MarioWiki:Proposals

Writing guidelines
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New features
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Removals
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Do not rename articles until the relevant media has released
What this proposal aims to enforce is that if a subject is confirmed to have a new name in an upcoming game, the article must not be moved to the new name until the game has released. A prime example is the recent situation with Psychopath, which the Nintendo of America Twitter account referred to as "Thought Peek" for the remake and the article was immediately moved, but was since moved back to Psychopath as it might not be a proper confirmation of a new name, so this proposal should also prevent jumping the gun like this. The new name can still be mentioned in the article, but as stated must not be the article title until the game's release regardless of source.

EDIT, PLEASE READ BEFORE VOTING: I get the feeling a lot of people are going to see this and completely misunderstand my motive here, I'm not saying that we should completely ignore or distrust all pre-release marketing, this proposal is solely aimed at returning subjects in games and if they are eligable for a rename, all I hope to accomplish is establishing a rule like with latest appearances and infobox images, in that the move doesn't happen until release. Obviously it would be impossible to apply this to new subjects and I would not try and halt the creation of those articles, any form of official pre-release marketing for those would be perfectly acceptable.

Proposer: Deadline: October 5, 23:59 GMT

Support

 * 1) Per proposal
 * 2) Not even just for games, content overall. Not to dig up old cases (and not to sound insensitive or anything), but we've | jumped the gun before on upcoming content so I support the idea of waiting until everything is fully known before making any moves.
 * 3) Per all. Doesn't seem like it could hurt, it's not like keeping the older name for a few months is the end of the world...  Or is it? 
 * 4) This seems sensible enough and consistent with how we generally handle upcoming media in other areas. Also saves us the headache of fixing things a second time if a pre-release name differs from the final product, which is always a possibility.
 * 5) Per all. Also there's always the chance of differences between American/British English localizations to take into account as well.
 * 6) This makes sense. As anyone acutely familiar with game development will tell you, things change mid-development, even (and in some cases especially) after promotional content says something about the game, all the time. And even if things don't change, all it takes is one blunder of cyclical reporting to accidentally trip people up anyways--remember God Slayer Bowser? Better safe and wait for the game to release than pre-empt it and get caught with our proverbial pants down if they walk back on it for whatever reason. And as Herobrine mentions, Nintendo has held different English translations between American English and British English for awhile now--who's to say this isn't another case of exactly that?
 * 7) Per all.
 * 8) Let's just say that I have unfortunate reason to believe that the retranslation situation is in a way more precarious position than all of us would've liked, but since I really should not get into that here/now/ever, I'll just say "I agree it's a good idea to treat everything as a placeholder until release" and leave it at that. (Also, I thought this was already standard practice.)
 * 9) Per all.
 * 10) Per all.
 * 11) The Mario Party 5 bonus disc demo had early minigame names, ""Pale Piranha" was a last minute change, and so on, and so forth.
 * 12) Per all.
 * 13) Per all, and i just agree in general.
 * 14) Per all.
 * 15) Agreed, we can’t be sure of the final name until the actual release.

Oppose

 * 1) I can understand not immediately moving based on one social media post, but this easily has the potential to just seem silly if a rename is ever made very clear in pre-release material. This would also create a bit of an inconsistency with pre-release material being acceptable for the names of new subjects but not returning ones. This should probably be case-by-case in my opinion.
 * 2) I see no reason to distrust official social media and other pre-release marketing material in cases like these.
 * 3) Per PaperSplash's reason.

Comments
@PaperSplash I'm not saying to distrust official social media and pre-release marketing, I'm just saying to hold off from moving article titles until release like with latest appearances and infobox images. 15:56, September 28, 2023 (EDT)
 * Then why hold off? And apologies for misunderstanding, but I didn't know how else to interpret "it might not be a proper confirmation of a new name". It makes sense to wait until release for latest appearances, and while I don't necessarily agree with our current rule on infobox images I can see the reasoning for there, but I don't here. I don't think the DS Mario Circuit edit Tails777 cited is a good enough argument for a policy change across the board because Mario Kart Tour and the Mario Kart 8 Deluxe – Booster Course Pass have a rather unique situation of having content released (and seemingly developed) concurrently. (Also said edit and the reason given for it in the edit summary feel rather contradictory to me...) This also isn't like God Slayer Bowser since we're dealing with an actual official source here. I'd also like to point out that Nintendo had largely put a stop to separate American English and British English localizations by the beginning of the Switch era; pretty much all the games that still have them separate are ports of games that already had them separate and are seemingly kept that way for consistency more than anything. (And even then, there have been exceptions like Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury where the original game's British English localization was discarded anyway.) The only comparable situation I can think of where the English localization ended up going back on a rename from pre-release to post-release is the Fishman ("Merman") spirit from Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (which didn't end up affecting us either way since it's not a Mario character, but I'll still concede on this). That's what we should be looking at if anything. PaperSplash (talk) 22:18, September 28, 2023 (EDT)

The Case of Donkey Kong 64 Sub-Areas
While inquiring about the Prima name of what we are now referring to as the Temple with Five Doors (discussion here), I posed another question. Why are the Temple with Five Doors and Llama's Temple (both parts of Angry Aztec) the only level-specific areas of Donkey Kong 64 to have separate articles? They date back to 2012, which is old, but not stone age old. Either way, it doesn't really make sense to have articles for just these two. So you'd think the obvious solution would to just give articles to every other sub-area. After all, we have articles for stuff like Surf Cabana and Sand Cabana, so why not? Well, there is one problem: names.

Super Mario Odyssey went so whole hog with naming everything aside from a few "bonus areas" that I had to make a proposal to decide what we didn't want articles for. Donkey Kong 64... does not do this. Wrinkly Kong mentions a few of them in her hints, but often in generic terms, so we're forced to rely on guides for many of them. Even then, the guides don't name every sub-area, so there are still some missing links in the chain. Using conjectural names to fill in the gaps would open a can of worms regarding creating articles for other nameless sub-areas such as the pyramid in Shifting Sand Land or the volcano in Lethal Lava Land.


 * Only split named sub-areas: Simply put, we only split the sub-areas that would not require a template. This avoids the issue of setting a potentially troublesome precedent involving nameless sub-area articles, but creates some discrepancies regarding size and scope. The rather expansive but unnamed underground crypt in Creepy Castle would not get an article, but the very small "Silo" from that same level would, purely because it and not the former was named in a guide with a seemingly arbitrary policy for naming and capitalizing things.
 * Split everything: Every sub-area gets an article, even if we have to use some conjectural names. I've already mentioned the can of worms this would open, but there's also just the fact that some of these areas, such as the crusher room in Frantic Factory, are very small and only house a single Golden Banana. Others may also prove challenging to come up with good conjectural names for. It does, however, avoid the arbitrariness of "whichever ones we can cite a name for" dictating which ones get articles and which don't.
 * Don't split any sub-areas: We'd just cover them on the main level articles. Llama's Temple and Temple with Five Doors will be merged with Angry Aztec. This avoids both the arbitrariness and the nameless sub-area precedent. Of course, many of these sub-areas are fairly large and even have different music tracks, so it could be seen as losing something. However, not having articles for DK64 sub-areas isn't that illogical to me. DK64 doesn't have much lore or world-building like Sunshine or Odyssey do, and this is reflected in how the game doesn't really name its sub-areas much, with a lot of the names coming from low-effort guides. Therefore, it's easier to justify not having an article for the Llama's Temple than it would be for Hotel Delfino.
 * Keep the status quo: Is there a valid argument for only having the specific two articles we have now? I really don't see how there could be one.

A list of the sub-areas and which ones have known names is included in the linked discussion page above. Note that the only guides I can reference are Nintendo Power and the Banana Guide, so anything from Prima or other guides is beyond me. If anyone could chime in about these, it would be helpful. Crocodile Isle (Donkey Kong 64), Banana Fairy Island, and K. Lumsy's Prison will not be affected by this proposal. Also, I'm thinking that the Mechanical Piranha (from Gloomy Galleon) should get an article regardless of this proposal's outcome, since it is an active robotic construct and not "just another submap".

Proposer: Deadline: October 10, 2023, 23:59 GMT

Only split named sub-areas

 * 1) Second choice.

Don't split any sub-areas

 * 1) To be honest, this is what I'm leaning towards, for the reasons I've given above and the flaws of both split options. I don't think this would result in bloated level articles either, since the two sub-area articles we do have aren't that long to begin with and many of these areas aren't as big as them.
 * 2) Per proposal.

Miscellaneous
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