UESPWiki:Archive/CP Mobile Game Page Names

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Mobile Game Page Names

Several pages related to mobile Elder Scrolls games, in particular Shadowkey, have been created lately (thanks, Jadrax!), e.g., Shadowkey:Potions, [[:Shadowkey armor]], and [[:Shadowkey Weapons]]. This raises the question, however, of where those pages should be located (see also User Talk:Jadrax). At the moment, they are all in the main namespace. Even if there is an eventual interest in creating a Shadowkey namespace, it is actually better in the interim to have these pages not look like they're in the Shadowkey namespace. And the site's namespace guidelines say that pages should not be in the main namespace. I would like to propose moving them all to the General namespace, for example, "General:Shadowkey Potions", "General:Shadowkey Armor", and "General:Shadowkey Weapons", and then creating links from the main Shadowkey page to these pages. Are there any alternative suggestions or ideas? --23:41, 19 January 2007 (EST)

The reason for not putting stuff in the Main namespace is that it's expected that everything fits in one of the gamespaces. But that assumption is incorrect for the Shadowkey pages. So, I would leave them in the main space -- but without the ':' delimiter since that would cause problems later when/if the Shadowkey space is created. So for the above, I would make the following adjustments: move General:Shadowkey to [[:Shadowkey Shadowkey]], Shadowkey:Potions to [[:Shadowkey Potions]]. --Wrye 01:08, 20 January 2007 (EST)

I think for the interim Wrye's suggestion makes sense, with the possibility of a shadowkey namespace being created later one once there is enough material to justify it? Jadrax 05:25, 20 January 2007 (EST)

OK, that works for me, with one minor suggested change: move General:Shadowkey to [[:Shadowkey]]. Having it named "Shadowkey" won't interfere with any possible future namespace, so we might as well go for the simpler name. And by extension, it seems like Dawnstar, Stormhold, and Oblivion Mobile should also be moved... or should we wait until someone shows an interest in one of those games before rearranging them? --Nephele 13:34, 21 January 2007 (EST)

Cool. i'd say do the same with Dawnstar, etc. Might be worth adding them to sections sidebar. Someone might start expanding them if they see they're available but empty. --Wrye 15:24, 21 January 2007 (EST)

I'd agree - except I'm not sure about adding to the sidebar, unless they're in their own section. That bar is crowded enough as it is, and if you start adding all the mobile games, it might get unwieldy. Maybe just one link for all the mobile games would be appropriate.

( Maybe collapse Bloodmood and Tribunal into the link for Morrowind while were at it? Jadrax 18:41, 21 January 2007 (EST) )

On a related note, what are we planning on doing once Shivering Isles comes out? Unlike Knights of the Nine, I think it's supposed to be a genuine expansion, as in, something you'll have to go to the store and buy, rather than something you can just download. If we follow the pattern we did with Morrowind, (Tribunal and Bloodmoon each having their own namespaces), then Shivering Isles would also merit a namespace. (I'd still even like to see Knights of the Nine put in a separate namespace, but I think I'm in the minority there.) What we'd call this new namespace is up for debate, since it's a 2-word name (unlike all our current namespaces.) Is it possible to make a 2-word namespace? If not, we could just leave out the space and call it "ShiveringIsles:", though I could see that getting confusing. --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 18:28, 21 January 2007 (EST)

I'd also been wondering about the sidebar. What crossed my mind was to create a new page All Games that provides links to all the games and add that to the side bar. Then, given that "sections" on the side bar already incomplete (doesn't have mobile games, doesn't have links to all the namespaces), would it make sense to remove the links to some of the less frequently accessed games? Checking the number of hits on each of the listed games' main pages showed (at that instant in time):

• Arena 108,840
• Daggerfall 99,388
• Battlespire 53,351
• Redguard 65,416
• Morrowind 441,651
• Tribunal 97,659
• Bloodmoon 120,021
• Oblivion 2,093,320
• Tamriel 157,095

I would say at least Morrowind, Oblivion, and Tamriel should be listed. But there isn't really a sudden, dramatic drop off past those three. So I'm not sure whether it will be possible to come up with a universally acceptable list of shorter links.

I also agree that a decision will need to be made sometime soon on Shivering Isles. I see that by analogy to Tribune and Bloodmoon, it should have its own namespace. On the other hand, it's not immediately obvious to me why any of the expansion packs need their own namespace. There shouldn't be any naming conflicts; for example, there shouldn't be any Shivering Isles places that have the same name as an Oblivion place. And there is the practical issue that "Shivering Isles" or "ShiveringIsles" is an awkwardly long name to have to type for every single page. I was wondering if any of the people who've been working on Tribunal and Bloodmoon pages might have some feedback: if starting to describe an expansion pack from scratch, would you think it better to create a separate namespace or not? (Not that I'm proposing to get rid of the Tribunal and Bloodmoon namespaces; I'm just wondering what benefits there have been from having separate namespaces). --Nephele 19:00, 21 January 2007 (EST)

Aggreed. Changes to the sidebar are nessicary, and I have always wondered why Tribunal and Bloodmoon belong in seperate catagories (although, since they do make huge changes and people may not have the games, it makes some sense, but if someone has both games, they may not know where to look for information: there are three possible locations). -- Dylnuge(talk · edits) 19:05, 21 January 2007 (EST)

As for the gamespace name, I think that Shivering would be fine -- reasonably short and clear. As for whether or not to do a new gamespace at all, I don't know.

The official mods so far don't really change gameplay, but rather just add new locations with a few new pieces of armor and items. Shivering isles will likely expand gameplay quite a bit (more alchemy items, more creatures, attacking npcs, maybe more towns). If it does add a lot of new gameplay elements, and if it's not put in a separate namespace, then its info should be merged with existing topic pages (alchemy, creatures, etc.), but its additions need to be made to stand out from the vanilla Oblivion items. This may be so much of a pain in the butt to do that a separate namespace looks better. I suspect that we won't be able to figure it out until the expansion comes out and we see just how much it adds. Note that the previously discussed Mod Info in Articles is somewhat relevant (since it also is concerned with addendary information). --Wrye 19:44, 21 January 2007 (EST)

Reply to Nephele: Well, since I've done the balance of the work on the Morrowind expansions so far, especially Tribunal, I guess my opinion kinda matters. For one thing, I like the separate namespaces. I think having them prevents confusion on what pages are in what game. This means that I believe that Shivering Isles in theory should have it's own namespace. I think having separate namespaces also assists in adding new content, since it allows editors to quickly see what data has or hasn't been added. This seems to boil down to one thing for me, any extras (expansions/official mods) need to be separated from the content of the main game to avoid confusion. There are two ways to accomplish this:

1. Add notes to any and all pages effected by the extras
2. Create a new namespace

Personally, I think that any extra large enough to make single page warnings affect to many pages to make that solution viable should have there own namespaces. As for the practicality of typing "Shivering Isles" in, we could abbreviate it. --Ratwar 19:57, 21 January 2007 (EST)

I agree with Ratwar. Having worked considerably on Bloodmoon, I found it very effective to have a separate namespace for hte expansion, which clearly separates what is part of the original game and what is part of the expansion. The two options Ratwar suggests are very reasonable to me. --DrPhoton 03:50, 22 January 2007 (EST)

Absolutely the expansion should have its own namespace. Simply to distinguish between material involving the base game and the expansion. And don't remove any of the games from the sections. --88.192.171.61 17:36, 22 January 2007 (EST)

Again, I'm not really sure namespaces are a suitable form of distinguishing between material. The problem with them to me is they rely upon whoever is coming to the site looking for information actually knowing which namespace is relevant and then knowing to type it in. Personally, (this from the point of view of someone using the site looking for information,) I would much rather search for what I want, and then be told which game or expansion it's from, rather than me having to tell the wiki where is from to start with. Jadrax 19:13, 22 January 2007 (EST)

Do you have a better suggestion? I mean, I see what you man, but at the same time, I think most people should be able to remember what game/expansion they're playing. --Ratwar 19:46, 22 January 2007 (EST)

Everything in the main namespace, if there is a duplicate name you put the other articles under different names with a redirect at the top. (This page is talking about te game Arena, for other uses of the term Arena in Elder Scrolls, got the Arena disambiguation page here..) Each Article must clearly state what it's relevant too. (But it almost certainly will anyway.) Again, this is just my observation, and in no way do I want to kick up a fuss or come across as on some personal crusade to get rid of the namespaces, I'm perfectly happy to use whatever structure the site adheres too, but it does seem to me to be particularly unfriendly to the new user, especially if he's unaware of any of the games prior to oblivion. Jadrax 20:05, 22 January 2007 (EST)

The discussion has convinced me that creating a new namespace for Shivering Isles makes sense. Although I do sympathize with Jadrax's concerns about making it easy for readers to find the information they're looking for. One big difference compared to Knights of the Nine is that Shivering Isles appears to be adding a whole new area, so I think it should be easier for readers to figure out whether a place they discover is part of Oblivion or part of Shivering Isles. And perhaps setting up redirect pages between the two namespaces for some key pages would help (so that hopefully no matter where you look you end up finding the right page).

Any feedback on what name to use for the new namespace? Wrye's suggestion of "Shivering" works for me. --Nephele 23:30, 22 January 2007 (EST)