Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Starch (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   no consensus. (non-admin closure) Vacation nine 00:12, 25 November 2012 (UTC)

Starch (game)

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I have searched a lot and didn't find any useful information to prove the notability of this videogame. I know it is very old so that off-line citations may be the best way to do this, but they weren't provided and I am not able to find them (not even in Google Books). — Ṟ  Ṉ™  09:50, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
 * It looks like said off-line citations are already provided? Unless someone pulls those out and find the references are only incidental, let's keep it.  Morwen - Talk 12:02, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
 * I concur, the current sourcing should be enough to keep the article. Diego (talk) 12:26, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
 * I would like to concur too, but i have checked the sources and they just make passing mentions of the game (except one of them which gives it a paragraph) :( — Ṟ  Ṉ™  16:30, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Did you check all of the sources, including the BBC Acorn User and the Acorn User? Phil Bridger (talk) 22:10, 4 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Delete I looked at all the sources, looked for more, and attempted to find scanned archives of Acorn User . I'm not convinced that this game passes GNG for a brief mention in Eurogamer and a mention on a top ten list. If someone has offline sources, now's the time to make them appear. Merging these "top games" into the Archimedes article (with citations on why they're notable) would be an option. Category:Acorn Archimedes games looks full, but mostly because it lists ports of games from other consoles. czar   &middot;   &middot;  18:30, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
 * You appear to be contradicting yourself. If you looked at all of the sources then why did you have to attempt to find scanned archives of one of them? Did you look at the Acorn User source or not? Phil Bridger (talk) 22:10, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Typo. Struck it—thanks. (The Acorn User articles are available here. The 1990 source is brief/peripheral, and the 1992 reference is from an ad.) czar   &middot;   &middot;  02:50, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of video game-related deletion discussions.  • Gene93k (talk) 22:54, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Games-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 22:54, 2 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Keep -(to make this a formal not-vote). For me, the Eurogamer and Acorn User appearances are enough to support a "snowflake" article and/or to merge into another appropriate place (maybe to a list of Acorn Archimedes games?). This is game is not mentioned in-passing but described directly, and coverage is significant as it includes critical review. So the content shouldn't be deleted in any case but kept by the WP:PRESERVE policy. Let's remove the detailed Levels sections to comply with WP:PLOT, include the reception by the professional reviewers of both articles, and leave it at that. Diego (talk) 18:08, 5 November 2012 (UTC)


 * So, so nobody else has to download the PDF and check: the Acorn User #101 (Dec 1990) reference is a full paragraph, putting it as number 6 of the top 10 games that year. I'd say it counts as more than brief.  And if it's in their top 10, it seems likely there was an additional full review of it that year.  I wonder if Risc User also reviewed it.   I'm willing to belief that the 1992 reference is indeed an ad, and there isn't of use in establishing WP:GNG, but Acorn User+Eurogamer should cover it, shouldn't they?  Mind, the plot summary section should go, and we don't have a very good explanation of whatever the unique mechanic is supposed to be.  Morwen (Talk) 11:34, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Delete The coverage of this game does not appear to be significant. 4 sentences in the Dec. 1990 issue, the Eurogamer retrospective only describes the gameplay, and the Aug. 1992 issue is a small blurb on the bottom of an advertisement. I don't feel this game comes close to passing the WP:GNG. Acorn User has many pages devoted to video game reviews, but in their entire run we've only found 4 sentences they've written on this game. --Odie5533 (talk) 21:40, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
 * How do you define "significant"? For me, describing the gameplay of a video game is significant. Diego (talk) 00:49, 9 November 2012 (UTC)
 * I define it based on the subject matter. For video games, the bread and butter for showing notability to me is a review in a periodical. For gaming mags from the late 80s early 90s, those reviews are often very short, but all the reviews from then tended to be much shorter than they are today. The significance is still there because they are the topic of the review. I don't believe that 4 sentences inside a larger article constitutes significant coverage. And I do not think that simply discussing gameplay passes the threshold either. I love articles about old games, it's why I collect old gaming magazines, but for a game to have an article on Wikipedia I believe it should at least meet the WP:GNG. Take a look at the article I wrote on PHM Pegasus. It's a very old game. Not many people wrote about it, but I believe it meets the WP:GNG because it still managed to receive multiple full reviews from magazines at the time. --Odie5533 (talk) 04:23, 9 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Let's not forget that Notability is a style guideline (deciding whether to have a stand-alone article or not), not a core content policy. This article is not against Neutrality nor What Wikipedia Is Not. Fact is, this game *has* been described by several reliable independent sources, and it *has* received critical commentary. Even if both are brief, they don't merit being deleted as you suggest; simply removing everything wouldn't be an improvement to Wikipedia. GNG deliberately avoids talking of the length of sources' coverage - thus, saying "there should be longer coverage and/or full reviews" is not required by the guideline; so for me, what we have is enough to pass the test. Even if we don't agree to that, the question to ask is where else we could place that content. I would support merging it into another viable article, but I think the current "snowflake" short article is the best way to meet the style, unless you can suggest a better place. Diego (talk) 15:53, 9 November 2012 (UTC)
 * As you said, the GNG is vague on this matter and I try to apply it as best I can given the subject matter. I would not oppose a merger into perhaps an article about the Acorn Archimedes, or an article about Acorn Archimedes software/games. But I do not believe the handful of sentences we have uncovered about the game warrant a full article. Not every word written in reliable sources needs to be included somewhere in Wikipedia. In regards to WP:NOT, this argument falls under WP:IINFO as stated at the top of WP:N. --Odie5533 (talk) 22:49, 9 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Those arguments are right in general, but not in this particular case. This is not a "summary-only description" of the work. Notability is about having enough content to write more than one paragraph (which this has), and INDISCRIMINATE is about not just describing the work's formal structure but also placing it in context saying how it was received by the world (which it also does).
 * Let's think less the letter of the bureaucratic procedures that we have developed through the years and more about what they're intended to achieve. If I want to learn about this obscure game, the article describes its setting, provides a summary of its gameplay, establishes its relative importance to other similar games and compiles the few coverage it received including references to the magazines with exact date and page where it occurred. This is exactly what Wikipedia should provide, as a tertiary compilation of the existing reliable sources for all conceivable topics that have received it, no matter how arcane.
 * Now, your current stance is to delete all this. What are the arguments for providing a red link when looking for "Starch videogame"? How is that an improvement to Wikipedia? Why are you measuring notability by volume instead of results? I really want to understand that position. Diego (talk) 11:49, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
 * The question here is one of notability: is the subject notable? Based on what we have found about the game, I would say that answer is no. See also WP:LOSE. --Odie5533 (talk) 17:31, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, if everything is reduced to what the letter of the guidelines say instead of their spirit, then your criterion for saying that this game is not notable (that GNG requires "full reviews from magazines") is against what the GNG itself says ("Significant coverage ... need not be the main topic of the source material").
 * But policy is not law, and WP:LOSE is not even a guideline but an essay. I've already explained how this article does meet GNG, and how even if it didn't we should keep the content, not delete it, because it's not a part of "everything" but of facts reported by reliable sources.
 * And you didn't answer my main question - how deleting it is an improvement? Now it's your turn to explain how the essays and guidelines you refer to apply to this particular case, not in the abstract but to the actual description of the videogame Scratch. Why a red link is better for Wikipedia than the current short article? The only answer you've provided so far is "rules must be obeyed", which is against the Ignore All Rules pillar. Diego (talk) 20:20, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
 * We clearly have different viewpoints here: you see that the GNG allows for a wide definition of significant coverage, and I look more at the coverage the game received in the context of the published medium. To answer your main question, I believe articles must be notable so that Wikipedia avoids being an indiscriminate repository of information, or in this case obscure video games. I've written too many short articles to be against them, and any red links to the game should be removed if the article is deleted. --Odie5533 (talk) 23:02, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
 * In that case, your definition of indiscriminate doesn't match Wikipedia's definition of indiscriminate. Wikipedia has always admitted obscure topics as long as someone reliable has written about their context and importance. Diego (talk) 10:01, 11 November 2012 (UTC)


 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  MBisanz  talk 00:34, 10 November 2012 (UTC)

 
 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, -- Cheers, Riley   Huntley  00:12, 17 November 2012 (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.