StrategyWiki:Guide/Categorization

Enforced!

This page documents an enforced policy on StrategyWiki. It has wide acceptance among editors and is a standard that everyone should follow. Except for minor edits, please make use of the discussion page to propose changes to this policy.

On StrategyWiki we attempt to provide information and guides for video games across all systems and genres. At the moment, there are 52,183 pages in guides and information pages for hundreds of games. In order to allow people to find what they need to find here, there is a categorisation scheme in place, as outlined below.

Article categorisation

Core article categories

There are eight core categories in which all content on StrategyWiki belongs:

1. Games: All main pages for every game are categorised here alphabetically, a full index to every game StrategyWiki has to offer. This category is automatically applied when {{Header Nav}} and/or {{Game}} is used on the guide.
2. Genres: Category for the various genres. Games are categorized into the genre(s) they most closely fit.
3. Series: Games that have spawned a series can be found here. This is useful because members interested in one game in a series can see how the other guides in the series are progressing, and help out however they can. Always try to categorise games in the most specific series you can find; for example, LEGO Star Wars rather than just LEGO. Don't categorise by both.
4. Modes: Single player, Multiplayer, Co-op or Massively Multiplayer Online game.
5. Systems: Category where all video game systems can be found for browsing. Games are categorized by all of the systems on which they have been released. Systems are also categorized into the company that released them.
6. Companies: A listing of all companies and groups related to gaming. All games are categorized by all the companies which had a hand in developing/producing the game (in all areas of the world).
7. Official pages: Pages and categories related to the functioning of StrategyWiki, including maintenance and other content.
8. Years: Categories for each year to list events that occurred during those times. Games are automatically categorised by every release year, assuming they use the {{Game}} template, which they should.

Page-specific

Achievement and trophy pages

Games that have achievements and trophies associated with them will have a separate page detailing all achievements with special templates used to create a standard achievements table. These pages should be categorised by each system achievement category for which they apply. These categories are in the form of [[Category:System Name achievements]] or [[Category:System Name trophies]]. For example, the Xbox 360 achievements and PlayStation 3 trophies categories.

Companies

Company pages are put in the Category namespace. The companies and founding date categories are automatically added on the page by using the {{company}} template. Subsidiaries of companies should be categorized under the parent companies. If a company is renamed, the old category page should be categorized under the new company page.

Guide pages

In general, only the main pages of guides get any categories. Sub-pages are automatically categorised as such by inserting the {{Header Nav}} template. Many categories are automatically inserted on main game pages through use of templates in the {{Game}} infobox. The syslist and {{colist}} templates insert categories (systems and companies respectively). The year= and series= parameters of the {{Game}} infobox also insert the release year and series categories. Additional categories you need to include are Modes (Single player, Multiplayer, etc.) and Genres (Platform, Action, etc.). Categories which you may or may not have to add include, company and system categories if one of the above templates wasn't used and expansion pack, series, MAME, Sony Greatest Hits, etc. where applicable.

Files

For more details on this topic, see the image policy.

Images require the use of any content-based categories, such as Screenshots or Box artwork, as well as a guide-specific image category in the form of [[Category:Game Name images]]. Images which are not guide-related, such as Company logos or System images, generally have their own specific categories and aren't usually paired with another one except for Photos.

The guide-specific image category is also categorised, by putting [[Category:Guide-specific images]] at the bottom.

Move lists

Individual character pages in fighting games (i.e. Game Name/Character Name) are categorised by Character move lists. In addition to individual character pages, the compilation of all characters' moves for a game is categorised under Game move lists. Lastly, if a certain game publisher has a wide array of fighting games, it is also possible to accumulate a large list of moves lists, which would be categorised with Company move lists (see Capcom/Move lists for an example).

Redirects

The majority of redirect pages should not be categorized. There is one exclusion to this rule: official titles of a game, such as a regionalization (i.e. a country-specific title), should redirect to the guide and be categorized to match the guide's main page. As such, do not exclude region-specific categories. For example, if the primary name is Japanese, and you redirect the US name to it, remember to add any Japanese developers and publishers, too.

Alternative titles that redirect should be categorized in the following way (see Akumajou Dracula for an example):

1. Developer(s)
2. Publisher(s)
3. Genre(s)
4. Mode(s)
5. Release years: only include the first release date; omit the country of origin (we don't have regional categories). Typically, the alternate name for the guide, as used for the redirect, is from a different region than the original release date. If this is the case, then use the first release date for the region where this name is used (do not use the first date when the game was released unless it is the same).
6. Series
7. System(s)
8. Category:Games: this specific category must be included.

Series

Series pages are put in the Category namespace. They should be added to the category of any parent series they are a part of. The series category is automatically added on the page by using the {{series}} template.

Genres

Genre pages are put in the Category namespace. The genres category is automatically added on the page by using the {{Genre}} template.

Systems

System pages are put in the Category namespace. The systems and release years categories are automatically added on the page by using the {{System}} template.

Templates

Generic templates which can be used on many different guides simply need to be placed in Templates. Templates specifically designed for one guide, or one series of games, should go in Guide-specific templates.

For templates with separate documentation pages (i.e. Template:Template name/Documentation) using the {{Documentation}} template, those pages should be categorised with [[Category:Template documentation]].