Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Omega (1987 computer game)


 * 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 Delete, since there is agreement that the lack of reliable sources has not been overcome, which does not only affect an important guideline, but also a core policy.Tikiwont (talk) 10:16, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Omega (1987 computer game)

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

Contested prod, of a non-notable rare roguelike game. Deprod reason is given as "removed prod template. I believe the deletion of this article may be controversial given the References section". Other then some blogish references in discussion about an open source version there are no reliable reference to the 1980's version of the game. The open source version is described in the article as "At present, development continues sporadically as a SourceForge project directed by William Tanksley". With no reliable sources for the original version and no notability for the incomplete open source version this article Fails WP:N and WP:V Jeepday (talk) 14:02, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Delete Non-notable, un-verified. Cheers, Jack Merridew 14:08, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Delete Omega is a real game. I spent many hundreds of hours playing it years ago, as well as porting it to new platforms, fixing the innumerable bugs (anyone else remember "grot"?) and otherwise being completely obsessed with it. Despite that, it's one of the most obscure games in the genre, and has received almost no attention from reliable sources appropriate for citation in Wikipedia. Someday, perhaps someone will write a book that has a chapter about Omega. At that point, we can re-write the article. But until such sources exist, we'll have to be consistent in our treatment of it. Nandesuka (talk) 14:28, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been added to the list of video game deletions. Pixelface (talk) 14:10, 2 March 2008 (UTC)


 * (Comment) Omega may seem obscure to some from the vantage of the present, but I must point out that it was distributed in the same fashion as Larn, Moria, Hack, etc. via comp.sources.games "back in the day", did prompt the formation of a Usenet group (granted, in the alt hierarchy and long since abandoned), and was as available as any contemporary to home PC users. I find fault with the characterization that it's "one of the most obscure games" in a genre riddled with throw-away titles, but can't contest that it is likely not the subject of significant treatment by independent, reliable sources. D. Brodale (talk) 05:37, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Delete For the reasons noted above. Eusebeus (talk) 16:21, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Delete Because it's one of the "obscure" games, it fails WP:N in my book. ArcAngel (talk) 21:29, 2 March 2008 (UTC) Keep - As Pixelface points out, there are numerous references to it within the rougelike genre. Obscure doesn't mean non-notable. --clpo13(talk) 05:11, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep, Here's an article about the game on About.com. That's makes the article in line with WP:V. This site says several roguelikes have achieved lasting fame and lists Omega as one of them. This site reviews Omega in comparison to other roguelikes, saying Omega "was the first Roguelike game with a significant plot." This site says Omega was the first roguelike game with a large wilderness. The newsgroup alt.games.omega was created in March 1992. Here's a post supposedly from the author. It was ported to Windows in 2003 by Geoff Dunbar. There is a version on SourceForge. This is a distribution page maintained by Erik Max Francis and it has many documents related to the game. I'm risking BEANS here, but we have article on other roguelikes, Moria, Hack, and Larn &mdash; along with everything in Category:Roguelikes. If that's not enough to keep, I would prefer redirection to Roguelike or List of roguelikes over deletion. --Pixelface (talk) 01:40, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * The about.com link isn't an "article," it's just a direct listing of the package description from some Linux distribution. The tripalot site is a personal blog, as is the armchairarcade link.  Nandesuka (talk) 02:17, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * The information still comes from About.com, a reliable source, even if they got it from somewhere else. I'm confused on your stance. You previously removed a prod tag from the article. Later you mentioned the Windows port, you added 2 more citations, and then you added a prod tag yourself 6 minutes later. On the talk page you said "Omega seems pretty much as notable and well-referenced (or not) as UltraRogue." and you argued to keep the UltraRogue article in its AFD. Do you want to delete this article because UltraRogue was deleted? Or have you just changed your mind? --Pixelface (talk) 06:40, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * D. Brodale convinced me that I was mistaken. Our policies are pretty clear that we need reliable sources to have articles on topics.  Nandesuka (talk) 13:06, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep. It's certainly notable within the roguelike genre. Xihr (talk) 02:41, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Do you have any sources to back that up, or is that just based on your personal experience? Nandesuka (talk) 13:08, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Pixelface already gave the details and citations. Xihr (talk) 21:25, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Keep. Notable game, and while there are factions within Wikipedia who don't want any articles on any topic until Brittanica devotes a chapter to it (at which point one must ask what's the point of Wikipedia?), we aren't there yet. And there are sources as indicated above. 23skidoo (talk) 04:59, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Delete then redirect to List of roguelikes, summarize with a couple of sentences and cite it with the about.com piece. Lacks the in-depth reliable sources to establish individual notability. The same could be done for others which don't have enough info for individual articles, though some of these games have been covered in reliable sources. Someoneanother 05:57, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Switched to plain delete and redirect, there are subjects we can cover properly and the focus should be on them, not messing around trying to build articles out of nothing. Someoneanother 11:16, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Please, no. I have to agree with Nandesuka that the about.com "piece" isn't what it's being made out to be. Redirecting to List of roguelikes with a short summary to excuse a de facto article deletion will become an open invitation for everyone and his or her dog or cat to wedge a listing of their pet roguelike known only to three people, developer included. D. Brodale (talk) 06:11, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I now see that the About.com page comes from the listing of a Debian package. But as far as Unix games from the 1980s go, this game seems fairly notable to me (although not as notable as NetHack). Omega was ported to MS-DOS, the Amiga, BeOS, Macintosh, and Windows (and also the Atari ST and OS/2 from what I've seen). It appears a new Windows version was created as recently as last month. There are 2,020 results for "omega" in the newsgroup rec.games.roguelike.misc, spanning 1993 to the present (that's over 1/4 of the messages in the group). People have written FAQs, spoilers, hints, and an FAQ on roguelikes in general. Omega has an entry on MobyGames This interview with Rick Saada (who developed the roguelike Castle of the Winds, published by Epic MegaGames in 1989) said Rogue, Larn, Omega, and Nethack were inspirations to him. This article from Salon.com from January 2000 says "On my recent visit to Blizzard North to preview the game company's wildly anticipated sequel to its hit role-playing game Diablo, Blizzard's designers readily acknowledged their debt to Nethack and other "Roguelikes" -- games of single-player dungeon questing." Roguelikes have been influential in the computer gaming world. --Pixelface (talk) 11:42, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * But we're not talking about whether there are reliable sources for "roguelikes", we're talking about whether there are reliable sources for Omega. That you are reduced to citing the Salon.com article, which does mention NetHack and doesn't mention Omega, speaks volumes. Yes, yes, yes, there are plenty of reliable sources for the idea of the "roguelike" as influential.  Yes, yes, yes, there are plenty of reliable sources for NetHack being influential.  But we're talking about this article, not some other article.  The sources we have for Omega -- a game that I immensely enjoy -- are terrible.  USENET posts?  A few blogs?  Random walkthroughs?  Nandesuka (talk) 13:06, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I think we need to keep in mind that this was never a retail game, I believe it's freeware. The author released the source and people are still developing the game over two decades later. The DMOZ directory gives a good overview. The Amiga port by Klavs Pedersen, AmiOmega, was on Fish Disk #320 (v1.0) and #528 (v1.5). I don't know if Computer and Video Games magazine ever reviewed Omega but I'll check a few issues. This site by Travis Emmitt looks like a good resource for reviews of roguelikes, even though it's not a magazine or newspaper. Personally, I've never played it. But reading that it was the first roguelike with a large countryside and a significant plot sounds notable to me. Omega influenced Rick Saada, the developer of a game published by Epic Games. --Pixelface (talk) 03:01, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * The statement that "Omega influenced Rick Saada, the developer of a game published by Epic Games" is a good example of dubiously chaining things together to manufacture notability, which is not inherited. Inclusion on Fish Disk is a terribly low threshold to meet; it was not a refereed software publication. As noted above by Nandesuka, the "Roguelike Review" site is a personal site of Travis Emmitt; by Wikipedia standards, it is not a reliable source, nor is the tone and nature of Omega's capsule summary there particularly compelling. I'm personally the one who categorized the Omega information at dmoz.org, and wouldn't characterize it as anything other than a potluck. I'm not sure what your mention of it above means to accomplish. D. Brodale (talk) 03:34, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I'd also add that the statement regarding the game's persistence ("The author released the source and people are still developing the game over two decades later.") is a gloss. In actuality, someone will occasionally produce a port or revamp; there has been no sustained development pattern with Omega apart from W.Tanksley's, which foundered for any number of reasons and never amounted to much other than a talking point for WT while discussing development issues on Usenet. Irrelevant to this AfD, but interesting nonetheless, is that the source "release" is perhaps one of the most confused aspects to Omega. I don't think it profitable to imagine patterns that in reality don't exist, let alone use them as underpinnings to arguments about notability. This particular argument I don't quite follow, myself. D. Brodale (talk) 03:56, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I concur with Nandesuka's analysis up-thread: we here should not confuse this particular game with its parent genre. The only two sources that might be considered reliable either do not mention Omega (the Salon puff piece on NetHack) or do so as a passing mention that cannot be considered significant coverage (the Gamasutra interview). The remaining six, externally-linked resources are unreliable. In most cases, they are not independent of the subject in question (FAQs, spoilers, hints, etc.); the others stem from pseudonymous venues (Usenet) or a site unrecognized as means to establish primary notability (MobyGames), unless I missed a memo. D. Brodale (talk) 04:22, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * The game was influential and made innovations in its genre. That the game exists is verifiable. The game can be written about neutrally. And we have several sources we can cite, including the game itself. The sources may not be newspapers, but they corroborate each other. Omega had players doing more than "simply wandering round a dungeon". Omega "started all the craze of overworld roguelikes" Omega was "the first roguelike game to feature large wilderness" Omega "is the first Roguelike game to feature a wilderness which connects several towns" There are newsgroups devoted specifically to Nethack, Angband, Moria, and Omega. I realize that inclusion on a Fish Disk may be unremarkable, but the game began on Unix, not the Amiga. The article may not meet WP:RS or WP:N, but they are not policy yet. --Pixelface (talk) 08:53, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * No one contests the game's mere existence. However, in linking to Wikipedia's verifiability policy above, you ought to have noticed that it rests upon the use of reliable sources. I encourage you to re-read that policy in full. The extent of the subject's influence and innovation is asserted rather than reliably documented, and the links offered above require assessment and characterization to appreciate fully, rather than enumeration. I'll begin at the end of your remarks, though, and ask what you mean by stating that reliability of sources, especially with regard to notability, is "not policy"? I'm unaware of any practice common to Wikipedia that asks editors to toss aside both issues so brazenly. I'm also left wondering whether that final statement is your concession to the lack of reliable sources that establish the notability of Omega. It would seem so. Contrary to your opening remarks, no one is asking for "newspapers", and it's misleading to restate earlier requests for reliable documentation as such. That the materials you have collated corroborate one another could be the result of any number of reasons, among them parroting. In particular, I would note that the second link offered above is a copy/paste of the first, with a hyped introduction tacked on with no basis given whatsoever. In order, you have offered the personal site of someone developing a version of the game, what amounts to a blog about roguelikes, a four-sentence synopsis on another personal site, and an archived reposting of a Usenet FAQ from what was a (had the term been coined then) blog. None of these address the core concern expressed above, several times, for reliable sources, independent of the subject at hand, that devote significant attention in order to establish the notability of this particular game. It's irrelevant that Usenet groups exist for NetHack, Angband, or Moria, though if you want to press the point, there is rather wide divide between the establishment of a group within the rec hierarchy (as for those three) and one within the alt hierarchy (as for Omega). So much so that I'm unmoved to consider the latter establishment irrefutable evidence of a subject's notability. I'm glad that we agree that inclusion on Fish Disk is unremarkable, though I don't quite follow how the originating platform for a piece of software factors in given my earlier discussion of this point. D. Brodale (talk) 10:21, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * If nobody contests the game's existence, you're arguing about notability, which is not a policy. The game exists and the article can use the game as a primary source, per WP:PSTS. An interview with the developer of Castle of the Winds *is* a reliable source that the game was influential. Can you cite another roguelike that featured a large wilderness and was released before this game? Otherwise, I have no reason to believe that claim is a rumor. If you still challenge the claim that it was the first roguelike to feature a large wilderness, that claim can simply be left out of the article. --Pixelface (talk) 18:43, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * As described both above and below, notability requires use of reliable sources that cover a subject in significant detail. Existence alone is a terribly low threshold for inclusion, lest Wikipedia devolve into a morass unfitting of an online encyclopedia. I will remind you again that mention of Omega is passing within the noted interview, and does not constitute significant coverage. I strongly encourage participants to review the interview in question and note that mention is both unexplained and not directly attributed to Saada himself. Regardless, notability is not inherited, as explained in detail above. Regarding everything else, I believe I made it rather clear that the nature of my challenge rests in large part with the lack of reliable sources for any claim one may attach to Omega. The one potentially reliable source you've identified makes no significant statement whatsoever about the subject of the AfD. As for WP:PSTS, could you please expand on your perspective? I find no indication therein that it trumps the need for reliable sources, nor that it serves as a substitute for independent verification of a subject, especially with regard to its notability. If the most Wikipedia can state reliably about Omega is that it exists, I fear the burden asked for in this AfD has not been met. D. Brodale (talk) 21:42, 4 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Extremely weak gut-feeling keep. Omega certainly has a long history and is also very much known among people who play roguelikes... (ah, and all those memories - I learned a lot about C programming by looking at this game's source code...) but aside of that, I have absolutely no idea if there's any kind of documentation that would say this game satisfies our notability criteria. Sad, really. If any such material surfaces, this is a definite keeper. If not, this "keep" !vote is basically me trying to make a harp play by blowing at it. But such sources could conceivably materialise, that's what I'm saying. --wwwwolf (barks/growls) 00:29, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Are you aware that the article in question has been tagged with an open request for reliable sources since November 2006, but to no avail? I'm a bit perplexed at a vote to keep, weak as it is, on the basis of a possibility that hasn't materialized in almost eighteen months. D. Brodale (talk) 04:55, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * There's nothing odd about an inclusionist wiki-philosophy. --clpo13(talk) 05:30, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * There is if it places an undue burden upon editors to entertain notions of an unknowable future when present needs of a substantive nature are to be met. This is an AfD, not a colloquium. D. Brodale (talk) 10:41, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * On the other hand, often it's the case that while there's no sources in the article there actually is useful sources somewhere, and people are just too damn lazy to add them to the article, and AfD nominators are even lazier at fixing things before hauling them here. It's always up to the interpretation and further research whether "tagged for more sources since 2006" means "no sources actually exist" or "no one's been that interested in improving sourcing of an article about a relatively obscure game". Based on the debate here, I'd say the lack of sourcing is a legitimate concern in this case and I'm very inclined to believe the former; all I'm saying it could very well conceivably also be the latter. --wwwwolf (barks/growls) 11:31, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Translation of my comment, in a more straightforward form: "This game has been around for a while, so obviously we should have an article about it; shame we don't have sources though. I'm just !voting Keep because the game is pretty famous in its own circles, but I'm well aware that that alone is not going to save the article (always be wishful in your thinking) - we'd need actual sources." --wwwwolf (barks/growls) 11:31, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * For both remark blocks above, I get your drift, but I know I took a stab at turning up reliable sources in the past (prompting my rantish post last October to the article's Talk page), and even though I shouldn't speak for Nandesuka, I would hazard to guess that he must have made a similar attempt prior to nomination here. Regardless, as I'm about to state below (or have already, depending on how one reads this AfD), longevity alone is no lock on notability, something that should not be presumed. D. Brodale (talk) 11:56, 4 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Delete for reasons I've articulated above (at length, ad nauseum) in response to the only developed opinion in favor of retention, by Pixelface. I'm unmoved by the remaining arguments along those lines, as three (Xihr, clpo13, 23skidoo) appear willing to rest on the strength of Pixelface's position alone, and the fourth (wwwwolf) is admittedly half-hearted and contingent on a possibility with no demonstrable likelihood of coming to pass. Longevity is not notability, nor do I see signs of reliable sources that contribute significant material toward recognition of the subject's notability. Obscure or not, Omega fails to meet Wikipedia standards and practices for inclusion on those grounds. I'm willing to be convinced otherwise, but to date I simply cannot agree that any of the resources linked-to above constitute adequate evidence per WP:V, WP:RS, or WP:N. D. Brodale (talk) 11:35, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm unmoved by the claims of "nn" by Jack Merridew (who is currently involved in an arbitration case with me, along with Eusebeus). WP:N is not a policy. I cannot see how an article on this game would necessarily violate WP:V, WP:OR, or WP:NPOV. I'm further confused by the quixotic behavior of Nandesuka &mdash; who previously removed a prod from this article in the past and then re-added a prod later, in violation of policy &mdash; which is the whole reason this article was listed for deletion. --Pixelface (talk) 18:57, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I think it might be more productive to assume good faith on the part of participants and discuss the substance of this AfD, rather than cast what might be interpreted as (potentially acrimonious) aspersions on fellow editors here. The matter is already before us all for discussion; I don't grasp the relevance of the path it took in getting here. It also seems to me that the arbitration case is a concern external to this AfD, and that Nandesuka did provide a response to the query reiterated above. Would you care to discuss your disregard for the guidelines formulated as WP:N? It is terribly difficult to assess your position when it amounts to out-of-hand dismissal. I would point you to the summarization offered at WP:ONLYGUIDELINE, which succinctly delineates why I'm unable to address your stated concern. Notability, to me, seems to be a core issue that should be discussed, rather than swept under the rug. Based on communal practice, and given that most would agree that Wikipedia is not a collection of indiscriminate information, notability borne out by verifiable information from reliable sources seems a reasonable starting point in distinguishing materials that could be the subject of articles from those that probably should not. I've already explained how the evidence brought to light in this AfD fails WP:V, and again, urge you to re-read that policy with particular attention to the relation it shares with WP:RS. As stated there: "If no reliable, third-party sources can be found for an article topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it." I must reiterate that I can find no reason to disregard this directive, and it would appear that you also hold WP:V in some high regard. Mention of WP:OR and WP:NPOV seem out of place above, but I welcome explanation as to why you chose to cite them. D. Brodale (talk) 21:15, 4 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Delete as explained by D. Brodale. I do think this game is notable in some sense, and should have an article about it - but on a wiki about roguelikes or about computer games and not on Wikipedia. Wikipedia has some - in my opinion rather clear - guidelines on what we want articles about and on what not. And a game which has not received any attention by the general public falls into the latter category. --Minimaki (talk) 12:45, 4 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Hold on a second: I noticed that the article in question is available on the Japanese wikipedia. I can't even properly view Japanese characters, let alone read them. However, there may be some editor who speaks both English and Japanese. Let's find that editor and see what the article says. It may very well be a translation of the English article, or it may contain some new information. I would hold off on the vote tallying until we can evaluate the Japanese article. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 22:01, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't see the harm in asking, but it seems rather clear that the article in question fails to reference any sources whatsoever and links to an external resource that could not reasonably be considered independent of the subject (the Official Distribution Page maintained by E.M. Francis). Automated translations don't suggest to me that there's much if anything directly related to the concerns voiced above. But again, I see no harm in asking if a willing volunteer is to be found. D. Brodale (talk) 22:18, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Are you saying Francis is somehow related to Brothers? --Pixelface (talk) 12:50, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
 * The primary subject of the article in question is Omega, not L. Brothers. D. Brodale (talk) 14:56, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
 * And you don't think Francis is independent from the 1987 game Omega? --Pixelface (talk) 01:53, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
 * It doesn't really matter what I think, as the page in question shows no evidence of being a reliable source; it's a file repository. That it self-identifies as an/the "Omega official distribution page" certainly calls into question its independence from Omega. Honestly, I'm puzzled by this line of questioning. D. Brodale (talk) 02:06, 7 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Delete the "references" in the article don't appear to be reliable sources. Delete unless properly sourced. Andrew Lenahan -  St ar bli nd  15:25, 5 March 2008 (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.