Talk:Silent Hill: Shattered Memories/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Hahnchen (talk · contribs) 14:53, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):

   I would probably refactor the lead to have the gameplay better explained, which is currently split up between the two lead paragraphs. If it's first person, then of course the player character is unseen - you should instead just state that they are unidentified until the game's end. I assume that "completion of psychological tests which alter in-game elements while in the first setting" means that the tests in the first setting affect the elements within the second setting. You should make this clearer in the lead.

   I like how you've set out the reception section to focus on individual aspects of the game instead of just listing review quotes. I think you have over emphasised the individual writers over the publications they represent. Reading through this section, you'll come to a reviewer's name, such as Gilbert, and then you'll have to scan back to figure out who he's writing for. Introduce the writer once, but after that, just refer to the publication name. No one really cares that it's Gilbert, but that it's GamesRadar.

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars, etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

   The gameplay screenshot is terrible. It's way too low resolution to show any meaningful information about the games presentation and gameplay. SDTV is 640x480, you could scale that down to a quarter at 320x240 without any scaling artifacts, that would still be way low resolution, but effective enough. I'm unconvinced that the screenshot you've chosen is indicative of the gameplay, I'm expecting an over the shoulder flashlight monster cam shot instead.

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

   A few other issues. Why is the reviews infobox hidden? What does GameRankings give you that Metacritic doesn't already? You don't need two places to give you a near identical overview of the critical reception. No one cares about fan reaction in forums. Why include the Edge and ONM review scores if you never visit their opinion in the text? What are the Milthon awards? I don't think the See Also section is helpful.

   One thing missing, which you probably want for an FA push is sales data - release issues, and that the game turned up in "overlooked" lists suggests that it did poorly commercially - but there was no confirmation of that in the article.

   Despite these minor issues, it passes the Good Article criteria. The points raised above are fairly minor, and they shouldn't take long to fix. As someone who has never bothered with the Silent Hill series, I found the article approachable, interesting and fairly comprehensive. - hahnchen

According to the official site (link provided in the source), the Milthon Awards is an event held in France, where various awards are given to video games. Shattered Memories' award was handed out by the Minister of Culture of France, an important achievement for the game that should be mentioned. Hula Hup (talk) 16:05, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

It's not that it shouldn't be mentioned. It's that you should explain what it is, in the text, or write the article at Milton Award so readers understand the context. - hahnchen 12:15, 19 September 2012 (UTC)

I gave an explanation because I thought you didn't know what it was. Yes, a clarification should be provided in the article. Hula Hup (talk) 21:36, 19 September 2012 (UTC)

I dissent on the removal of the GameRankings scores because the site doesn't have exactly similar scores with Metacritic, so citing only 1 source of aggregate scores could be considered sticking to a point of view, and on the removal of "See also" because I cannot see any plausible reason at all, as its addition is optional and doesn't contravene any policy or hinder the article's reability in any way. About "Reception", I'm not overwhelmingly sure that substituting reviewers' names with the names of the publications they write for is correct because a website or magazine cannot "say" or "dislike" or "criticize", they are not humans; such phrases are very frequent, but wouldn't using people's names be more, let's say, accurate? I don't know. Agree with everything else. Hula Hup (talk) 14:45, 22 September 2012 (UTC)

GameRankings says the same thing that Metacritic do, they do the same thing that Metacritic do. They both aggregate reviews and come up with a composite figure. They may do it slightly differently and have marginally different scores. Readers just want to see an aggregate they can trust, they don't need two, and both GR and Meta are reliable sources. It's a way to make sure that the reception section they're reading follows the critical consensus. I don't mind keeping both when it's an older game, which may have come before the days of Metacritic wide coverage, but in recent games, the two just overlap.

The writers represent the publication that they write for. Whoever wrote the review for Gamespot dictates Gamespot's point of view, their editorial team has approved it. I don't have a problem with introducing the writer, you could argue that for individually notable writers like Charlie Brooker, that their opinion trumps the publication that they write for, but for the vast majority of writers, it should be obvious that people only care about what Tim Turi says, because he's saying it at Game Informer. Regardless of the human/non-human status of publications, they clearly have a voice.

I didn't think the See Also section was useful because it seems difficult to see why those links are as relevant as the links in the text. The first link in the article goes to survival horror which should cover it. Why are those games covered? Why not Amnesia: The Dark Descent for example? - hahnchen 02:22, 23 September 2012 (UTC)

You probably have a point, concerning the notability of the reviewer. The current links in "See also" link to subjects much more closely related to the subject in question, while the link to survival horror's article or links to other genres' articles only provide very general information without focusing on the most emphasised shared characteristic of the subject in question and other similar subjects; the vast majority of horror games feature, for instance, the elements of the flashlight and puzzle solving, but only certain center on combat evasion. Amnesia is a good suggestion and hadn't been added up to now because I didn't know it emphasised combat evasion. Hula Hup (talk) 00:43, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

Hi, Hahnchen! Thank you for taking the time to review, and thank you for your kind words (the format for the reviews was suggested by Maxim in the GAN review of another SH article, so I can't take the credit:) ). I haven't found anything about SHSM's sales, with the exception of the UK sales ranking that another editor noted on the talkpage. But yes, it does look like it didn't do too well, doesn't it? With the exception of the screenshot, which unfortunately I will have to leave to another, more skilled editor to replace, I hope I have addressed your concerns. If not, please tell me. I'm unsure what to do about the "see also" section, however. I understand Hula Hup's reasoning behind it, and yet I also see its limitations. Also, I think it could be cleaned up a little, since one line is basically repeated three times. Rapunzel-bellflower (talk) 18:36, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

The Nintendo Everything article posted on the game's talk page by Lenin and McCarthy is unreliable, I guess, because the source is not contained at all in the project's list of sources, not even as unreliable (when a source isn't mentioned at all it's unreliable, right?). The Eurogamer one posted by Mika1h should be added in "Reception". I've added some more related items in "See also", but I'm open to a removal of the section if we can find a logical reason, though I haven't come up with one by myself up to now. Could you give an example of what you think would be a limitation? What would you suggest to avoid repetition in the descriptions? I've noticed that a dead link previously present in the article has been removed, so I believe these are the remaining tasks before trying A class (gradual ascension is safer, I believe, to avoid a quick fail at FAC, which would be quite bitter, especially after all this nice collective try during the latest months): in "Gameplay", replacement of the image with a better one and provision of a very brief explanation of how the static works (remember that it's a staple of the series along with the flashlight, which is mentioned); in "Reception", provision of refs for some unsourced release dates; and finally, a brave (no, I'm kidding:P) ref clean-up over the whole length of the article to take care of the disgustingly common trouble with the "Work" and "Publisher" fields; the vast majority of the refs are OK, so it'd only take a quite short time. We are getting close!!! Hula Hup (talk) 16:48, 4 October 2012 (UTC)