Forum:Multiple Characters by Era or Game?

For characters who appear in multiple eras, should we differentiate by era or game? By this, I mean should it be differentiated by:
 * Era
 * No parentheses
 * (G.U.)
 * (LINK)

or


 * Game
 * (R:1)
 * (R:2)
 * (R:X)

I've noticed we have a mix, an example being Aura, Aura (R:2), and Aura (LINK). Or how about Natsume, Natsume (G.U.) and Natsume (LINK). Or maybe Cubia (R:1), Cubia (R:2) and then Cubia (LINK). Kulaguy 01:43, March 11, 2010 (UTC)

I vote Era. That way it would much more obviously incorporate all medias from that era such as mangas and animes. --Rpg 01:55, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * I vote eras, too. games can be misleading as if they appear merely in that game or as if it's an article about a noncanon parody of another character. It may also help to put a different eras template at the top of the page.
 * Example: or something. I can't code, but basically the message could be: "As Aura appears in three distinct eras of the series, she has three different articals: r1, r2....ect." characters missing from an era could simply have "no appearance" under said era.
 * --Falcon At 02:02, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * Whoops. I guess I wasn't clear. Era means of course Project .hack, GU, and then LINK. Game means versions of The World, that being R:1, R:2, and R:X. Personally, I prefer era. Kulaguy 02:08, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * Then I'd say era still, BUT, I don't think we need to go adding tags to the Project .hack era articles. For example, the Aura pages would be Aura, Aura (GU) and Aura (LINK). --Rpg 02:14, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * I wholeheartedly agree. That's why I said no parentheses for Project .hack up there. I hate having parentheses in a page title. Kulaguy 02:19, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * Wait, I'm confused, what are you voting for? Revision era (and the more logical one) or Kulaguy's era (G.U. isn't an era, it's a game. don't you mean conglomorate? And isn't Link technically part of that project? Also, is it LINK or Link?)--Falcon At 02:16, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * G.U. is an era. It's also called Project G.U., but having (Conglomerate) on a page would be dumb if (G.U.) gives off the same meaning. LINK is technically part of Conglomerate, but it is still recognized as a separate era from G.U. and Project .hack. You would agree, correct? That's why having it GU and LINK would be better than naming GU "Conglomerate". Kulaguy 02:19, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * Still, think about the borderline cases: ChupChopCase. It's Project G.U, but it's set in R:1; EotT(N) is in Projct G.U. but before even R:1. I'm not going to argue for conglomorate anyway, thus agreeing to the previous statement will not damper my argument.--Falcon At 02:46, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * Era. Definitely Era. --Rpg 02:19, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * I think I'm gonna have to go with Era, as it makes more sense. Games is how I have it on the sidebar, but then I went and put the Epitaph of Twilight novel in the "R:2" section, which don't make a lick of sense. I only sorted it into R:'s because I wanted three separate ears, and separating into Project .hack / .hack Conglomerate didn't work (as LINK is part of Conglomerate). But I guess I'm willing to go with (no parenthesis) / (G.U.) / (LINK). Should I go ahead and make the changes on the sidebar?--OtakuD50 02:24, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * Why would you put EotT in the R:2 section? It's not in any of the revisions, thus exempt. Besides, the revisions unify them better than the name of the revision's representitive game. --Falcon At 02:39, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * Except that "LINK" isn't just a game, and neither is "GU" (I still refer to that era as the "Project GU" era and not ".hack Conglomerate"). The EoT thing is mainly me not knowing anything about it. I don't consider there being nearly enough info in there for me to make any judgments regarding sorting it, but I had to put it somewhere. Anyway, there's also stuff like the Terminal Disk, which is technically somewhere in between, but also mostly during R:1 if you think about it, but it definitely fits in with R:2. Thus, I think going with G.U. makes much more sense, currently.--OtakuD50 02:45, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * And RPG proves LINK is the 3rd era. Kulaguy 02:46, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * almost made me wet myself...........does that mean that LINK=the end is a lie! Whatever. This page is hectic. I'm going to OCD this page.--Falcon At 02:51, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * From what I heard, LINK was the last game of the series. That doesn't mean they can't make more manga/anime/novels. Kulaguy 02:52, March 11, 2010 (UTC)

I go for era... Because if there are no era, Game wouldn't be born. Tepellin 02:21, March 18, 2010 (UTC)

For eras/projects/generations (blank, G.U. LINK....the mysterious 4G....

 * It makes our shorts tight, I guess....someone please post an argument.--Falcon At 03:12, March 12, 2010 (UTC)


 * We'll adjust with whatever we see, however we should split by era and make pages according to the nature of the set. It might end like the epitaph (novel) pages. Outlaw630 03:18, March 12, 2010 (UTC)

For Revisions of the World (Pre R:1, R:1, R:2, R:X, ect.)

 * Favors the timeframe of the character over real-time. Seriously, just because Elk appears in G.U. (and LINK's CCC) as Elk doesn't mean he's going around devoting his neverending affection to Haseo, who hasn't even made a character yet. Also, it helps with in game terms, skills weapons, items, ect. by showing which game they're for. --Falcon At 03:02, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't understand this. Simply put, just put a link to Endrance, Elk LINK and Endrance LINK on the Elk article. Kulaguy 03:22, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * What I mean here is that the revision type supports the timeline within the games rather than a CC2 agenda.--Falcon At 03:42, March 11, 2010 (UTC)


 * Projects can be misleading as if they appear merely in that game or as if it's an article about a noncanon parody of another character. --Falcon At 03:02, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * Umm... what I said above. Kulaguy 03:22, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * I see no correlation. You were not clear before, but that's not what I was arguing about. people off google will see LINK or G.U. and think instantly, "duh....where do you find that character. I want Nanase in my party!"--Falcon At 03:28, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * Seriously? We have a Party Member infobox for Kite, Haseo, and soon Tokio. I don't see how this is relevant. Any idiot could read the page and find out that she doesn't join. Kulaguy 03:32, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * You know, your right. there are infoboxes....at the bottom of the page. Besides, knock on wood. It will happen eventually. In a different tangent, would somebody come up with at least one argument for eras/projects/generations besides that it makes your heart feel warm and fuzzy? just disproving this one isn't productive.--Falcon At 03:42, March 11, 2010 (UTC)


 * Think about the borderline cases: ChupChopCase is Project G.U, but it's set in R:1; EotT(N) is in Projct G.U. but Pre R:1 or exempt, if you don't like that title; EotW is neither R:1 or R:2, thus exempt.--Falcon At 03:02, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * As a rebuttal, . Those borderline cases seem to "officially" fall under the first era, even though they were created along with the G.U. material. Kulaguy 03:22, March 11, 2010 (UTC)
 * ToT--Falcon At 03:42, March 11, 2010 (UTC)

Officially outlining eras for Wiki policy
I think the support is overwhelmingly towards the side of "eras." So now we need to scientifically classify what works count as being in which era. I think going by the Old Testament / New Testament infobooks is as good a basis as any. This seems to cover series set before 2016. It's pretty much synonymous with R:1 and before. This includes the Epitaph of Twilight novels (which are part of Conglomerate) and the pre-R:1 builds. If I had to name it, I'd call it the .hack era. Which is fitting because the Epitaph of Twilight novels sound like they actually fit within the original scope of the .hack franchise and the core mystery. 2017-2020. The majority of the G.U. era is the actual G.U. story itself (retold like three times). Alcor, GnU, and CELL are all supplemental to G.U. and Roots is a prequel/interquel. Now that I think of it, if you compact all of the alternate G.U.'s into one, you have one really short era. Rather than add to the .hack universe as a whole, all of the supporting materials of the G.U. era tend to support the core G.U. story alone. We don't know of the full scope of this era, but so far it looks to be just the story of Tokio, told three different ways. Thus, Link IS the era, so of course it makes sense to use it as the era name. I like to think of it as the franchise's "clip era." So, uh... can we get a scan or at least a better angled snapshot of those two pages? It seems like those pages and Mihono Kite (Sora) are all we have on the 4th era, and I'm not sure if 2024 is the 4th era or part of the Link era.
 * 1st era: (blank)
 * 2nd era: G.U.
 * 3rd era: Link (was originally all caps, but seems to have been retroactively changed)
 * ?4th era?: ?2024?

By the way, think we should make an Eras page to make it clearer / official?--OtakuD50 03:21, March 16, 2010 (UTC)
 * 2024 is 4th era. Scans later. --Rpg 03:25, March 16, 2010 (UTC)
 * An Eras of .hack page seems good. Kulaguy 04:42, March 16, 2010 (UTC)
 * The page is there, if a bit sloppy--Falcon At 01:36, March 17, 2010 (UTC)

i really don't see why we should separate the character just because he appears in a different game, everything else about him should be right. anything new can just be added in a new section. like merge kite (link) to kite. I don't know, this way seems much more simpler, and I'm not saying so just because wikipedia does it.XXXth form 19:35, March 23, 2010 (UTC)

Don't have the templates for it. However I was working on one, might present it later. Personality Haseo is the reason why I disdain any form of over length on a page. Outlaw630 19:53, March 23, 2010 (UTC)

i dont really see why we need a template to add in .hack//Link. i really dont think haseo's is that lengthly. just make differnt sections for each appearance he made in the article.XXXth form 20:43, March 23, 2010 (UTC)

You kidding me Haseo's article use to be triple, triple damn it. (And its not even done) Also we use templates hence we need them. Name, Class, Age, Guild and circumstantial information all belong there. In addition that's billion more pictures I hope we never have to see on a page. Outlaw630 21:38, March 23, 2010 (UTC)

There are far more pros than cons with separating characters by era. Really, you're pretty much the only one I know that actually complains about this policy, and it's a damn good one.--OtakuD50 22:05, March 23, 2010 (UTC)

Calm the heck down, i'm simply saying we can merge them. and that it's not that lengthly. and that i dont see much difference. Stufff that are adapted to the same story of .hack//GU can simply be summarized to merely explain the differences. For example, .hak//G.U.+ can explain the second half of the story instead of the whole thing. .hack//TRILOGY can be summarized aswell extensively. Separating by Era would make some be confused if it's really the same haseo or different.XXXth form 18:37, March 25, 2010 (UTC)


 * You are the only person who wants to merge articles, which would be the most idiotic thing to ever do. Wanna see a big article? Starwars:Luke Skywalker. That is 236 KB of holy shit amount of info. We don't need that. We don't want that. In addition, we want to summarize each and every media available. Who gives a fuck if it's the same thing in the beginning? It's still technically a different media and we will summarize as such. And do you know what's fucking confusing? Fucking LINK. I don't know who the fuck is returning or who the fuck is an AI. Separating by era is so much simpler. People won't be confused on whether or not it's the same person because it will say in the article that they are the same or different. If it is confusing, then it's the fault of .hack and it's just hard for us to explain it in simpler terms. Anyways, leave and make your own .hack wiki if you don't like the way we do things here. Kulaguy 20:04, March 25, 2010 (UTC)


 * By era, no one outside of here would know the format. that's the problem. this wikia would basically be dedicated to us, not to everyone else. I could be the only one who wants a merge, or i could be the only one thinking of a way that merge could work that others could consider. There are many other things we could fork out other than era. There's Form and abbilities which would mean we merely list the forms onto the main haseo article while forking out the heavy detail somewhere else and allow even further information. Again some information on these is really unnecessary to describe, such as adapatations that follow basically the same storyline, those ones could simply describe the . Again the articles can be trimmed so the information could be better. . Instead of saying "no, because you dont like it means we dont have to listen to you." have an open mind and at least listen to what i'm saying. just because i'm against separate articles, doesnt my idea is bad. Sure for re organizing it would be a god idea, but the flow of character would change. FOr now i say wait until we know for sure if these two are really different characters. the only reason why this is being approved is because of "length". i'm not even considering star wars luke skywalker example. he is in a different league.XXXth form 20:37, March 25, 2010 (UTC)
 * You say that we need to open our minds, but you're the one that sounds closed-minded to me, saying things like "no one" would understand the format. It's worked out pretty well for us. Division by era actually AVOIDS confusion more than compounding it. Unnecessary information? You're going to have to point to some valid, specific examples. Several stories are retold in different ways, and while there will be some overlap, it's our job to highlight the main differences. Honestly, it's also very difficult to take organization tips from you considering you're not very good at expressing your point in a way that's easily understood or convincing. You think you could do it better? Show me an example. Just pick one article set that you can merge and post an example on the Net Slum BBS. I welcome your challenge.--OtakuD50 21:21, March 25, 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm simply bringing out reasons to why we should do it in such a format. what im eant to say was that if we split the two by era, noone would know "why". everyone would make up there own conclusion like "Oh it must be a different haseo" or "This haseo must be an AI" or stuff like that. and this isn't one ofm y expiriences i run into people outside of this who told me this because of the format. that's why i originally joined. but that's not the point. Again, we should highlight the differences, bu t the similarities are not necessary. and your not even considering other things to split. the character itself shouldnt be split because of era. maybe abbilities and forms. or weapons. what i meant by no one, i meant no one out there who hasnt joined hack wiki. but no joke, right now any article can do. I think this wikia is heavily influenced by small details. And those details would work best if they were seperated into a specific article. the onyl one i could think of is abbilities. for example Kite's abbilities in LINK, and project.hack, all those abbilities can be merged into one article and seperate them by media. so let's say we list all the abbilities of kite in one article that appeared in .hack, and then other new abbilities we didnt see or different version of the same abbility appears in the manga, or in the novels, or anime. we can simply list the name of the anime/novel/manga and explain the abbility in each place. all we could do is focus on the difference when it comes to the same storyline. like .hack//G.U., first half resembles almsot the same but the second half is like an extra part of the story of G.U.. it's difficult to propose an exmaple right away without anyone to cooperate at least hypothetically.XXXth form 21:43, March 25, 2010 (UTC)
 * What the fuck are you talking about? Are you seriously complaining about LINK's return of characters?
 * "Oh it must be a different haseo" or "This haseo must be an AI" or stuff like that
 * We don't fucking know what the fuck is going on in LINK. He may be Haseo, he may be an AI. We DO NOT know. Whether or not he is Haseo will be noted in his LINK article when we find out. Or maybe you're complaining about Piros and Piros the 3rd? So, what the hell would somebody be the confused about? It specifically notes in both pages that they are the same characters.
 * and this isn't one ofm y expiriences i run into people outside of this who told me this because of the format.
 * Examples. Give examples, otherwise you're spouting bullshit. LINK articles don't count since we've already established we don't know the fucking connection between them and previous entities. Once we learn the connection, it will be noted in each page. In addition, do you really expect some random person on the internet to come onto .hack//Wiki and just start reading? No. People who read the Wiki are people who have read/watched/played anything .hack related and/or are interested in learning more about the series. Therefore, they have a general knowledge of .hack. I fail to see the reason why we should "simplify" the Wiki by making it so anybody can read it, when our targets are fans of the series.
 * the onyl one i could think of is abbilities. for example Kite's abbilities in LINK, and project.hack, all those abbilities can be merged into one article and seperate them by media. so let's say we list all the abbilities of kite in one article that appeared in .hack, and then other new abbilities we didnt see or different version of the same abbility appears in the manga, or in the novels, or anime. we can simply list the name of the anime/novel/manga and explain the abbility in each place.
 * What? Kite's only ability is Data Drain. We already have an article on that. What the fuck are you complaining about? Personally, I wanna break up that page because it's a complete mess and I don't understand what the fuck is going on in it.
 * all we could do is focus on the difference when it comes to the same storyline. like .hack//G.U., first half resembles almsot the same but the second half is like an extra part of the story of G.U.. 
 * And this is where we disagree. This isn't Wikipedia where all they do is summarize things. This is a wiki specifically for .hack. As such, it is expected we detail each piece of media that Wikipedia fails to do.
 * it's difficult to propose an exmaple right away without anyone to cooperate at least hypothetically.
 * No, it's difficult to give an example because there aren't any. You're just spouting bullshit. You do not need our cooperation to give examples. All you have to do is prove your stance with examples and evidence. You don't need us saying "Oh yeah we agree with you. Show us examples" because that is the complete opposite of what's supposed to happen in an argument. Go find examples instead of speaking in bullshit generalizations. Kulaguy 22:25, March 25, 2010 (UTC)

no, you dont even need to agree right away, but you could at least acknowledge that the possibility of amerge isn't a bad idea. anything uncivil and i'll just ignore you. i wouldnt even consider merge for every single character, jsut for those who have over lengthly articles, but looking at haseo's it doesnt appear that long. any new abbilities haseo obtains in this game we can fork it out onto a different article, name it the Abbilities of haseo, or sometihng like it. and this is what i meant by close minded. i wasnt referring to you Otaku.XXXth form 22:32, March 25, 2010 (UTC)


 * Or you could acknowledge the possibility that our system is better than what you're proposing. I find it hilarious when idiots like you go "BAWW U MADE GOOD POINTS BUT U INSULTED ME SO ILL JUST IGNORE EVERYTHING U SAID!!11!" Ignore the insults, not the argument. You've made no legitimate response on my argument. All you're doing is whining that I'm insulting you. Boohoo. You claim I'm close-minded when you're the one who doesn't want to consider that our structure is better. We've already told you how and why ours is more organized, yet you claim cramming everything into a page is more organized, which is actually the complete opposite. Also, learn how to fucking construct sentences and spell words. Your messages are an eyesore. Also, why the fuck should we make an abilities page for Haseo? You're saying to combined pages, yet you want to make a random page for something completely unnecessary. Kulaguy 22:41, March 25, 2010 (UTC)
 * Yup, that's pretty much, if you lose the focus on the topic and just aim it towards me, then yeah, i'll pretty much ignore you. anyways, i am thinking if that's the possibility but your not bringing much reason other than "because article pages are too long" that's about it. And no, Haseo has different Abbilities and forms depending on the media. SO why not make an article of all the different abbilties he has?XXXth form 22:46, March 25, 2010 (UTC)
 * Because that would be unnecessary, when we could integrate that information into Haseo's page. Besides, we already have Data Drain, Avatar, B-st Form, and Xth Form articles. It's pointless to create an article just to list the powers of a single character when we already have those powers covered in full detail in separate articles.--OtakuD50 23:00, March 25, 2010 (UTC)


 * this was just an example, though i would like this one later on when more detail of link appears. it would be difficult to do so. Plus, i find how you define "era" and "game" really odd. both can be used for the same meaning. "game" could refer to (LINK) (GU) and Era can refer to (the world) (the world R:2) (the world R:X). that's what trumps me th most. you mentioned earlier that haseo's article was once 3x longer? wellit seems normal length too, and adding link would make it seem long, but i dont see that as a problem unless the page slows doneXXXth form 23:04, March 25, 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree that the labels are a bit confusing, but you just have to look at what they list to "get" it. As for article length, I honestly don't care how short or how long it is, as long as all the information is organized and implemented in a logical manner. As for Haseo's page in particular, the problem with that is that it was written by multiple editors that read whichever work, not just one editor who read all works. Fixing it is the kind of thing that should be addressed in Haseo's talk page, not something that should be fixed by a wiki-wide structural overhaul.--OtakuD50 23:14, March 25, 2010 (UTC) Haseo si just one of the articles i'm trying to focus on. i'm simply saying that all the other characters can be merged back to the original article. theres no need for splitting. Right now i dont think a splitting is necessary unless these characters differentiate drasticly, like a different person playing kite.XXXth form 23:18, March 25, 2010 (UTC)
 * This is our current policy. It's simple, specific, neat, and definable. We already tried what you're suggesting, way back when GU first came out. We discussed whether or not we should separate which articles, but most importantly WHY, in order to create a rule for future cases. This works. Merging a character with the same name unless they're controlled by different users is not as simple, since it also creates a double standard conflict. So, Sora and Haseo have different articles, Piros and Piros the 3rd have different articles, but Natsume and Natsume (G.U.) share one article just because they share the same name? Where's the logic in that? Division by era works because there exists a significant "gap" between eras in which the characters change. We don't know the exact scope of Link, but considering the natures of both G.U. and Link telling the same story differently, the division rule has already made things a lot more organized. As you can see by this forum topic, the discussion was always HOW to separate the articles, not whether or not it should be done. We already crossed this hurdle years ago and decided on division. It's settled. It's staying. You would need to have either a lot more support for consensus, or a very persuasive argument to change this, and so far you are lacking in both. Don't take it personally, just know that you lack support (and consensus is important in a wiki), and you lack the persuasion to gain support.--OtakuD50 23:44, March 25, 2010 (UTC)

you misunderstood, or maybe you did and took it in a different direction. Haseo andryo misaki can still be merged, but anything in-game, such as haseo and Sora should be avoided to be merged. And no, if they share the same name, but are different characters, then yes, they stay separate. Just look at Kite and Kite (sora). they both have the almost the same name, but one is used by different person. I dont see why it's a conflict. the natsune example just made me think you just didn't like the format. plus you're not as persuasive as you think. first it was about length, and now it's simply just for organization? you all make it sound like this is the only way it can be done. like i said, i may be the only one who is proposing different ways. to me it's not a matter of one way or the other, it's talking to see which way is best and see if we can get the best of both worlds.XXXth form 18:31, March 26, 2010 (UTC)
 * Don't put words in our mouths (or keys on our fingers... whatever). We're not saying this is the ONLY way to be done. We're (or I'm) saying this is the best way it can be done for our purpose. Unnecessary? Maybe. Does it work? Certainly. Does it make sense so far? You betcha. "the natsune example just made me think you just didn't like the format" Well, that's your problem, not mine, that you misunderstood my perfectly valid argument. I personally never said it was about length. Others said it was about length. I say it's about organization. If both arguments are valid, then it swings that much further in our favor. to me it's not a matter of one way or the other, it's talking to see which way is best and see if we can get the best of both worlds. And if we are of consensus that the current way is best with no need for immediate change, then we've done our duty and you can drop it, and we can get back to our true discussion, division of eras.--OtakuD50 19:14, March 26, 2010 (UTC)

I would imagine it took similar form as virus cores article, but much more complex. the same idea could apply. and it will not look diorganized. a bit lengthly, but not disorganized.XXXth form 18:40, March 26, 2010 (UTC)
 * "Much more complex." That's your problem right there, simplicity is preferred.--OtakuD50 19:14, March 26, 2010 (UTC)

That doesnt mean we have to go to the simplest fomr we can think of. And by more complex, i didnt really mean it in a way that it would difficult to read. it just be more detailed. XXXth form 19:20, March 26, 2010 (UTC)
 * Again, I ask that you show me an example. The Net Slum BBS awaits. it's one thing to say "it could be done better and I can think of such a way," and another to show that it can be done. Otherwise you're just wasting everyone's time.--OtakuD50 19:25, March 26, 2010 (UTC)


 * i just posted it in.XXXth form 21:00, March 26, 2010 (UTC)

I suggest we go by game (R:2) (R:X) because the wiki format right now is doing such. so the pattern would match. Also it would help differentiate the two despite being the same character. So even though ryo misaki is haseo in the world, he's technically two haseo's. one in R:2 and R:X. so yeah...again this is younger sister.XXXth form 19:15, March 29, 2010 (UTC)

oh well, nevermind, it seems the format of the wiki itself has been changed in order to keep the name. i think it should be reverted back to (R:2) (R:X), (G.U.) (Link) are only names of games, but there are many other manga related to it that have different names. So anything related to hase o in .hack//Link would go in (R:X) instead of any title with the name "Link">XXXth form 18:48, March 31, 2010 (UTC)

"so you wanted to know something well .. aura is a diff. char. (a just in case article had been described before). what exactly is the debate about? j/w97.127.114.199 12:06, May 12, 2010 (UTC)