MarioWiki:Proposals

List of Talk Page Proposals

 * Create the page: Drilldigger (Discuss) Passed
 * Split the sections Attackathlon, Toad Quiz and Lakitu Info Centre into and  (Discuss) Passed
 * Split and create articles for and . (Discuss) Deadline: February 14, 2016, 23:59 GMT
 * Split Frog and, , and . (Discuss) Deadline: February 14, 2016, 23:59 GMT
 * Split Bee and and . (Discuss) Deadline: February 14, 2016, 23:59 GMT

Writing Guidelines
None at the moment.

Deal with the duplicate Paper subjects in Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam
Since we started hearing about the subject matter of Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam, there has been questions about what that means for the Paper Mario series and how we cover it and its subjects. There are three options:


 * 1) Make separate pages for the duplicate Paper characters/species/etc. that appear in Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam alongside their flesh/real/3D counterparts, ONLY covering their appearances in that one game, and NOT in any preceding Paper Mario games. It follows the same logic that splits Metal Mario (character) from regular Mario (or Metal Mario (form)) and Baby characters from their adult counterparts, in that the two versions of the characters appear in at least one game simultaneously and function separately from each other. Separate characters (or species, etc.) in the context of the applicable games getting separate articles makes coverage easier (one characters' plot overview per page, one set of stats per page, etc.), and, since the subjects have specific names and identities, it's likely that people will search for them, and we want to make sure that traffic comes to us and finds what they want. This is what I suggest we do.
 * 2) Split coverage of the Paper Mario series entirely due to the M&L:PJ showing that the paper world exists in a book in the regular Mario universe. This means that for consistency, everything that appeared in both series should get split, which is insane from an organizational/comprehensive coverage standpoint and runs afoul of numerous policies and fundamental organization standards. For one thing, the mere assertion that all previous Paper Mario games happened in the M&L:PJ book is reading between the lines and linking unrelated games together into a single narrative, which is against the rules. It also comes dangerously close to making forbidden canon judgments about the Paper Mario series, and even ignoring the "the book's not the real world" angle, it's still placing Paper Mario into its own chronology by separating it from the regular Histories of all the subjects, and we haven't organized articles like that for MANY years, much less split them over it. The only vestige of that sort of thinking is the separation of the film characters, under a biased "they're different" excuse, and that is currently being fixed by another proposal. Even Dr. Mario, while superficially splitting out info based on series origin, is actually more along the lines of the aforementioned Baby characters (as well as other things like Dry Bowser and different forms of boss enemies), in that he's split because he has a specific name, appearance and function with self-contained info that folks are likely to search for, with extra justification that he appears alongside the regular Mario in SSB. And so, because this flies in the face of how we cover things in the Super Mario Wiki and would result in the creation of hundreds of superfluous pages that would snarl up organization forever, I strongly suggest we do NOT do this.
 * 3) Make no new articles and talk about both versions of every co-occurring pair of Paper and flesh/3D subjects in single pages. While this would keep all the Paper things together in one page, I think the resulting clutter in those sections will outweigh any advantage that not splitting it apart would bring, plus M&L:PJ isn't even a Paper Mario game, so the Paper content within it will still be far from the actual Paper Mario content on pages with any sort of History built up. Unless there's two M&L:PJ sections per History section, one for the flesh/3D stuff, one for the Paper stuff, but that would be awkward, and could even make both sections seem incomplete or repetitive, depending on how they're handled, plus it's unlike any other aspect of our coverage of any game, and inconsistency is bad. So I suggest we don't do this either.

Hopefully there were enough pros and cons in there to convince everyone that Option 1 is the simplest way, and is the most consistent with current standards and policies. If you want more words, I also made a big forum post going through all the different sorts of doppelgangers we cover. That forum discussion actually exists because someone already went and made a Paper Mario (character) article, without any discussion, and initially as an "option 2"-style Paper Mario series-wide page, although I've since cut it back to M&L:PJ only. I'm hoping this proposal will make it clear that the community as a whole is behind that decision of mine, and will continue in that direction to move forward with that article, and the ones to follow.

I'm not going to bother making a list of pages that will need creating if Option 1 passes, but it's basically every Paper character in M&L:PJ, including Paper Luigi and his cameo, as well as the Paper Toads and Paper enemies, assuming their stats, attacks and/or other non-superficial aspects about them are different from their non-Paper counterparts (but if, for example, Paper Goombas are the same as regular Goombas except for how they look, and same goes for all the other enemies too, don't bother splitting them). Unfortunately, I don't have the game yet, so I don't know enough to even attempt to split anything myself, so others are feel free to have at it: I'm just here to establish the overall game plan.

Proposer: Deadline: February 9, 2016, 23:59 GMT

Option 1: Separate pages for M&L:PJ characters only

 * 1) - Per proposal. Even if subsequent SSB trophies or whatever vaguely characterize the M&L:PJ character as the "Paper Mario" from earlier games, I think it'd be disastrous to split the series: everything being canon and equal and organized through release dates only is the simplest and best solution, and the current practice of giving pages to simultaneously occurring alternate forms of characters is a logical, straightforward and consistent exception that should work for Paper Jam too.
 * 2) Supported this stance from the beginning, supported it in the forums, will continue doing so.
 * 3) Per Walkazo.
 * 4) Per Walkazo. I was skeptical at first, but after playing Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam and have read discussions, I finally agree to separates paper characters and only those of Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam.
 * 5) I've supported this stance, and Walkazo's points only reinforce my position.
 * 6) This is the most reasonable solution. The enemies were likely going to get separate articles anyway seeing as they were fully classified as separate enemies in game, but it does fully clear up what we'd do with characters like Paper Mario, Paper Peach and Paper Bowser (due to his incredibly small role, I'll assume Paper Luigi doesn't fully count, or does he?). Either way, per all.
 * 7) Per Walkazo in the comments.

Comments
While I'm not suggesting we should split all Paper Mario content, I'd like to hear your thoughts on why Baby Mario is different. His article covers all his appearances as Baby Mario, even when he doesn't appear alongside adult Mario (apart from Super Mario Momotarō and "The Early Years", for a reason I admittedly don't quite grasp). Why should we not cover Baby Mario's appearances when he doesn't meet Adult Mario in the main Mario article, which is what you guys are suggesting to do for Paper Mario? 17:22, 2 February 2016 (EST)
 * There's a very specific, consistent and explicitly named characterization of Baby Mario, and covering half his appearances on one page and half on the other would be messy, confusing and make both articles look incomplete. Dr. Mario and Dry Bowser are covered independently from the main character pages for similar reasons. But this Mario / Paper Mario co-occurence is a one-off so far, so it doesn't need to reconcile recurring solo/duo adventures. Plus, there were four games and many years where there was no distinction between Paper Mario and "real" Mario: they don't call him "Paper Mario" in the earlier games, just "Mario", so it would be wrong of us to go back and say "actually, it was this different Paper Mario all along because a game created years later says so". By contrast, Baby Mario was always "B/baby Mario", and Dr. Mario was always "Dr. Mario", etc., so we're not making stuff up to say there were distinctions from the start. The only times an infant Mario wasn't "Baby Mario" were things like Super Mario Momotarō, Family Album "The Early Years" or "Toddler Terrors of Time Travel", hence they're not covered in Baby Mario's article: that'd be us making connections/appearances that don't exist - same as retroactively making all Paper Marios feature the M&L:PJ "Paper Mario" would be. - 22:25, 2 February 2016 (EST)

To fully clarify, where will we put Paper Luigi in this case? I'm leading to assume he won't get an article due to how minor his appearance was.
 * Paper Luigi should get his own article. Sure, it's extremely minor, but it's a harmless small article. 20:40, 3 February 2016 (EST)
 * The proposal specifically states that Paper Luigi would get his own page like all the rest of the characters. - 21:44, 3 February 2016 (EST)

Removals
None at the moment.

Remerge most Super Mario Bros. film information
It's a pretty complex problem, so it's important that you read and understand what exactly is going on in this proposal. The general crux of this proposal is to overturn the previous proposals mentioned below, thus remerging the film information to their parent articles, but there are a few exceptions that have to be made, and they'll be explained below.

Some history: we had a few proposals related to the Super Mario Bros. film. This one in 2009 set the idea that film information should be separate because, the reasoning went, the film depictions are drastically different and unfaithful to the games for the most part. Later, this proposal (by me) reinforced it. The biggest problem with this reasoning is that is singles out the Super Mario Bros. film for being different from the games but other media and even the games themselves don't exactly follow the standards for character designs all the time. One example is Mario, which if we did went by "they look super different", we may have to split live action depictions of Mario (such as in the cartoons) because there's no way to faithfully replicate Mario's design in live-action. Another example, we don't separate King Koopa from the cartoons from Bowser even though King Koopa is completely green, has no hair, wears a crown, and has yellow underbelly that extends to his tail, traits Bowser does not have. It may be argued that King Koopa isn't different enough and the cartoons want us to treat this character the same as Bowser. What is the line between "different" enough, though? This is entirely subjective and while King Koopa indeed shares more traits with games Bowser than film Bowser does with games Bowser, I feel this is the wrong point to make. This film also wants its viewers to treat this human as Bowser, but simply "evolved" to look more human, and we get to see this character as a reptilian later in the film anyway. Furthermore, there is at least one enemy that largely resembles its game counterpart, the Bob-omb, but that isn't split.

Which brings me another problem: the split job from those proposals is inconsistent. Mario Brothers Plumbing, Snifit, Tweeter, and Bullet Bill/Banzai Bill are also not split. Why not just split them instead of merging the rest? Because there are no very good reasons to keep them split, as the only reasoning was that "they're super different". After you look past the drastic depictions, the split invites canon arguments in the wiki and suggests that the film is "less canon" than the games/cartoons/whatever, which violates a well-enforced policy, which appears to be a major blind spot or double standard for outsiders to this wiki. We've had users trying to add film information to these character's articles, which may have highlighted the problem with this split.


 * To be merged
 * Mario (film character)
 * Luigi (film character)
 * Toad (film character)
 * Princess Daisy (film character) (similarities to Princess Peach can be noted if needed; do NOT add extensive infant Daisy's information to Baby Daisy aside from a side note, similar to how Toddler Terrors of Time Travel is handled in Baby Mario and Baby Luigi)
 * President Koopa (to Bowser)
 * Yoshi (film character)
 * Goomba (film) (reptilian forms can be noted as a possible parallel to Koopa Troopas, although I don't know if the film ever refers to these as even Koopa Troopas.
 * Iggy (film character)
 * King (film character) to Mushroom King

Sure, some of these will vastly expand the parent characters (which may be heavy in content to begin with), but that means a rewrite not a reason to keep articles split. Our own MaRPG plot information is arguably just as detailed as the film's plot information, but we don't split information.


 * To remain split
 * Big Bertha (film character) (no individual Big Bertha character; there is a Big Bertha character in Fins and Roses, although its article isn't created as I speak, so the film identifier is fine)
 * Spike (film character) (there was no individual Spike character in the games; rename to Spike (character))


 * Needs information
 * Mario Brothers Plumbing
 * Snifit (Shy Guy could also use a mention if not there already)
 * Banzai Bill (it resembles a Banzai Bill and is linked as Banzai Bill in the film's article, so a mention in Banzai Bill needs to be made)
 * Monkey!

The general idea is that there has to be some parallel to these two characters. If there is an individual in the film (Mario) that is an individual in the games (Mario), then it should be merged. If there is an individual in the film (Big Bertha) that is a generic species in the game (a Big Bertha) then it should get its own article.

Proposer:, suggestions by Deadline: February 4, 2016, 23:59 GMT

Support

 * 1) - Per proposal, per consistency with how we deal with every other conflicting piece of media, including games that don't quite fit. Even for species we split for being different in certain appearances, it's because there's different names to justify it, but that's not really applicable here, and besides, there's no reasonable question that characters like the film's Mario is Mario, just a different take on him, and that's too subjective to split pages over. If the to-be-merged character pages are massive, that's only because they're doing a poor job of summarizing the film and should be cut down: the film has its own article for a scene-by-scene breakdown, on character pages, it's padding (regardless of whether the articles are merged or standalone).
 * 2) Per all.
 * 3) Per all.
 * 4) Per all.
 * 5) Per all.
 * 6) Per all. I always thought this splitting was inconsistent.
 * 1) Per all. I always thought this splitting was inconsistent.

Oppose

 * 1) - If we are going to have pages for all paper characters (see Paper Mario (character)) on the basis of them being different characters, I see no reason why the film characters should be re-merged. Paper Mario is way more similar to Game Mario than Film Mario, and it makes little sense to state that Paper Mario is "its own entity", as Film Mario clearly doesn't follow the general story and concept of Game Mario and should therefore be its own entity.
 * 2) - Mario's article is too long, so I don't want a film continuity crammed into it. Besides, we have had different forms of Mario as separate pages and different versions of Mario on the same screen. I'm aware of Canoncity, but I would prefer the separate pages for Other Media forms of Mario and other characters that are too different from the games.
 * 3) - The post-credits scene where Iggy and Spike are brainstorming video game ideas to Japanese executives is meant to show the "true" origin of Nintendo's Super Mario Bros. due to language difficulties. This isn't reading between the lines - this was somewhat recently confirmed as the actual intent by one of the directors, and is apparently the sole reason the entire movie feels "different" from the rest of the series (which backfired with audiences). That alone should tell us the film's characters are not exactly meant to be the same entities that fans are familiar with.
 * 4) - Per LTL.
 * 5) Per LTL.
 * 6) Per LTL.

Comments
Who would we merge Iggy with? He's clearly not Iggy Koopa. -- 18:27, 28 January 2016 (EST)
 * How is he not "Iggy Koopa", though? I know, he appears different and the rest of the Koopalings aren't there, but I'm sure he was created with the Koopaling in mind, with him being a cousin rather than a sibling. 18:35, 28 January 2016 (EST)
 * Possibly, but the only similarity besides the name (which could be a coincedence) is that he's a Koopa who serves Bowser. I would believe he was based on Iggy if the other Koopalings actually existed. -- 18:39, 28 January 2016 (EST)
 * So he's Koopa's adult cousin in the film instead of the (now-retconned) parent-child connection? Big whup - it's no more drastic a change than Daisy being the Mushroom princess, Koopa being President instead of King, Goombas being giant pea-headed men, Yoshi being a pet, Toad being a busker, a bare-faced Luigi being much younger than Mario, etc. It's pretty obvious that they got the name and inspiration from the Koopaling, so let's call a spade a spade and put the info in that article. -
 * Fair enough, you got me :P -- 18:41, 28 January 2016 (EST)

@Tucayo: Just because the film does a poor job at handling the depiction of the Mario characters doesn't make it grounds for disqualification within the Mario series. That's pretty much the base of your entire argument, something this proposal thoroughly debunked in its opening statements, regarding how differently various characters were portrayed in the cartoon (including the live-action version of the Super Mario Bros. Super Show, should we also split that information off considering how vastly different their roles are?) and even within the games themselves. Whereas, it's arguable within not only storyline matters but also gameplay matters that Paper Mario is his own character. Film Mario had never been referred as separate from regular Mario in the Mario series. The movie clearly established that it's the same Mario as this Mario, no matter how bad of a job they did with it or how deviating from the canon it is (and we know that this wiki has a firm stance against established canonicity), so therefore, they should be merged. 13:12, 1 February 2016 (EST)
 * "disqualification within the Mario series". The fact that the movie is not part of the Mario series makes it grounds for disqualification within the Mario series. I'd actually support splitting those appearances as well, but that should be a debate for another time. --
 * And may I ask exactly how is it not part of the Mario series? 13:21, 1 February 2016 (EST)
 * From Mario (series):
 * "The Mario series is a long-running video game series published by the popular gaming company, Nintendo. The Mario series has been running for more than a quarter of a century, and in its lifespan has released more than two hundred video games. The series also holds the title of best-selling video game franchise in history, with over 262 million combined units sold."
 * Video game series. I'm aware we classify it as "Other Media", and it's exactly that, it's other media. Our own name for it indicates it's "other", not a main part of the series but rather something additional. My vote stands. -- 13:25, 1 February 2016 (EST)
 * Are you going to advocate splitting off the Mario as depicted in other media aside from the film as well? Like, any appearances in Super Mario Adventures, Super Mario-Kun, Super Mario Bros. Super Show, Amada Anime Series: Super Mario Bros., and whatnot as well? Keep in mind, this is not a Mario series argument. This is an argument whether to integrate the film depiction of Mario into Mario's article, Luigi film character into Luigi, and others. We don't have the cartoon series and what not in the Mario series article simply because you are correct, the Mario series is a video game series. However, we are talking about individual character articles, not a video game series one, and that allows more leeway of interpretations of the character into them, in which, film Mario has the criteria of being included into Mario the characters article. 13:38, 1 February 2016 (EST)

Tucayo: Where did you get that conclusion from? What does Paper Mario have to do with the film? We're splitting Paper Mario because he's treated as a different character in Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam (he's considered a third partner, he has his own stats, and Flesh Mario interacts with him as if he's his own character). Film Mario should be merged because he's supposed to be a take on Mario; if this Mario interacted with Game Mario, it would be feasible, but no, this is supposed to be the Mario. This has nothing to do with how "different" a Mario is or "he's made of paper" or this conclusion based on faulty logic that "Paper Mario is different and his own character; Bob Hoskins Mario is different, so therefore, he should be his own character". Frankly, your logic behind why "the movie is not part of the Mario series" is ridiculous. You're even contradicting yourself in your definition: first, you're saying it's not part of the series, but then you go around and say it's not a "main" part of the series but something additional. The external media does count as part of the Mario series, but the Mario series is primarily about the games, especially when the other media are based off these games. The only barometer of what makes media worthy of coverage is if Nintendo officially was involved in it. How closely a medium (or a series of it!) adheres to Nintendo's world of Mario invites canon arguments like you're arguing here, specifically "it's not faithful so it shouldn't be covered alongside everything else", which is just a different way of saying "it's less canon/it's less authentic" when we shouldn't even begin to focus on that. As Canonicity states, "the organization of an article is simply a way to convey information in the most effective and efficient manner possible." The current split-off is not effective or efficient due to its inconsistent nature and that it singles out the Super Mario Bros. film just for being different. 15:27, 1 February 2016 (EST)
 * Show me what the article would look like if it's merged. That way I'll decide if this is indeed efficient and effective. -- 15:56, 1 February 2016 (EST)
 * This is what it may look like. 16:29, 1 February 2016 (EST)
 * Alright, looks OK. -- 21:46, 1 February 2016 (EST)

LinktheLefty: I think that verges on speculation. And even if you do accept the intent of the filmmakers, that the game developers "bastardized" Super Mario Bros., exactly how would this make film Mario a separate character from game Mario? 01:41, 4 February 2016 (EST)

SeanWheeler: Your entire vote is invalid and it is easily refuted by the arguments made in the proposal here and in this forum post here. Your argument carries no weight and I don't think your vote should count unless you actually argue your points more thoroughly. 01:43, 4 February 2016 (EST)


 * This isn't speculation, though: it's laid out pretty clearly in the aforementioned Rocky Morton interview.


 * “Well, the concept that I came up with for the movie — because it wasn’t an original script, which I didn’t like, and I went away and thought about it and then pitched to the producers my new idea — was to create a backstory that only tentatively related to the final game. The idea being that we were going to tell the real story, and that the game itself was a perversion of the original story, which the movie is. That’s why it’s different, you know; the characters are slightly different and everything because [the story] was discovered by the Japanese and they reinterpreted it, but got a few things wrong in the actual video game. Of course, [that] backfired, because people thought "They got it wrong!" ... Well the original script was like that, was like more of a direct lift from the game. And I thought well, we all know the game, wouldn’t it be interesting to create a game that was kind of darker and was the "true" story. And, you know, in history, myths get distorted — this would be the same thing, the origin of the myth, and then it got reinterpreted by the Japanese — like, you see, at the end the two executives from Nintendo come at the end to to talk to Mario and Luigi, and they tell the story of their adventure verbally and then [Nintendo] kind of writes it down and gets it all wrong, and that’s why the game is different from the film. ... I wanted to find a reason to free myself from the game, and the reason I came up with was this was the original story, and everything else was a distortion from this being the truth. And once with that concept, it freed me from being shackled to any portrayal of the video game. Of course, that p*****d a lot of people off — but that was what we decided to do!“


 * Best as I can tell, this was brought up because it was decided feeling "too different" was not a valid reason in itself, which is true. However, there's a very deliberate rationale for this, officially explaining that the film does not consciously represent what is depicted in the franchise proper. I don't know what the thought process was for reserving this key detail until after the credits when most viewers would've gone up and left the room (and those remaining would probably not think of it as anything more than an ill-executed gag), but either way, the scene definitely isn't an afterthought - according to the co-director, it is actually the entire basis that the final shooting script revolves around, specifically so the film wouldn't have to be restrained down. Essentially, it comes down to a game of telephone - can something that started out entirely differently and got mangled over time and communication troubles really be considered the thing it started out as? Same applies to the characters, setting and story as a whole. To me, this is ample grounds for segregating the information. I'm generally all for wiki policy, but I think that's really supposed to be enforced if the intent is unconfirmed and unknowable. Policy shouldn't come at the expense of overriding well-documented creator intent (whether we agree with it or not). LinkTheLefty (talk) 17:32, 4 February 2016 (EST)

I'm ebarassed to say I actually knew about the Rocky Morton comment (even wrote about it on the film's page), but I didn't consider the implications for this proposal until LTL posted.

To add to the above, this trading card for the film also hint at Rocky Morton's explanation of the movie. It even directly says "Nintendo video game". --Glowsquid (talk) 22:24, 4 February 2016 (EST)

Miscellaneous
None at the moment.