Wikipedia:WikiProject Role-playing games/Notability

This page gives some rough guidelines intended to be used by Wikipedia editors to decide whether a role-playing game should or should not have an article on Wikipedia. While satisfying these notability guidelines generally indicates a book warrants an article, failing to satisfy them is not a criterion for speedy deletion.

These guidelines may be considered a specialized version of Notability, applied to role-playing games, reflecting the following core Wikipedia policies:
 * Wikipedia articles must not be vehicles for advertisement
 * Verifiability
 * Neutral point of view
 * No original research
 * Wikipedia is not a soapbox
 * Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information
 * Wikipedia is not a crystal ball

Claims of notability must adhere to Wikipedia's policy on attribution; it is not enough to simply assert that a book meets a criterion without substantiating that claim with reliable sources.

"Notability" as used herein is not a reflection of a game's worth. A book may be brilliantly written, fascinating and topical, while still not being notable enough to ensure sufficient verifiable source material exists to create an article in an encyclopedia.

Coverage
Although the term "role-playing game" is broadly used to cover many pursuits, these guidelines refer only to the games in which the participants assume the roles of fictional characters, determine the actions of their characters based on their characterization, and the actions succeed or fail according to a formal system of rules and guidelines. This includes live-action role-playing games but excludes role-playing video games.

The criteria set forth below also apply to online text-based role-playing games. However, the notability of these games should also be evaluated using the notability criteria for web-specific content.

Although the rules of most role-playing games are published in books, these criteria do not apply to articles dedicated to those books if a separate article exists to describe the game. Articles solely about books should be evaluated using the notability criteria for books. If a role-playing game's rules are instead published online, then the publication should be evaluated using the notability criteria for web-specific content.

Criteria
A role-playing game or game topic is generally notable if it verifiably meets through reliable sources, one or more of the following criteria:
 * 1) The game or topic has been a subject of multiple, non-trivial published works whose sources are independent of the game or topic, with at least some of these works serving a general audience. This includes published works in all forms, such as newspaper articles, other books, television documentaries and reviews. Some of these works should contain sufficient critical commentary to allow the article to grow past a summary of rules or in-universe information.
 * 2) * The immediately preceding criterion excludes media re-prints of press releases, flap copy, or other publications where the author, its publisher, agent, or other self-interested parties advertise or speak about the game or game topic.
 * 3) * Coverage from an online review website can be considered non-trivial for the previous criterion if the coverage includes work by at least one professional reviewer or staff writer. Multiple reviews on a single website do not impart additional notability, so online reviews must come from multiple sources or be supported by additional coverage.
 * 4) The game or topic has won a major award.
 * 5) The game or topic represents a significant milestone in the development of role-playing games.
 * 6) * This criterion includes the first game to use a game mechanic which was later widely adopted; the first game within a given major genre of setting or the first to use a setting which was later widely used; the first to be published in a certain way, for example online or print-on-demand; or which is otherwise described as a significant step by multiple reliable sources. Generic role-playing games do not prevent future setting-specific games from counting under this criterion.
 * 7) The game's designer or setting is so historically significant that any officially associated works may be considered notable; or it is the focus of an active WikiProject
 * 8) * This includes licensed games of significant franchises.

Self-publication
Self-publication and/or publication by a vanity press is indicative, but not determinative of non-notability. By the same token, it should always weigh against an article's inclusion if the author or other interested party is the creator of the Wikipedia article. See Conflict of interest and Autobiography for more information.

However, not all self-published games are non-notable, and some early independently published games are notable precisely because they were among the first to be published independently.

Online stores
A game's listing at online stores such as Barnes & Noble.com or Amazon.com is not by itself an indication of notability as such websites are non-exclusionary, including large numbers of vanity press publications. There is no present agreement on how high a book must fall on Amazon's sales rank listing (in the "product details" section for a book's listing) in order to provide evidence of its notability, vel non.

Not yet published games
Since Wikipedia is not a crystal ball articles about games that are not yet published are generally discouraged unless multiple independent sources provide strong evidence that the game is widely anticipated and unless the title of the game and its approximate date of publication have been made public.

Derivative articles
It is a general consensus on Wikipedia that articles should not be split and split again into ever more minutiae of detail treatment, with each split normally lowering the level of notability. What this means is that while a game may be notable, it is not normally advisable to have a separate article on a character or rulebook from the game, and it is often the case that despite the game being manifestly notable, a derivative article from it is not. Exceptions do, of course, exist—see Notability (fiction).

In some situations, where the game itself does not fit the established criteria for notability, or if a game is notable but the designer or publisher has an article in Wikipedia, it may be better to feature material about the game in that article, rather than creating a separate article for that game. Conversely, if a rulebook is notable but the game has an article in Wikipedia, it may be better to feature material about the book in the game's article, rather than creating a separate article for the book.

Resources

 * Pen & Paper RPG Database