Metroid Prime hacking research

2015-01-22 02:29:10 pm

I'd recommend against relying on a general purpose metroid wiki as a primary host of this kind of information because wiki politics can be a bit weird and you risk having general purpose editors messing around with things that they shouldn't. You'd probably want a place where at least some of the major people looking into this this have admin rights and thus more control.

MrSinistar

2015-01-22 04:02:33 pm

Quote from TheMG2:

I'd recommend against relying on a general purpose metroid wiki as a primary host of this kind of information because wiki politics can be a bit weird and you risk having general purpose editors messing around with things that they shouldn't. You'd probably want a place where at least some of the major people looking into this this have admin rights and thus more control.

I second that. Admin control is definitely a must. I used to admin the TRON Wiki on Wikia and it can be very annoying when other people mess up your work or plagarize it.

BioSpark

2015-01-22 05:04:04 pm

nate would probably set up a wiki if you pm'd him. might have to ask him on sda though

Aruki

2015-01-22 05:05:55 pm

Yeah, I did PM him on SDA, and I think he's going to set it up for us soon.

embyr_75

2015-01-22 07:10:39 pm

Metroid Wiki

If you could host it right here, that makes the most sense. Let me know if you need help getting it set up from an organizational standpoint.

Aruki

2015-01-22 07:11:53 pm

Organizational help would definitely be welcome. I know what content needs to go on the pages, but I don't necessarily know how it should be laid out, heh. :P

Aruki

2015-01-22 07:32:52 pm

The wiki is up!

embyr_75

2015-01-22 07:43:50 pm

Metroid Wiki

Whoopie!

Aruki

Edit history:

Aruki: 2015-01-22 08:21:21 pm

2015-01-22 08:20:35 pm

I made a page. Yay! Can be expanded on a lot and the layout could probably be fixed up a bit but it's a nice start. Now we just gotta get pages like this up for all the known formats :P

The thing I'm not really sure of is how to handle cases where formats differ between games. Like obviously if it's just a small change, like CMDL from MP1 to MP2, it doesn't really warrant a new page, but if it's basically completely different, like anything in Tropical Freeze, it prolly shouldn't be on the same page...

Also I'm not sure if I can change any of the style/layout stuff, looking into that because it's kinda ugly as is.

embyr_75

2015-01-22 08:27:24 pm

Metroid Wiki

I whipped up a crappy logo for the interim which you may use or dismiss at your discretion.

You could use each file format type as a hub, with the main page (For example: CMDL) outlining its purpose and basic structure, as Retro uses it, and then make the games it's used in headers under which you can leave a {{main}} article-type template with brief paragraphs, which would go to CMDL (Metroid Prime 2: Echoes), CMDL (Metroid Prime), etc etc. I don't think that we should worry about pages not being "warranted" just because differences are small. Documentation is the important bit, even if a little redundant at times, right? Making the Wiki as easy to navigate as possible for someone who stumbles across it should be the main drive in its layout, I'd think...

Also, Wiki discussion may need its own thread. =\

Aruki

Edit history:

Aruki: 2015-01-22 08:31:00 pm

2015-01-22 08:29:52 pm

Quote from embyr_75:

You could use each file format type as a hub, with the main page (For example: CMDL) outlining its purpose and basic structure, as Retro uses it, and then make the games it's used in headers under which you can leave a {{main}} article-type template with brief paragraphs, which would go to CMDL (Metroid Prime 2: Echoes), CMDL (Metroid Prime), etc etc. I don't think that we should worry about pages not being "warranted" just because differences are small. Documentation is the important bit, even if a little redundant at times, right? Making the Wiki as easy to navigate as possible for someone who stumbles across it should be the main drive in its layout, I'd think...

You're making valid points, but I kinda disagree that we shouldn't care about redundancy. Redundant pages mean harder to maintain pages. If someone makes an update to a description somewhere, it doesn't seem reasonable that they should have to make the same changes across multiple pages. I think that might just end up putting people off from wanting to update the Wiki at all and then it'll end up outdated.

Also, that's a nice logo! I'll toss it up if I can figure out how. :P I'm googling and it sounds like you have to modify PHP files to change that stuff, which I don't have access to... Do you have a transparent version?

[quote="embyr_75"]You could use each file format type as a hub, with the main page (For example: CMDL) outlining its purpose and basic structure, as Retro uses it, and then make the games it's used in headers under which you can leave a {{main}} article-type template with brief paragraphs, which would go to CMDL (Metroid Prime 2: Echoes), CMDL (Metroid Prime), etc etc. I don't think that we should worry about pages not being "warranted" just because differences are small. Documentation is the important bit, even if a little redundant at times, right? Making the Wiki as easy to navigate as possible for someone who stumbles across it should be the main drive in its layout, I'd think...[/quote]

You're making valid points, but I kinda disagree that we shouldn't care about redundancy. Redundant pages mean harder to maintain pages. If someone makes an update to a description somewhere, it doesn't seem reasonable that they should have to make the same changes across multiple pages. I think that might just end up putting people off from wanting to update the Wiki at all and then it'll end up outdated.

Also, that's a nice logo! I'll toss it up if I can figure out how. :P I'm googling and it sounds like you have to modify PHP files to change that stuff, which I don't have access to... Do you have a transparent version?

embyr_75

2015-01-22 08:33:34 pm

Metroid Wiki

I'll make one.

Also, I guess the redundancy issue really depends on how many games you want this wiki to eventually cover. If it was just the Trilogy, one page might be sufficient. But so far you're planning on adding DK stuff, and then will there be more growth in the future? I don't really know how small all these differences are and such; I guess all I'm saying is, if it's significant, document it, and do it in such a way that it's easy to find. I HAVE SPOKEN! :P

Aruki

Edit history:

Aruki: 2015-01-22 08:38:09 pm

2015-01-22 08:36:05 pm

Yeah, I'm kinda thinking having something like disambiguation pages that link to more specific pages would work well. It's just a little tricky to try to come up with where the line is that something should be split off into a separate page. DKCR's CMDL, for instance, has a very similar structure to Prime 3's CMDL, but it has tons of differences. That one probably warrants a separate page. Prime 1-3 CMDL, on the other hand, are all rather similar, with the only real differences being on materials (which will probably get a separate page anyway).

embyr_75

2015-01-22 08:51:14 pm

Metroid Wiki

As more pages go up I'm sure you'll figure out what works for you and what doesn't and it'll naturally develop. :)

Antidote

2015-01-22 09:00:26 pm

Ooooh, I like that logo, makes me glad we went with Retro Modding

embyr_75

2015-01-22 09:02:58 pm

Metroid Wiki

If I could've found the font Retro used for their logo that would've been even better...

Antidote

2015-01-22 09:11:20 pm

Eh, it's pretty close, did you try using a font detection site?

Aruki

2015-01-22 09:27:19 pm

It's not really close at all, but it's not really important, looks fine anyway IMO.

If you wanna go with a more Metroidy font though, you could look up Zero Threes. It's extremely close to the font used in the Metroid Prime series.