MediaWiki talk:Community Portal

Car Robots note?

While doing some clean-up work on the RID01 suite I couldn't help but notice what's going on in the JG1 sections is pretty much entirely opaque on the individual character pages at the moment. I know the debate over how much weight to give Car Robots info can get pretty contentious, how would we feel about the idea of adding a brief note at the top of the JG1 sections of RID01 guys that merit them broadly following the one we put on the JG1 sections of G1 guys?

Something like:

The events of the American animated series occur in Japanese continuity as noted above, except that they take place on the Generation 1 cartoon timeline, the cast are time travelers from the Beast Era, and [RID01 NAME] is a character discrete from Generation 1 [G1 ANALOGUE] named [CR NAME]. Listen, just roll with it.

Obviously that last bit would be unnecessary for guys without legacy names but you get it. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 14:10, 15 November 2021 (EST)

I'm down with it. Reader accessibility should always be our main priority. Just because the older fandom has known about the continuity difference in both versions of the cartoon, doesn't mean that the newer fandom who may be looking to expand their TF knowledge will know this. A reader shouldn't have to stumble upon the franchise page just to understand the differences they've seen on the individual character pages. We already use notes like this for US and UK Marvel, so what's the harm in doing it for this? -- Fanofcoolstuff27 (talk) 16:57, 15 November 2021 (EST)

I think this is being too concerned of an artificial continuity distinction that doesn't actually matter. "This is in continuity with this thing in another country" isn't a unique thing and insisting on it is only confusing things. Saix (talk) 19:23, 15 November 2021 (EST)

I think that's reasonable. --Xaaron (talk) 12:45, 16 November 2021 (EST)

I fully agree with AzimuthAcolyte's idea, it doesnt make sense to browse RID2001 pages and see a mix of continuities' ideas without being fully established at all, otherwise let's remove RID2001 Optimus Prime's place in the Energon Matrix page or the KP/Legends backstory of RID Fortress Maximus in his own page. MahXyme/MahXymal (talk) 18:06, 16 November 2021 (EST)

I think it is an acceptable note to include, just like how most G1 cartoon characters have the note clarifying that The Rebirth didn't happen in Japan and the events from 2006 were moved to 2010. --Fritz (talk) 18:56, 16 November 2021 (EST)

Alrighty it looks like we have a general consensus in favor here. I've recieved a thumbs up in the discord from Riptide and Cyberlink420 with the finalized wording:

The events of the American animated series occur in Japanese continuity as noted above, except that they take place on the Generation 1 cartoon timeline and the cast are time travelers from the Beast Era.

and:

The events of the American animated series occur in Japanese continuity as noted above, except that they take place on the Generation 1 cartoon timeline, the cast are time travelers from the Beast Era, and [RID01 NAME] is a character discrete from Generation 1 [G1 ANALOGUE] named [CR NAME].

for characters with prominent legacy names.

I'm neck deep in another project right now but barring a shift in discussion I'll see about rolling this out when that wraps. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 17:50, 24 November 2021 (EST)

Yeah, this all works for me. --Riptide (talk) 18:23, 24 November 2021 (EST)

I concur. S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent 47 (talk) 18:55, 24 November 2021 (EST)

Shouldn't it be "distinct from" or "separate from" rather than "discrete from"? Otherwise, no objections.--Khajidha (talk) 19:03, 24 November 2021 (EST)

Nah, discrete is also an acceptable term. -- Cyberlink420 (talk) 20:08, 24 November 2021 (EST)

So...

Note 1 - Side Burn, X-Brawn, Slapper, Gas Skunk, Dark Scream, Sky-Byte, Bullet Trains, Rail Racer, R.E.V., Crosswise, W.A.R.S., Skid-z, Tow-Line, Armorhide, Movor, Rotor, Mega-Octane, Ruination, Wedge, Heavy Load, :Hightower, Omega Prime, Emissary, T-AI and assorted humans

and

Note 2 - Optimus Prime, Megatron, Prowl, Hot Shot, Mirage, Ironhide, Scourge, Rollbar, Grimlock, Ultra Magnus, Fortress Maximus, Cerebros?

If it's just prominent legacy names, I might toss Rollbar back in the Note 1 pile. If we're being more lenient then Skids, Brawn, and Octane might warrant Note 2. Concerns? --Xaaron (talk) 23:21, 24 November 2021 (EST)

I'd definitely give X-Brawn the second note. We have him included on the Brawn (disambiguation) page. Same with Skid-Z being on the Skids (disambiguation) page since it's pronounced the same way. Maaaaybe Mega-Octane too since we do disambiguate between him and Octane at the top of both of their pages.

Hot Shot, however, probably shouldn't need Note 2 since he was the first Transformers character to ever bear the name "Hot Shot"; there was no G1 namesake at the time. In fact, he's one of the few whose Car Robots name is the one that has a G1 namesake. --Sabrblade (talk) 00:38, 25 November 2021 (EST)

Does "at the time" matter? Visitors are reading these pages now. If there had been a RID2001 character named "Windblade", I'd still have recommended a Note 2. --Xaaron (talk) 20:35, 26 November 2021 (EST)

Aren't these notes also meant to distinguish them from the G1 cartoon characters whose world and English names they share? There is no "Hot Shot" in the G1 cartoon world. Otherwise, we already have the general "Hot Shot (disambiguation)" note at the top of his page, which is full of guys based on the Armada character anyway. --Sabrblade (talk) 00:40, 27 November 2021 (EST)

Is it worth adding to the note that Hot Shot/Artfire is a separate character from the other Artfire as well? --Fritz (talk) 01:51, 27 November 2021 (EST)

I would say Xaaron's accounting is broadly sensible and the edge cases can be hashed out on their individual talk pages as needed. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 12:06, 27 November 2021 (EST)

Shouldn't it be "events take place IN the JG1 timeline", not "events take place ON the JG1 timeline"? BattleBlade (talk) 12:20, 27 November 2021 (EST)

Both are gramatically correct. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 12:41, 27 November 2021 (EST)

Okay my big project is wrapped so I've now thrown together mockups of implementation for both the

• Without Name

and

• With Name

iterations of the note. Thoughts? If there are no major concerns I'll start rolling these out for the more straightforward cases. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 01:35, 29 November 2021 (EST)

A few minor things: Calling it the "American animated series" kinda rubs me the wrong way, since it gives the impression that the show was made in America. I think just "the animated series" comes across better. Also, Note 2 works better grammatically as two sentences. End the first sentence where you do in Note 1, then begin the second sentence with the character's name, dropping the "and" in between that makes it a run-on sentence. So like "...from the Beast Era. Optimus Prime is a character..."

And, frankly, I have to agree with those who questioned the uses of "on the timeline" and "discrete from". We want to be as concise and straightforward as possible, so "distinct from" would probably be the more understandable to the most amount of people, as "discrete" and "discreet" are easily mistaken for one another (I see it all the time online). As for "on the" vs. "in the", it's more a matter of semantics. I agree that the out-of-universe cartoon takes place "on" the fictional timeline, but its in-universe events take place "in" the timeline, and your notes give priority to the events of the cartoon over the cartoon itself. --Sabrblade (talk) 11:06, 29 November 2021 (EST)

Alrighty that's concerns from a few people now so if we want to keep things as dirt simple and free of jargon as possible how's:

The events of the 2001 Robots in Disguise cartoon occur in Japanese continuity as noted above, except that they take place in the world of the original Generation 1 cartoon where the Transformer cast are time travelers from the Beast Era to the year 2000.

and:

The events of the 2001 Robots in Disguise cartoon occur in Japanese continuity as noted above, except that they take place in the world of the original Generation 1 cartoon where the Transformer cast are time travelers from the Beast Era to the year 2000, and [RID01 NAME] is a character separate from Generation 1 [G1 ANALOGUE] named "[CR NAME]."

Hopefully that rips out the sticking points entirely. I frankly don't think grammatical correctness should be that much of a priority but I took a pass at that as well anyway. I'm debating sliding "time travelers from the Beast Era to the year 2000" in there somewhere now that I'm futzing with it again but that may be overegging the pudding. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 12:28, 29 November 2021 (EST)

You could slot "in the year 2000" between "world" and "where": "...except that they take place in the world of the original Generation 1 cartoon in the year 2000, where the..." --Sabrblade (talk) 12:57, 29 November 2021 (EST)

Hokay edited the above to include the 2000 thing and here's take two at the mockups:

• Without Name

and

• With Name

Feedback appreciated. Once again if there are no further notes after a couple days I'll start pushing this live. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 14:01, 1 December 2021 (EST)

I would replace "the cartoon" with "the 2001 RID series". Otherwise its somewhat ambiguous what cartoon you're talking about, especially in cases where the RID write-up isn't immediately above the note. --Xaaron (talk) 15:06, 1 December 2021 (EST)

I kinda liked it better the way you had it before with the part about the cast being time travelers coming before the name thing, like "The events of the cartoon occur in Japanese continuity as noted above, except that they take place in the world of the original Generation 1 cartoon in the year 2000, where the Transformer cast are time travelers from the Beast Era and [RID01 NAME] is a unique character separate from Generation 1 [G1 ANALOGUE] named [CR NAME]." But otherwise, I think it works. --Sabrblade (talk) 18:37, 1 December 2021 (EST)

Folded those into the above. I think I'm gonna declare this last call for notes over the weekend and then get moving next week. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 12:54, 2 December 2021 (EST)

Alrighty, probably final update: We've begun implementation for the more straightforward cases and courtesy of Saix we now have a template to produce both versions of the note. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 20:44, 6 December 2021 (EST)

So, should Japanese/English naming conventions be adapted for these Bio segments now? For instance, should we changes "Prowl" to "Mach Alert" in the JG1CC section, since we now have a note immediately above this which says "His name is Mach Alert here"? --Xaaron (talk) 08:30, 7 December 2021 (EST)

Absolutely not. Escargon (talk) 09:03, 7 December 2021 (EST)

Flipping through, Fire Convoy, Gigatron, Brave Maximus, and God Magnus already use the Japanese names in the JG1CC segments. Can we agree this sort of thing should be applied consistently at least, one way or the other? --Xaaron (talk) 09:33, 7 December 2021 (EST)

Were it up to me, those would have been using the English names as well, but they were concessions since Brave Maximus (most prominently with KP) and the other three (somewhat less so) were so radically changed from the CR narrative by being turned into new versions of old characters, moreso than the likes of Prowl and Scourge, who are just nameslaps who don't really get affected by having those names, ala BW Silverbolt. Escargon (talk) 09:51, 7 December 2021 (EST)

Well let's see here. Surveying the characters where we're currently disambiguating from a G1 guy we have:

CR name in JG1 section - Optimus Prime, Megatron, Fortress Maximus, Emissary, Cerebros, Ultra Magnus

RID01 name in JG1 section - Scourge, Prowl, Ironhide, Mirage, Rollbar

It's probably relevant to examine which of these guys use their CR names in English language JG1 material. That gives us:

Optimus, Megatron, all six Spychangers, and Kelly of all people

I don't have a clean solution here but it may be worth investing in a third version of the note that disambiguates but drops the CR name, ie:

The events of the Robots in Disguise cartoon occur in Japanese continuity as noted above, except that they take place in the world of the original Generation 1 cartoon where the Transformer cast are time travelers from the Beast Era to the year 2000, and [RID01 NAME] is a character separate from Generation 1 [G1 ANALOGUE].

Thoughts?

EDIT: ACK, missed a couple. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 11:20, 7 December 2021 (EST)

FTR, I prefer using Japanese names for JG1 continuity. Saix (talk) 17:21, 7 December 2021 (EST)

I prefer Japanese names for JG1 continuity as well. It feels rather disingenuous to call the CR characters by their English names. It just doesn't feel right to me. I feel CR is a grey enough area in the franchise to do some things differently with our documentation.

EDIT: Only using those names for certain characters over others feels silly to me too. I get why it's done, but I'm personally more of an all or nothing kind of person. -- Fanofcoolstuff27 (talk) 17:29, 7 December 2021 (EST)

People have consistently been calling it a gray area but I've never been convinced by that. It's only a grey area if you think of it from the terms of "continuity," and even then, the idea that they're somehow "different characters" is patently ridiculous to any casual reader. It might be "technically correct" but it is vastly unhelpful. Escargon (talk) 17:53, 7 December 2021 (EST)

At this point, when we've created a note specifically saying "This character uses a different name in the following section", and then we don't use that name, that is more confusing and unhelpful to casual fans. We have numerous examples of characters like Novastar, Slug, Visper, Skrapnel, or Tall Tankor being referred to by different names in Fiction sections than the title of their page. This isn't any different. --Xaaron (talk) 19:14, 7 December 2021 (EST)

The difference being that those are names used in an English medium. Japanese names are different; "Convoy" is not a different name for Optimus Prime, it's how his name is rendered in the Japanese language. Escargon (talk) 19:32, 7 December 2021 (EST)

Unite Warriors Grand Scourge's bio uses both "Convoy" (コンボイ) and "Optimus Prime" (オプティマスプライム) to refer to him in Japanese. Along with both "Cybertron" (サイバトロン) and "Autobot" (オートボット) in reference to the faction. --Sabrblade (talk) 21:09, 7 December 2021 (EST)

That has nothing to do with anything that has been said here. And in any case, it's dealing from an in-fiction universe perspective when my statement is entirely from an out-of-universe reason, so using it as a pedantic "well here's this one time that this has been said" trump card isn't going to work. Escargon (talk) 21:31, 7 December 2021 (EST)

Okay let's take a beat and roll this back to workshopping an action item for JG1 cleanup. First for anyone coming in late I want to emphasize we are discussing the JG1 sections only of RID01 pages, generally a couple sentences in the cartoon tab.

Now it sounds like we have 4 votes broadly in favor of erring on the side of CR names in the JG1 sections of RID01 pages and 1 against so far. We can, at the very least, circumscribe the scale of the discussion here:

• If we were to implement CR names in the cases where we have already deemed disambiguation from G1 nameholders necessary in the CR context note as per Xaaron's initial suggestion, this would constitute a change to 5 articles with the result of 11 articles total with JG1 sections using CR names, give or take an edge case or two for disambiguation.

• If we were to implement CR names for all JG1 sections of RID01 character pages, it would constitute a change to (roughly) 26 articles with the result of 32 articles with JG1 sections using CR names.

• If we attempted to go the other way and remove the CR names entirely from the disambiguation note and the body of the JG1 sections, we hit a wall of either directly interacting with the other guy or non-negligible English use of the CR name for, at minimum, Fire Convoy, Gigatron, and Brave Maximus/Brave/Plasma.

Take this as you will. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 23:53, 7 December 2021 (EST)

I think that the JG1 names should be used for those who's names clash with an existing JG1 character, e.g. Scourge, X-Brawn, Prowl and Optimus. --ZacAttack (talk) 03:02, 8 December 2021 (EST)

This doesn't even need to be a discussion, because every single time this has come up in the past, Walky or M Sipher has shut it down. Votes are meaningless; this same debate with the same few actors comes up every couple of years, and each and every time admins have made it clear that we are not going to refer to them with the JG1 names. Escargon (talk) 08:26, 8 December 2021 (EST)

Concerns about Japanese name usage are valid. Nobody wants this to snowball in a "Jazz should be called 'Meister' in the Headmasters section!" direction. But CR/RID is a gray area and unique situation. There's a twelve paragraph dissertation about it on the franchise page. When we're only doing one write-up of a multi-language series with minor deviations (re: UT), then Optimus Prime/Galaxy Convoy defaults to the English name. But here, 1) we're creating separate sections in Fiction to address the two different versions of a series, 2) we've drafted a Note specifically calling out they use a different name, and 3) the major characters like Fire Convoy and Gigatron already switch to the other name in their JG1 sections. "Should Prowl be changed to Mach Alert in two sentences under the JG1 heading?" doesn't seem like a big deal at this stage. --Xaaron (talk) 08:43, 8 December 2021 (EST)

I agree, tbh. -- Fanofcoolstuff27 (talk) 08:53, 8 December 2021 (EST)

It's not about which is more technically correct, though, it's about presenting it to our audience. If this whole thing is going to be turning into some weird things where we try and make it seem like the RID and CR are more different than what they actually are, then I am absolutely against implementing these notes and rescind any support I've given to it thus far. Escargon (talk) 09:03, 8 December 2021 (EST)

The audience is already capable of recognizing that characters have different names in different contexts. Why is using Japanese names in a Japanese-unique scenario different? Saix (talk) 09:09, 8 December 2021 (EST)

I already stated why. Escargon (talk) 10:17, 8 December 2021 (EST)

Yeah any of these options sounds cool to me. I like me a good localisation but it's good to respect the official name the media actually used for it when documenting. Sky Shadow (talk) 12:28, 8 December 2021 (EST)

Honestly it's best to just say that they're distinct from their G1 namesakes but leave out their Japanese names from the note. It's the same thing as a lot of G1 and BW characters sharing names in the same continuity and no one gets confused by that. I see Optimus being called Fire Convoy as a valid exception to cleary state that he's supposed to be a Beast Era Convoy that has nothing to do with G1 Optimus in JG1CC. --Fritz (talk) 13:19, 8 December 2021 (EST)

Don't have time to fully backread the discussion here, but just want to note for the record that I'm in favour of Japanese names in JG1 sections only where it serves the purpose of avoiding confusion/ambiguity with G1 guys (e.g. Fire Convoy vs. Optimus Prime). Yes, CR/RID is a unique situation compared to a lot of "normal" JG1 coverage on the wiki, but I don't see that there's anything about that situation that suddenly makes it useful to the reader to use, say, "Gelshark" instead of "Sky-Byte". For those non-ambiguous names I just don't see that there's a case for deviating from the wiki standard of "use Hasbro names to ensure improved accessibility for casual readers". Jalaguy (talk) 16:07, 9 December 2021 (EST)

I'm with Jala on this one. No sense overcomplicating things if it's not necessary. -- Cyberlink420 (talk) 17:34, 9 December 2021 (EST)

Okay Saix and I have implemented two further cases in the template such that the full options are now:

1) Setting only

The events of the Robots in Disguise cartoon occur in Japanese continuity as noted above, except that they take place in the world of the original Generation 1 cartoon where the Transformer cast are time travelers from the Beast Era to Tokyo in the year 2000.

2) Setting + disambig

The events of the Robots in Disguise cartoon occur in Japanese continuity as noted above, except that they take place in the world of the original Generation 1 cartoon where the Transformer cast are time travelers from the Beast Era to Tokyo in the year 2000, and [RID01 NAME] is a character separate from [GENERATION 1 ANALOGUE].

3) Setting + CR name

The events of the Robots in Disguise cartoon occur in Japanese continuity as noted above, except that they take place in the world of the original Generation 1 cartoon where the Transformer cast are time travelers from the Beast Era to Tokyo in the year 2000 a character separate from [RID01 NAME].

4) Setting + disambig + CR name

The events of the Robots in Disguise cartoon occur in Japanese continuity as noted above, except that they take place in the world of the original Generation 1 cartoon where the Transformer cast are time travelers from the Beast Era to Tokyo in the year 2000, and [RID01 NAME} is a character separate from [GENERATION 1 ANALOGUE] named "CR NAME".

This was sufficient to match all RID01 JG1 sections as they currently exist.

I think there's still probably some value in more holistically examining how we handle RID01/G1 name overlap in JG1 sections but the CR context template should now be flexible enough to follow any given implementation. -AzimuthAcolyte (talk) 10:24, 10 December 2021 (EST)