Template:Did you know nominations/Star Control

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The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by BorgQueen (talk) 11:56, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

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Star Control

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  • ... that Paul Reiche and Fred Ford created the 1990 space game Star Control by adapting the action-strategy gameplay from Reiche's 1983 game Archon into a science fiction setting? Source: "I wanna mention that, and it was obvious to us, because we intended it that way, but "Starchon" is really "Archon" with an S-T in front of it. "Archon" being a strategy game on top of a one-on-one combat game and that's what "Star Control I" was."[1]

"The first Star Control is actually somewhat similar in concept to one of Reiche III and Ford’s earlier games, Archon, in that it’s a strategy game where conflict is resolved via action-based one-on-one combat. (It could even be termed a spiritual successor, given that it’s even in the title – “StAR CONtrol”.)"[2]

Improved to Good Article status by Shooterwalker (talk). Self-nominated at 23:45, 24 January 2023 (UTC).

General: Article is new enough and long enough
Policy: Article is sourced, neutral, and free of copyright problems

Hook eligibility:

QPQ: Done.

Overall: Excellent work improving the article to GA status. QPQ done. The only thing that needs to be adjusted is the ALT, which is not immediately enticing to somebody unfamiliar with the subject or its creators. CurryTime7-24 (talk) 22:56, 25 January 2023 (UTC)

  • I'm open minded. I've done a few of these and I was starting to feel a little repetitive with "did you know that this was considered one of the best games because...?" I figured I would try to link it to another historic game, but I can see how that might be inaccessible to someone who isn't into games. Let me know what you think, and I'll come up with something either way. Shooterwalker (talk) 18:17, 26 January 2023 (UTC)
Very sorry for leaving you hanging, my friend. Let me jump back into this DYK tomorrow. Been slammed with work, but things are lightening up again. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 00:13, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
  • @Shooterwalker: The article itself is tip-top. I just think the hook is a little staid and wouldn't be rewarding for readers unfamiliar with the subject. I would offer my own ALTs, but don't want to disqualify myself as reviewer by doing so. That said, there is a lot of material in this article that could be mined for appealing ALTs. For example, this passage alone seems like it could generate two very effective ALTs: "When they saw that the Syreen ship resembled a cross between a rocket ship and a ribbed condom, Fred Ford suggested calling it the Syreen Penetrator, which coincidentally happened moments before the 1989 San Francisco Earthquake." —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 19:07, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
Sorry for being MIA again. Was out of town, then got caught up in other articles I've been working on. Your revised ALT is better, but it still needs a bit of work. I would trim down the overlinking of well-known things and maybe remove the reference to the Loma Prieta quake. Ideally the ALT would focus either on the unusual appearance of the starship or the timing of its naming, but not both as it might be a bit much. Feel free to ping me. I'll be able to respond in a timelier fashion now that I have more time. :) —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 23:56, 26 February 2023 (UTC)
ALT2 ... that the creators of the 1990 space game Star Control designed a starship for an all-female alien race, naming it the Penetrator for its resemblance to a ribbed condom?
ALT3 ... that the creators of the 1990 space game Star Control named a starship the Penetrator for its resemblance to a ribbed condom, moments before the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake?
@CurryTime7-24: Having trouble deciding so I gave each one a try. Let me know what you think. Shooterwalker (talk) 23:36, 1 March 2023 (UTC)
@Shooterwalker: Both ALTs are wonderful! Thank you for your patience with me and for your excellent work. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 22:22, 2 March 2023 (UTC)
This needs more work, as I've checked the sources cited in the article, and they do not exactly verify the specific claims made in ALT2 and ALT3 (and in the sentences where they are cited in the article). Pinging CurryTime7-24. Cielquiparle (talk) 10:13, 9 March 2023 (UTC)
Striking ALT3. Per the preceding discussion, not sure why the earthquake is relevant, particularly as no further information is offered within the article about it (it's essentially restating the hook). Re: ALT2, I have now re-looked at Computer Gaming World and found the reference to the naming of "Penetrator" and the resemblance to the ribbed condom toward the bottom of p. 34, so am inclined to approve...but the first part of the hook "all-female alien race" somehow didn't match when I first searched the Ars Technica transcript – both in the article and in the source cited, it's referred to as a "humanoid" race of powerful females (rather than "alien" even if it's implicit) and it doesn't seem to say "all-female" anywhere in the source or in the Wikipedia article (just "female"). Cielquiparle (talk) 08:50, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
Copying in @Shooterwalker: – apologies for missing you off CC earlier as the nominator. Cielquiparle (talk) 08:55, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
@Cielquiparle: I meant to check back in too, and wasn't sure if I was supposed to respond. It's important to take things in context, and not just as a short quote from one source. The game is about aliens, and it's repeatedly verified that these are different alien species. Similarly, the Computer Gaming World source doesn't explicitly use the words "San Francisco earthquake", since they're telling a story with a rhetorical flourish. But the story clearly refers to October 1989 with a room shaking in San Francisco. If need be, I can pull up additional sources, but the article is full of them. Shooterwalker (talk) 16:54, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
@Shooterwalker: Are you 100% certain that the Syreen are all-female? How do you know this? When I ask the Internet, I see that while many people assert that the Syreen are all-female, I also see that this is sometimes disputed, with some people arguing that they are merely female-dominated. Cielquiparle (talk) 22:38, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
@Cielquiparle: The short answer is there are no male Syreen in the game. The game's manual refers to them as humanoid females on page 31. The longer answer gets into the deeper game lore, which is that the male population was "virtually" exterminated in a disaster. I'd treat "all-female" as basically true. Female-dominated feels less true, as it implies a kind of power structure that isn't part of the story. I'd stick with all-female unless there's a short phrasing that means basically the same thing. Shooterwalker (talk) 00:51, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
@Shooterwalker: Right, even if "all-female" is "basically correct" (as you say), I'm not sure we want to put that phrase on the main page of Wikipedia if we can't find a reliable source that says the same thing. (All it takes is one person out of the 20,000+ people who click on the article to dispute the Syreen back story, and before you know it, a bunch of editors will start trying to fix your hook on the fly, or worst case, they end up pulling the hook and it doesn't complete its run.) We could use other wording more in line with the sources, like:
  • "a female humanoid race"
  • "a female alien race"
  • "female humanoid aliens"
Going back to whether or not the Loma Prieta earthquake reference makes for a compelling hook or not – I don't think it does, and it's possibly even misleading in that most people who know about the history of that earthquake and video game development will think that you're about to offer additional insight, like the story about the post-Loma Prieta settings in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas or the death of John J. Anderson or how the earthquake was a bad omen for development of The Dig at LucasArts. Instead, all you're saying both in the hook and in the article is that the timing of coming up with the name for something was right before the earthquake. Also...we actually have run hooks about "coincidental timings" before and I don't think they perform particularly well, like the March 2023 hook about the covers for "Just Like a Woman" coming out on the day Bob Dylan was in a motorcycle accident. Some people will click, but it's possible some people will just shrug and say "so what" if that's the best you could come up with. It's also generally not a good idea to cram too many facts into a hook, and in this case you have quite an eye-catching one with the ribbed condoms and the female aliens, so I would stick to that rather than distract/detract from it. Cielquiparle (talk) 08:02, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
@Cielquiparle: Thanks for the suggestions. My original hook was about the game Archon: The Light and the Dark, so I'm relying a lot on outside input to find an interesting hook that is still clear. Let's try:
Let me know if that works. Shooterwalker (talk) 15:05, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
Thanks. Approving ALT4 only. Haven't verified ALT0 but previous reviewer said it wasn't interesting enough to a broad audience. Cielquiparle (talk) 15:13, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
@Cielquiparle and Shooterwalker: I had to grapple with one of those "when it rains, it pours" situations the past few days and was only very intermittently active here. My deepest apologies to both of you. Delighted that this wonderful DYK is moving forward. Thank you kindly both of you. —CurryTime7-24 (talk) 17:18, 11 April 2023 (UTC)
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