MarioWiki:Proposals

Writing guidelines
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New features
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Removals
None at the moment.

Clean up latest appearances for crossover characters
Currently, the way we handle the latest appearance section on infoboxes for crossover characters in certain cases is a bit awkward. If the character's latest appearance is in a game that is a crossover with the Mario franchise, that game is listed alongside their latest appearance within their series. For characters who have not had installments in their series before a crossover installment, this becomes a bit awkward and we list both. Since I've probably lost you by this point, I'll provide some examples: (On an odd note, Banjo doesn't do this - maybe because his first appearance overall was Diddy Kong Racing? Not quite sure here)
 * Captain Falcon lists both F-Zero Climax (2004) alongside Super Smash Bros. Ultimate as his latest appearance.
 * Samus and Ridley list both Metroid: Samus Returns (2017) alongside Ultimate as their latest appearance.
 * Pit and Palutena list both Kid Icarus: Uprising (2012) alongside Ultimate as their latest appearance.
 * Little Mac lists both Doc Louis's Punch-Out!! (2009) alongside a cameo in Luigi's Mansion 3 as his latest appearance.

This seems very odd to me because those crossover installments ARE their latest appearance, yet somehow it's treated as "lesser" solely because of its connection to the Mario series. This is especially awkward when we're dealing with "dead" franchises like F-Zero where the other "latest appearance" predates their true latest appearance by over a decade. Therefore, I propose that we remove these older games from the infobox solely in cases where the crossover installment in question was released after these games. Aside from Smash, this would probably affect a majority of our Sonic characters thanks to Rio 2020's very recent release. Characters who have since appeared in other games in their own series after the release of these crossover installments, such as Link and Kirby, would be unaffected by this proposal.

Frankly, I almost confused myself writing this, so if you have any questions please let me know in the comments.

Proposer: Deadline: November 13, 2019, 23:59 GMT

Support

 * 1) Per proposal.
 * 2) - Per proposal.
 * 3) Per proposal.
 * 4) Per proposal, which is also per all.

Oppose

 * 1) Honestly, I think it's fine the way it is. We're separating their appearances in their original franchises from their crossover appearances, regardless of the time difference between their latest appearances. Captain Falcon's last appearance in his own franchise was back in 2004. Most of the time, crossovers are their own franchises, so it still makes sense to list them separately. Smash Ultimate is Captain Falcon's latest appearance as a whole, but it's in a completely different series than F-Zero. Personally speaking, it makes sense to me. Though to speak for Banjo, as he did split off from Diddy Kong Racing, it's probably better to add his franchise into the mix as well, especially since he's now a third party character. In any case, I feel the current situation is fine the way it is.
 * 2) Disagree to change anything.

Comments
@Tails777: I don't see why what franchise it is matters. What's your opinion on Kirby, who currently lists his latest appearance outside of crossovers as Link's Awakening for the Switch? No mention of the Kirby series there. Fox, Falco, and Wolf also list their latest non-crossover appearance as Starlink: Battle for Atlas, which isn't even a Star Fox game, but features the characters anyway exclusively on the Switch version. If we can neglect mentioning the Kirby/Star Fox franchises in those cases since their latest appearance in those franchises aren't actually their latest appearance, what's the big deal doing it for Smash/Mario & Sonic/any other Mario-relevant content? Are we really going to treat those games as "inferior" in some way just because they happen to be related to the franchise that this wiki is about? That doesn't make sense to me at all. -- 16:10, November 6, 2019 (EST)
 * Hmm, yeah, I see what you're getting at now. That is a bit of a tricky situation. I had two thoughts on solutions, though one isn't really correct and the other may make things look messier; my first thought would be to focus on the characters original franchise rather than dating their appearance in another different one, but that would end up leading to false information. My second thought was to simply add their latest appearance as a whole while retaining the latest appearance in their original franchises, but that would probably be a bit much. While I still disagree on removing an appearance in the home franchise that predates current crossover appearances, as I still stand by the whole original franchise thing, I can't truly speak for cases like Kirby and Fox, who's latest appearances aren't from their own franchises. Overall, I don't exactly know what to do in those cases.

@FanOfYoshi: That sounds like a really weak vote to me. Do you have any reasons why you don't think it should be changed? -- 12:15, November 12, 2019 (EST)

Lemme see if I have this right: You want to remove non-Smash latest appearances from the infoboxes if they are crossovers themselves, keep things just to their own series above and a Mario-related game below? I don't think any games are "inferior", but doing it that way, "latest" would be an inaccurate term. 12:31, November 12, 2019 (EST)
 * No, this would only affect characters where their "latest" appearance outside of a Mario-related crossover is not actually their latest appearance, like the examples listed in the proposal. So characters like Captain Falcon, whose "latest appearance" outside of these crossovers predates it by 14 years, would only show Smash Ultimate, while characters like Link and Kirby who have been in other games released since those crossovers are unaffected. Basically, the point of this proposal is to get rid of outdated latest appearances. Think Banjo and Kazooie, who for whatever reason already follow what I want to establish in this proposal and only list Ultimate in their infoboxes because that's the most recent game they appear in. -- 12:35, November 12, 2019 (EST)
 * Aaaand I just reread your comment and realized I misread it. Whoops. I have no intention of removing the Smash games from the infobox. As far as I care, they're just as related to the Mario franchise as other crossovers like Mario & Sonic are. What this proposal would do is remove games from their original franchise (or in awkward cases like the Star Fox characters currently, non-Mario games in general) from latest appearance in cases where that game is not actually their latest appearance. In most cases for affected characters, this would mean keeping only Super Smash Bros. Ultimate in their latest appearance section. -- 12:43, November 12, 2019 (EST)

I know it's a bit late in the proposal for this, but I have created an example of the proposed changes in my sandbox if anyone's still confused. -- 13:46, November 12, 2019 (EST)

Miscellaneous
None at the moment.