure out the length of things easily. 04:51, 29 July 2009 (UTC)
 * You don't need a reference for every single sentence in a plot summary of a television show or movie. Same thing here.  The original media can verify anything listed there.  You don't have to list exactly what hour, minute, and second into the show something happened.  Think about how the characters in a film are listed.  And the article's quality level is based on content, not pointless citations for every little thing.  Would you feel better if they told you what cut screen, or dialogue in the game, or other event, each character had their information revealed in?  Looking over the article, I'm sure most of that just comes from the manual.  You don't need to be told what page number each bit is from, since that section of the manual is short, and easy to navigate through.   D r e a m Focus  10:47, 29 July 2009 (UTC)
 * CommentUm, you're plain wrong there. You need a reference FROM the original media for the plot summaries. Just check some featured vg articles to see examples. You can't just claim "look it up yourself" and expect your article to be verifiable.--ZXCVBNM (TALK) 18:37, 29 July 2009 (UTC)
 * I did a Google book search and did find some information on development and reception that I added to the article. There appears to be oodles more on Google News.  So, perhaps expanding the development and reception information would be a good start to build off of my additions.  Best, --A NobodyMy talk 04:50, 29 July 2009 (UTC)
 * All the news articles appear to be about the 2-D-ness of the characters, but this all falls under "reception" rather than "development information". I still doubt that this would distinguish the article for its own page, since the reception information could easily be added to the articles' character sections.--ZXCVBNM (TALK) 18:36, 29 July 2009 (UTC)
 * I am not opposed to a merge and redirect as a compromise, but per WP:PRESERVE, see no pressing need to redlink what is neither a hoax nor libelous. Best, --A NobodyMy talk 16:30, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete - I see absolutely no reason that this is notable. There are 3 sources that are totally unreferenceable online, which while I understand is not a reason to delete, makes the fact that online resources are apparently unavailable a bit suggestive. Besides, even if these are totally intact as the references suggest, why is this separate article really relevant and not just plain and simple List Cruft? I think this list section is as long or maybe longer than the actual original article at Paper Mario (correct me otherwise). Shadowjams (talk) 08:58, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Because WP:ITSCRUFT is not a valid reason for deletion. Best, --A NobodyMy talk 16:30, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep as subjects are clearly notable as demonstrated by the improvements made to the article since nomination, that they come from a recognizable franchise, and the fact that the items on this list can be verified by reliable sources as linked within this discussion to Google News and Books. Sincerely, --A NobodyMy talk 16:30, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep: there are definite improvements being made, and most of the content can be referenced from the instruction manuals (I can't find one for the original Paper Mario:
 * PM2: [] SPM:[] —Preceding unsigned comment added by FMasic (talk • contribs) 13:39, 1 August 2009 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. 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.