Moving Controller and Emulator/Emulation pages to "Controller:ControllerName", "Emulation:ConsoleName", etc?

[Nicereddy 109]

Some examples:

• Emulation:Xbox 360
• Emulation:GameCube
• Emulation:Wii
• Controller:DualShock 3
• Controller:Xbox 360 Controller

We already have pages for these, but they're not very well upkept and are fairly unorganized. I was interested in making boxes for Emulation and Controllers, similar to the current DRM navigation box we have right now, but wanted to see if I could get this organized first. I didn't want to make these changes until I had a consensus on whether or not such a thing was appropriate. "Controller:" would be used for controllers, "Emulation:" for pages about specific consoles, and "Emulator:" for pages about specific emulators. We've already implemented something similar for pages like "Developer:Valve Software" and "Engine:Source", so I think it'd be fine to use this for organization purposes.

 

We've talked previously about improving our Emulator/Emulation pages, but nothing has come out of it thus far. Just wanted to see if I could kickstart a new discussion.

 

I'd also suggest we merge pages like "Dolphin Emulator" into the respective game consoles it supports, I don't think having pages for specific emulators is a good idea right now, considering we're barely able to upkeep the console pages.

[Garrett 215]

Having one page per console makes sense since there are only a few active emulators for each console.

 

Consoles that have no viable emulator (able to run commercial games) probably don't need their own pages since they would never have any useful information. Those consoles could be covered on the general emulation page.

 

It might be useful to have the game layout and templates on emulator pages since emulators can force some of these features but they aren't always obvious (e.g. Project64 can run Nintendo 64 games in widescreen and even multi-monitor resolutions through an obscure option that is hidden by default).

[Mirh 103]

I think pcsx2 (the playstation 2 emulator) would be an exception.

It has lots of hacks, fixes and things everybody could stumble on

 

Atm I can't take a decision about Emulation:, Hardware:, or Controller:

 

..but a general page for emulation could be a good idea to begin. We could mention for example that they are already working on ps3 and x360 emulation, just for reference

[Nicereddy 109]

What about instead of doing several separate namespaces, having a single "Hardware" one.

 

Anyway, I'm all for moving stuff that's not games out of the main namespace. But when we're doing this, I'd like us to start with full form use, to simplify it in the long term.

I think "Hardware" may be too broad. "Emulation" doesn't really fit under the Hardware category. At the same time though, one could argue that something like the Oculus doesn't fit under "Controller". I think it'd be okay to create "Hardware" for our GPU pages, etc. (which are currently also fairly underused), "Controller" for a generic namespace to put input devices, and "Emulation" for emulators/emulation of specific consoles. As for my logic in using "Controller", it's really just that it sounds better than "Input Device".

 

I'd definitely support the use of forms for this, it'd make everything a lot easier.

 

I think pcsx2 (the playstation 2 emulator) would be an exception.

It has lots of hacks, fixes and things everybody could stumble on

I think, even in that case, we could just list only that emulator on the PS2 page (since I'm assuming it's the most used and upkept?). There's not much else to put on a page about consoles other than their emulators so I still think it'd be preferable to keep them joined together.

[Mirh 103]

Actually, pcsx2 is the ONLY ps2 emulator.. so merging it in the ps2 page would be wise

 

And btw, how should we manage different vendors for every hardware piece?

Are we going to follow the trend used for graphics card with a different article for every part manufacturer?

An Asus soundcards page would be nice to mention unofficial fantastic drivers exist for them, for example. But then.. I was thinking there wouldn't be so much thing to write down and the page would be rellay strip off.

Creative soundcards on the other way have lots of relative problems-fixes and we would certainly need a specific page

 

But then how to deal with Via or realtek audio chips? The pages would be only a link to driver section

*really thoughtful*

[Nicereddy 109]

Progress update on this, with the help of Soeb I've moved all the emulation pages over to the "Emulation" namespace and am in the (admittedly slow) process of moving controller pages over as well. They're currently non-existant but I have them saved on my desktop and backed up in "The Cloud" just in case. I want to make sure that all of them are using a similar format so that we can have a clean Controller section moving forward.

 

For a list of the Emulation pages that exist/will exist in the near future, see the Emulation page.

 

For the same with regards to Controllers, see the Controllers page.

 

I'm trying to learn a bit about making templates for Wikis so that I can make proper infoboxes specific to these use-cases, etc. but I haven't had as much time as I'd like lately.

 

Does anyone have any suggestions? I'd prefer as much feedback now as possible, rather than once all the pages are up and we have to change them all for every minor update.