MarioWiki:Naming: Difference between revisions

*The Super Mario Wiki is an English language wiki, so the name of an article should correspond to the '''most commonly used English name''' of the subject, which, given our user and visitor demographics, means the '''North American name'''. For example, the North American title of "''[[Mario Strikers Charged]]''" takes precedence over the PAL region's "''Mario Strikers Charged Football''" title.

*If a subject isn't released in North America, but is released in another English-speaking region (i.e. Europe or Australia), the name they provide should be used for the article. If there is a conflict of which source to use, the region where the game was released first will have priority (i.e. the '''first international English name''' will be used).

*If a subject's name has changed over time, the more commonly used modern name should be used as the title, rather than the historic name. For example, [[Princess Peach]]'s original English name was "Princess Toadstool", however, she is usually called "Princess Peach" in recent games, so the article's title is "Princess Peach".

*If there is no official name in any language, then a [[MarioWiki:Conjectural names|conjectural]] title is developed if the subject is notable enough for an article. For example, the unnamed mayor of [[Fahr Outpost]] in ''[[Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door]]'' has been given the conjectural yet straightforward name "[[Fahr Outpost mayor]]", as he plays a role in the game's story, unlike [[MarioWiki:Minor NPCs|most NPCs]], which are not granted conjecturally named articles.

#'''Name used in officially licensed media''' – A name from any officially Nintendo-licensed non-video game media source. This includes cartoons, movies, magazines, comics and web content. Like games, North American media names get priority, followed by the first international English name and finally, the first non-English source.

#'''Development name''' – Any name used during the development of a video game or other Nintendo-licensed media source. This type of name usually comes from unused data, developer interviews or development documents.

Please note that ''regardless of the source'', the '''official North American name''' takes priority, followed by the '''first international English name''' if no North American name is available, and finally the '''first international non-English name''' if no English name is known. For example, if a subject is given a name in-game in the Japanese version only, and not in the English localization of the game, but an English strategy guide names it, that English name is used, rather than the Japanese.

{{see also|MarioWiki:Japanese}}

Rather than using the actual Japanese characters, we use {{wp|Romanization of Japanese|romanizations}}, such as [[Itsunomanika Heihō]] (for 「いつのまにかヘイホー」) or [[Unibō]] (for 「ウニボー」). However, if a Japanese word is itself a transliteration of an English word, simply use the original English word. Similarly, names that were transcribed slightly differently from the proper romanization when the games were translated from Japanese to English should use those official transcriptions (i.e. "Yosshī"/"Yossy" and "Kuppa" should be written as "Yoshi" and "Koopa", respectively). Therefore, 「ヨッシーのクッキー クルッポンオーブンでクッキー」 is given the title ''[[Yoshi no Cookie: Kuruppon Oven de Cookie]]'', even though the direct romanization is "''Yosshī no Kukkī: Kuruppon Ōbun de Kukkī''"; another example is 「スーパーマリオ　不思議のころころパーティ」, which is romanized as "''Sūpā Mario Fushigi no Korokoro Pāti''", but given the article name ''[[Super Mario Fushigi no Korokoro Party]]'' to reflect how users instinctively want to refer to the familiar words in the title. However, if the word is part of a compound, leave it as the original Japanese, as a partial translation would just look awkward, rather than instinctual; for example, [[Kaibādo]] (「カイバード」) is not changed to "Kaibird".

==Conjectural names==