StrategyWiki:Staff lounge

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Welcome to all users! This page is where you can ask StrategyWiki-related questions to the staff and senior community figures, and they will do their best to answer. If you want to raise a topic for discussion (rather than just ask about it), please use the community issues forum instead. New issues are entered here, with the most recent at the bottom of the page. If your question does not pertain to editing StrategyWiki (e.g. asking for hints or game-specific information), please ask on the guide's talk page or on the forums.

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Suggested new infobox parameter: titleimg
I came across a glitch in some of our page layouts that have a title screen image at the start of the article. Check out Space Quest III: The Pirates of Pestulon for an example of an affected layout. This does not affect marquee like on Donkey Kong because that does not use CSS' float.

The title screen appears below credits, not because of a header issue, but because we added the social media text box table without combining it into a single div. Since the infobox class has the clear:right attribute, the social media text box table is forced downwards and it starts a new block on the page (forcing all other in-line objects downwards). To get around this, I propose adding a titleimg parameter that would add the thumbnail div between the main infobox and the social media infobox tables. See the image on the right for a highlighted fix (code and layout-wise). Can you find a better fix or propose a different solution? -- 05:08, 22 March 2017 (UTC)


 * I may have found a superior solution. I wrapped both tables in a div, floated right, and that seemed to do the trick. Anyone have an even better solution before we add it? -- 05:16, 22 March 2017 (UTC)


 * I do! A one-cell invisible table. See the "Dragon Slayer II: Xanadu" or "Ultima III: Exodus" main pages, as examples.
 * But I would support your idea of "title images" instead of "box artworks" in the infobox. I always considered the title shown by the game itself as the "TRUE title", and the title on the box or elsewhere (if different) just as a mere "official title". This is just my humble opinion, and nothing more. --Abacos (talk) 14:30, 16 May 2017 (UTC)
 * The boxart is what people see when they're looking to buy the game, or have the box on the shelf. It's generally more recognizable than the first splash screen from the game.  My view is that all those extra images can just be put in a gallery below. -- Prod (talk) 22:47, 27 May 2017 (UTC)

Replacing Pictures
I've been working on the RollerCoaster Tycoon walkthrough and I'm wondering how I can replace some of the old jpgs with cleaner-looking pngs. I've tried searching the help files, but couldn't find how to do this.

As an aside, RollerCoaster Tycoon/Mels World should be nuked since it's missing the apostrophe. Sorry about that. Antwan 04:43, 1 May 2017 (UTC)


 * While you can convert from one image format to any other format, when it comes to losslessness (what you're calling "clean"), you can't go from jpg (a lossy format) to png (a lossless format), because image integrity has already been lost. The only way to do what you're asking is to retake the screenshots from scratch and make sure they output in png format.   Pro  cyon  14:37, 1 May 2017 (UTC)


 * That is exactly what I plan to do. I have the new screenshots. How do I replace the old ones with the new ones? I still can't find that feature. Or do we delete the old ones first, then put the new ones?
 * Antwan 06:01, 3 May 2017 (UTC)


 * Yeah, since you're switching to a new file extension, it won't count as a file replace. Just go to the existing jpg images and add a delete tag to the top of them.  That will flag one of us to go ahead and delete it from the site.  Then upload the new image to site and you're all set.  Thanks!   Pro  cyon  13:32, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

Long pages
Long pages are listed under Maintenance reports on Special pages: is this just so we can see which pages might benefit from subpaging or use of templates, or beyond a certain point does page length cause technical problems? I ask because, despite the use of templates, 12 of the longest 50 are Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic pages, the main guide to which I've been contributing. Onderduiker (talk) 21:17, 1 May 2017 (UTC)


 * Yeah, that's the basic idea behind that list. If a page is on there, we don't necessarily have to subpage it, but it might be a good idea.  This is primarily a consideration for people browsing the site on mobile devices, which we don't do a particularly good job of taking into account.   Pro  cyon  13:32, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

Star Wars templates
First, a heads-up that the following guides are in the Star Wars category but don't match wanted pages in the Star Wars series template:

Star Wars: Lethal Alliance and Star Wars The Clone Wars: Lightsaber Duels are in the category but not the series template. There are also many wanted pages that look like they should be prefixed with Star Wars: or Star Wars, but I'm not sure how to proceed (I'm much more interested in contributing to specific guides, rather than researching SW titles in general).

Wanted pages for Star Wars: Racer Arcade and Racer Arcade may also be the same game, and there may be more sub-series (like Super Star Wars, or per episode or trilogy), particularly if a series is defined as just more than one (Rebel Assault, Force Unleashed, Angry Birds and possibly Starfighter).

Second, I'm thinking of creating a template for opening crawls, since based on the 14 (yikes) SW titles in my own library most, if not all, SW games have these. I've previously added opening crawls with yellow text on a black background to the Walkthrough pages of five guides, including Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, although I now think they'd be better placed on the main game page, below. Using KotOR as an example, something like this:

Any feedback appreciated! Onderduiker (talk) 19:44, 4 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks for pointing out these issues! This was initially a copy-paste of the wikipedia template output, rather than the original game names, so some of them were missing the "Star Wars".  I've corrected a bunch of them now, but there are still a few missing games, and some ambiguous names.
 * I'm not sure what we should use for the official name of Star Wars: Episode I Racer.
 * Racer Arcade does appear to be one game, so I've moved it to the racing section in the template.
 * Series are generally defined as 3+, otherwise we'd be splitting things up too much. I'm not sure I want to split those ones off, since they're mainly just separated by the console they were built for. I think it's a bigger problem that they're not even listed!
 * That template should be pretty cool and make it easier for other users to add them in other games. -- Prod (talk) 00:59, 28 May 2017 (UTC)


 * I'd since noticed the similarity to Wikipedia's Star Wars game template and had planned to try editing Star Wars myself, but you beat me to it: thanks!


 * Just over four years ago you supplied me with this LucasArts.com link (although this archived copy is now needed for the older games) after I mistakenly renamed a game, but Star Wars: Episode I Racer only seems to be listed as Star Wars Racer (whereas the box art title clearly contains Star Wars, Racer and Episode I). This and other inconsistencies are part of why I'm reluctant to edit the template myself.


 * I'll most likely create SWOC when I next edit a main game page, and add it to other guides when I contribute to them: I'm unlikely to complete guides for all 14 SW games in my library, but it is likely that I'll at least create or edit Getting Started pages (and possibly some Appendices) whenever I start playing a game. Onderduiker (talk) 21:09, 30 May 2017 (UTC)