Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Journey (2012 video game)/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Ian Rose 14:28, 30 January 2013 [1].

Journey (2012 video game)

Journey (2012 video game) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

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Nominator(s): PresN 06:47, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hi all, it's been a while but I'm back again with another indie video game. Back in 2010/2011 I got the other games by this studio (as well as the studio itself) to FA-class, and I'm here to make the attempt with their latest. Here is Journey, which is no stretch to say is the indie video game darling of 2012- it's currently cleaning up in awards, beating out games with a hundred times its budget to win game of the year accolades, and with the first video game soundtrack to be nominated for a Grammy. I've tried very hard to ensure that this article is up to the same standards as my other featured articles, and I look forward to your comments. Thanks for reviewing! --PresN 06:47, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Story really needs to go before Gameplay in this case if they remain worded the same. I read the gameplay section and I had no idea what else is there besides the desert/sand. Rereading it after story actually made more sense. I guess I'm wondering why does one need to run/jump/levitate or care about the scarf if there aren't any actual obstacles described (I'm guessing mobs can't kill you). Is it just to make progress faster? —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 15:02, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Well, in general story never goes before gameplay, so I think it's more that the gameplay section isn't clear enough on it's own. There's no obstacles that can kill you per se, but if you need to cross a long ravine, for example, you need to create a bridge. I've address most of your concerns above, except clearing up the gameplay section/gameplay bit in the lead- I'll need to think on that for a bit first. --PresN 21:48, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Alright, I've played with it a bit, let me know what you think. I think the issue was that I was saying that you could walk "throughout" the level, and that the scarf lets you "fly", when really I meant that you were able to walk, and that the scarf lets you float- you can move horizontally, so you "fly", but you're not superman with unlimited vertical movement. I've tried to be a bit more explicit that the path through the levels is gated by obstacles that you need to sing and fly/float your way through. --PresN 22:14, 27 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Source review - spotchecks not done

  • Fixed the discrepancy, and thesixthaxis, while not the world's biggest site, is a commercial site with editors. The interview in question with Austin Wintory is linked from Wintory's website, indicating that it is a valid interview and not made up or embellished. The source is not used for thesixthaxis's opinions or facts, only Wintory's comments. --PresN 00:27, 28 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

More comments from Hellknowz:

  • "Journey has achieved both critical and commercial success" -- what is "critical success"?
  • Commercial success is success with commerce (sales), critical success is success with critics (reviews) - this is a very common phrase to describe this. --PresN 19:53, 16 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I know what it means; I just cringe when I read it all the time. To me, that's like saying "emotional success" and meaning "emotes". But I'm nitpicking since this is like the top 10 phrase in reception sections. —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 20:25, 16 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Overall the language and sentence structure is a bit more complex than it usually is in articles or needs to be. Personally, I don't find it hard to read, so that's not a big deal.
  • "Reviewers were laudatory" - reviews were, not reviewers? I'm not sure of this, but it doesn't seem right.
  • Reviewers write reviews, and as people can have emotions. Reviews, as words, cannot. It's the same was as we write that "Joe blah of GS praised x" rather than "The GS review praised x". --PresN 19:53, 16 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Right, I guess I'm wrong about what exactly it means. I went by "expressing or containing praise" definition, which I then read as all reviewers are praisers, instead of their reviews for this particular game having praise. I guess I'm nitpicking because it's an adjective on reviewers themselves as opposed to just "Reviewers lauded...". P.S. Merriam Webster uses "The play received mostly laudatory reviews." —  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 20:25, 16 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I might be a little biased, but I liked my wording better. ;) Plus, now it says, "Reviewers were especially pleased with the emotional experience of playing the game, especially with other players." —Torchiest talkedits 21:06, 16 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
"particularly" now. I liked it too, I'm just now worried about using words like "effusive" and "laudatory" when I'm already straight-facedly using quotes like "occasionally startling power"- I do have a tendency to make my reception sections love notes to the game with my word choice and sentence structure if I'm not careful. --PresN 22:01, 16 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

—  HELLKNOWZ  ▎TALK 10:12, 15 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by Torchiest

My first set of comments are about prose issues.

  • In the gameplay section: "While all of the figures generally look the same, individual players can be told apart by the unique symbols displayed on their robes and shown when they sing."
    This wording is confusing, because it could be read as "individual players can be told apart by the unique symbols displayed on their robes" and "individual players can be shown when they sing". It's also a bit confusing as to what the difference between the symbols being displayed on the robes versus being shown when the player sings is, exactly. Do the symbols float in the air when the player sings? It feels like a detail clarifying this part is missing.
  • In the development section's raw text: "Thatgamecompany, however, always expected needing an extension, as they believed that finishing the game within a year was "unrealistic"."
    Is that referenced somewhere, and would it possible to say which employee of the company said it?
  • Same section: "A PlayStation Home game space based on Journey was released on March 14, 2012 and is similar in appearance to the game."
    I didn't know what a game space was, so I clicked the link. The list article didn't really help me out, so I clicked through to the Home article and found the game space section there, which made it clear. Can you figure out a way to either briefly explain the concept or improve the linkage? I thought about changing the game space link to point to the subsection of the Home article, but that seemed redundant, since it's linked immediately in front of the list link. Also, game space is capitalized in the other articles; which is correct?
  • In the music section: "the music would dynamically tie in to the actions and sound effects of the player".
    This is a bit confusing. What does "sound effects" refer to, exactly?

I copy edited the article, but generally, the prose was already very good. I'll do a source spot check later. —Torchiest talkedits 18:28, 15 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm starting to spotcheck sources.

  • I've gone through the entire gameplay section, and everything there looks okay, except for the part about the larger creatures ripping the scarf. I can't find that in any of the five sources used in the section, although I admit I'm just using search for individual words like "scarf" and "creature" to skim them all. —Torchiest talkedits 13:54, 17 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • I couldn't actually find a (reliable) source that explicitly stated that the creatures ripped the scarf; the closest I got was the source for that sentence, "scarf... which can be cut short as well as grown", and I felt noting that it was the creatures that were the proximate cause was not stepping out into original research- the source for those few words, in this case, is the game itself- there's no editorial opinion involved, as creature hits you, scarf goes away. --PresN 21:04, 17 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • In the development section: "Development ended up taking even longer than anticipated, as the team had difficulties paring down their ideas for the game and maintaining efficient communication as the team expanded from seven to eighteen people." I'm not seeing the second half of this supported in the source. I see one source saying they started with seven people, the official site saying there were eighteen people (if you don't include the president) on team, and I see Hunicke talking about communication problems in larger teams, but to me, it looks like WP:SYNTH to put all those bits together. —Torchiest talkedits 14:13, 17 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Delegate comment -- Correct me if I'm wrong but looks to me like all support (pretty well all reviews in fact) come from gamers; that's great for expert opinion but I'll want to see comment from outside that fraternity to help ensure the article is accessible to the wider audience. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:37, 27 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comments – The good news is that I went through the text and found it fairly easy to comprehend. The bad news is that I found some lingering prose issues, which should be addressed before promotion occurs.

  • Don't see a reason to have two Thatgamecompany links in the lead.
  • Gameplay: Since jargon issues have been requested, perhaps you could link analog stick or point out that the stick is on the PlayStation 3 controller, as in "either with the PlayStation 3 controller's analog stick" or similar.
  • Redundancy here: "When two players finish a section together they remain together...". Hard to find different wording, but one of the "together"s should be changed so there aren't two in four words.
  • "The game takes about two or three hours to complete a playthrough." Not sure if "to complete a playthrough" is FA-level writing. Maybe "to complete from the start" would be better?
  • Story: "The player is then shown the game's credits, playing over the ending cinematics showing a shooting star emanating from the crevice and traversing the path the traveler took through the ruins and catching glimpses of other robed characters headed towards the mountain." This strikes me as a bit of a run-off. Try making the items from the cinematics part of a separate sentence.
  • "where the game started, and the player is given the option of starting the game again." Two uses of "start"/"starting"; changing one to "begin"/"beginning" would fix this redundancy.
  • Development: "and was replaced as producer by Robin Hunicke." Since we already say the prior producer didn't come back, the "as producer" is not needed here. It's clear enough from the context that Hunicke was taking that role.
  • "Thatgamecompany, however, always expected needing an extention." The "however" isn't needed, and seeing as it has been much-criticized at FAC lately, you should probably remove it.
  • "The stress of the project lead to the feeling...". "lead" → "led"?
  • Contraction needs removal: "couldn't".
  • Music: "with the game's sound designer Steve Johnson". Comma needed before the name. Or you could remove "the game's" before this, if you want to limit the number of commas.
  • I don't believe that collapsable tables in-text meet MoS recommendations, as they cannot be printed well by the readers. Not sure what can be done about this, but the table doesn't look big enough to cause problems if uncollapsed.
  • Not true, it turns out- screen readers have no problem with collapsible wikitables, and the MOS has said nothing about that since 2010. What it does say is that collapsed sections might have issues if javascript is disabled; however, collapsible wikitables are properly designed to not have this issue, and I've verified that if you turn off javascript the table simply converts to a regular table with no show/hide option. --PresN 22:20, 28 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Reception: "The game at release became the fastest-selling game to date...". This would be a less clunky read as "After its release, it became the fastest-selling game to date...".
  • Repeated IGN and GameSpot links in this section should be removed.

Giants2008 (Talk) 01:41, 28 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Replied in-line, thanks for reviewing! --PresN 22:20, 28 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

CommentsSupport taking a look now. I think we're in the black as far as prose goes. I tightened up the lead a bit, but otherwise found no prose clangers as such. Queries below: Casliber (talk · contribs) 01:21, 29 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

You might wanna just check my tweaks - the lead I felt just needed a bit of reworking to tighten it and make it as engaging as possible. Casliber (talk · contribs) 01:37, 29 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]


The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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