The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was  delete. In making this decision, I have had to consider the reliability of the sources, if they are not reliable, the verifiability requirements have not been met. The issue over the online reviews makes up most of the discussion. What appears clear to me is that the reviews are written by gamers. While I have every reason to believe that those reviews represent a sincere view of that gamer, it represents only one person's opinion. If the person is a noted expert, this may be forgiven, but in this case we have no information on the reviewer's credentials. I therefore find that the reviews must be considered self-published though hosted on an external website, pretty much along the lines of book reviews on Amazon.com. Such material may usually not source articles, save for a narrow range of exemptions; even then the article cannot rely on such sources exclusively. Concerning the awards, "user voted awards" (that is, awarded by those who choose to participate rather than by professionals) can be a notable achievement (many TV contests are decided in that manner), but when the voting pool is limited to a relatively small group on a website, the award will most likely not qualify. Because all the sources the article relies on fail to meet reliability criteria, I am closing this discussion with a "delete" result. Sjakkalle (Check!) 13:50, 1 February 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Shaiya[edit]

Shaiya (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log • AfD statistics)
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Article deleted numerous times over last few years, always recreated soon afterwards. Just before it was deleted the last time I issued a challenge to the article's editors to find even one reliable source giving the topic significant coverage, a challenge that went unheeded. Needs deleting per WP:N and salting to prevent its recreation again. GDallimore (Talk) 13:23, 16 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Game has been relaunched as far as I know and is on the rise (user wise). The article needs tidying up for sure, but is of some relevance to Wikipedia. - mtr4 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mtr4 (talk • contribs) 13:42, 16 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]

So at the moment, I'd be looking at a redirect to the developer or publisher, per WP:PRODUCT, and writing a little about it there. Marasmusine (talk) 19:56, 17 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  Sandstein  06:35, 24 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
  • See the reliable sources guideline for exactly what is being asked for - something like this article from Eurogamer, basically. The likes of MMOsite etc. (the ones who consistently have anything on these games at all) are not up to the journalistic standard of the likes of sites which cover PC or console games in general, who in turn do not have the time to review a fraction of the MMOGs available. Massively is another example, as part of the Weblogs, Inc. stable, which is itself part of AOL, it's a lot closer to a 'reliable source' for use on WP than say some random self-published MMOG site. Even then, Massively does a lot of press-release parroting, anything truly useful would come from a piece where the writer actually takes the time to investigate and form an opinion. The whole problem with coverage of MMOs boils down to there not being enough days in the hour for journalists to cover them, once the copy-and-paste MMOG industry really cranked up it became impossible and as a result coverage is totally random. Someoneanother 22:23, 27 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Why GameSpot, GameDaily and GameZone are unreliable? They are websites, specifically dedicated to video games, just like the mentioned Eurogamer. I can't understand why a player review is unreliable. And the fact that the game was featured on GameTrailers just adds more notability. As long as we don't have criteria for video games, general principles should be applied. WP:RS allows the usage of reliable non-academic sources in such areas. Or we need to dig for non-existing academia? Brand[t] 06:04, 28 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
  • Player reviews are self-published sources from random gamers, that they're probably passed through a word-filter before being posted on GameSpot etc. doesn't change that, I could go and write one tomorrow after spending a few hours playing Shaiya. It's no different than anyone showing up to a game article, inserting their own opinion and adding a footnote "cos I said so". That falls afoul of verifiability, which is a hell of a lot more serious than the notability guideline. Game Daily, GameSpot and GameZone are reliable sources, certainly, but the pages you've found are not articles, reviews or anything which contains any kind of neutral/analytical info to actually use to build the article. A couple of articles like the Eurogamer one I linked to alone are the basis of a solid article, a hundred like this would not verify anything more than can be found from the game's homepage. These are just copy-pasted or typed up details, stuck on a game listing page to give the illusion that the site's actually actively covering that game. It's a hollow promise. They're not the analysis of gameplay and journalistic opinions needed to actually write a neutral article, have a reception section etc. Someoneanother 06:46, 28 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I think you misunderstand WP:SELFPUBLISH. Such sources are created by the author him(her)self or paid for the creation. The sources like GameSpot and GameZone are independent, although I withdraw Game Daily reference as extremely short. And who is more qualified to review the video games other than gamers? IT experts, law professors or some other guys? A reviewer of any authoritative game magazine is a gamer, more or less. In this case the independent coverage is not striking, but it exists. Brand[t] 08:05, 28 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
No, I'm pointing out that there is no practical difference in terms of WP:RS between someone posting a review on their personal blog, GeoCities etc. page or on YouTube than there is posting a user review on a game site. By definition it remains a user review, not an article by a journalist, they are labelled as user reviews to distance them from pieces written by the site's staff and they are not subject to anything like the same level of editorial control. User reviews such as that are routinely removed during clean-up of video game, film and music articles. As far as who is most qualified, video game journalists, which is what video game articles are built from. The journalists are gamers, but only a handful of gamers are journalists. If you're unconvinced then I'd encourage you to bring this up at the reliable sources noticeboard, where someone more articulate than me can discuss it with you. Someoneanother 11:33, 28 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I think any detailed review on such sites as GameSpot is useful in establishing a threshold for inclusion. Btw, GameSpot's rating is used in Quake III Arena, Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots and several other games. Some registered long-time users on such sites may actually produce good info. I have also found GameStats and GameFAQs references for Shaiya: [9] and [10]. And the fact that Shaiya is a free-to-play MMORPG boosts its popularity to some extent. Brand[t] 16:23, 28 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
There's nothing wrong with GameSpot as a source when it comes from GameSpot's staff. Player reviews are just player reviews; using them is no different from just inserting your own opinions into the article. GameStats is incorrect in this case. It's not a review from GameSpot, it's a view from a GameSpot user. It even says as much in the URL. Look to the right of that review at the section that says "GameSpot Score". "N/A". "No Rating". GameSpot did not review the game. You can also confirm that from the GameFAQs link, which always includes a link to the GameSpot review if it exists. It doesn't. And it provides no links to other reviews provided by the GameRankings review aggregator either. Neither GameStats nor GameRankings lists any reviews. I just checked Metacritic and there weren't any listed there either (Metacritic doesn't have a page for the game). There are no reviews correctly listed on the most popular game review aggregation sites, and the other sources you've provided don't appear to meet Wikipedia's standards for reliable sources. They certainly prove its existence, but that's not the issue here. I know it exists; I've even played it. We're debating whether it's notable, and without any significant coverage by reliable sources it isn't. Reach Out to the Truth 19:33, 28 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Judging by the box to the left on GameStats, Shaiya received a press score of 10 and a gamer score of 8.0 (overall 8.8), while GameFAQ indicates 8.0 (from 20 users). Besides, right now I've spotted a quite detailed reviews at IGN ([11]) and MMORPG Reviews ([12]). A review at Examiner.com could be left aside because the website is blacklisted on Wikipedia, but that would suffice for inclusion, I think. Brand[t] 22:39, 28 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
The press score of 10 comes from the 9.5 GameSpot review. I'm not sure how they got a 10 out of a single 9.5 score, but that's not important since the GameSpot review isn't valid anyway. The IGN reviews are user reviews as well, so they're not acceptable either. I'm not familiar with MMORPG Reviews, but it doesn't look like something we'd accept as a reliable source. Reach Out to the Truth 12:26, 29 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
The fact is that the game is ranked at all of those sources (albeit I have learned that GameStats is IGN's subsidiary). I believe the users's score at GameSpot and IGN are important, especially when the staff's score is absent. The advantage of the users' voting is that multiple people express their opinion, whereas the staff's rating may come from one or two persons. Brand[t] 14:06, 29 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
If the staff of a site have not posted a review, then no review from that site should be used at all. There is no peer review process, no editorial oversight. Anyone can post a review on those sites, and have them published immediately without anyone so much as looking at them. You may like user reviews — I like to use them too sometimes — but they're not reliable by Wikipedia's standards. Reach Out to the Truth 03:41, 30 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
The staff may not rate the game because of three reasons: it did not notice, it 'forgot' that or it did not find that worthy. In the last case there is no disputing about tastes — one may disregard some game, whereas several others adore it. As long as there is no scientific stuff here, material from reliable non-academic sources may also be used in these areas, particularly if it appears in respected mainstream publications as per WP:SOURCES (in this case GameSpot, GameFAQ, GameZone and IGN, which are not questioned). We have both rankings and reviews, that is a verifiable objective evidence per WP:NRVE, which is better than nothing. Brand[t] 08:28, 30 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
The user-written reviews on GameSpot and IGN are not subject to editorial oversight, and therefore unusable. If there's no stopping me, a visitor to the site, from registering and submitting some convincing comments and a score despite having never played the game (except I have, but you know what I mean), then we're missing the "reputation for accuracy and fact-checking" caveat of the verifiability policy. Marasmusine (talk) 08:58, 30 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
It's their policy to allow users to rate and review the games and I don't believe, that the scores and reviews generally come from the persons, who never played the related game. As long as such reliable sources permit that, especially when there's no staff's feedback, the users' reception may constitute a threshold for inclusion and could be mentioned in the article. Such reception comes from a much wider audience, than some particular staff, which consists from a limited number of persons. Brand[t] 13:58, 30 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
If you're saying we can examine at the overall response of users then we have original synthesis. If you want to just cite the average user score, this is not significant coverage. If you're saying we can cite a specific, unchecked user review, then we have an unreliable source. Marasmusine (talk) 10:31, 31 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I ignore such assumptions, add the Aeria Games newsletter, which confirms that Shaiya received the title of Best MMORPG of 2007 (which is the first award given to AG) and 2007 Readers Choice Award for Best Graphics by MMOSite: [13]. So I see no formal violation of general notability criteria to justify the deletion. Brand[t] 11:54, 31 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Nothing that can't be cited at the proposed redirect target (if the awards are indeed notable). There's still not enough coverage to justify a seperate article. Marasmusine (talk) 19:52, 31 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
What do you mean? Just click 'Shaiya' in the content box there. And how the Best MMORPG of 2007 could be a non-notable distinction? Brand[t] 07:55, 1 February 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Depends who awarded it. Having found the award, I see it was user voted and therefore not contributory to notability IMO. I don't know enough about the site to know if any award from GameBorder.com could contribute to notability - that's up to someone from the relevant gaming wikiproject to decide. Also, IAR doesn't apply here in my opinion because I do not see how having an article on a topic that has not had sufficient reliable coverage to write a detailed and balanced article can improve wikipedia. That was my motivation for the nomination in the first place. GDallimore (Talk) 10:52, 1 February 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Sorry for the intrusion again, but what exactly is the definition of 'enough coverage'? Liu Tao (talk) 20:11, 31 January 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]

The sources must provide "enough coverage" that detailed information about the game can be extracted from the source in order to be able to write an article. Something that merely identifies that the game exists is not significant coverage. Something that essentially copies and pastes the description of the game from the game website or from a press release is not significant (independent) coverage. GDallimore (Talk) 10:52, 1 February 2010 (UTC)Reply[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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