Wikipedia:Peer review/Rain World/archive2

Rain World

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Hello fellow editors. I didn't really know what I was doing last time, but now, I (hopefully) do.

I am interested in whether this article has potential for passing an FAC and how it could be improved to the level of a Featured Article. Please note that I have never nominated an article for GA or FA before, though I have review a few GANs. This article happens to already be a GA because Czar authored it in 2017. Because of that, I might be clueless on a few things and would need some explanation.

Czar has already given some suggestions on the talk page that I did my best to deal with. I'll add this peer review to the FAC sidebar. Thanks yall. Tarlby ^{(t) (c)} 01:28, 6 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I’ve added maintenance tags to the article. Some sections, like the plot sections needs more citations. TzarN64 (talk) 01:43, 3 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Plot sections don't need citations. Tarlby ^{(t) (c)} 02:12, 3 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Other FA games like Final Fantasy 7 do. TzarN64 (talk) 02:27, 3 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

See The Longing. Tarlby ^{(t) (c)} 02:33, 3 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Quick comment here (should be able to write some comments in my own section soon) but Tarlby, you are correct. Plot sections that are straightforward are assumed to be sourced to the game itself and do not require citations. However if the plot has material that is up to interpretation, it should generally include sources supporting a certain interpretation. WP:VGPLOT is the applicable guideline. I'm less familiar with this game but I would generally expect a plot section and even though according to your comments below critics really didn't cover the narrative, an overview of the game's setup and a short plot section on the story that a player would cover on an average playthrough seems sufficient. Fathoms Below (talk) 04:51, 15 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I'm typing up a few comments btw, sorry that I've been unusually busy the last couple of days. Takes a bit of time for me to concentrate on content. Fathoms Below (talk) 23:59, 17 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thoughts as I read through this; some of these are nitpicky since this is aiming for FAC:

General note, since you said you've never nominated an article before: FAC reviewers will get very deep into critiquing the phrasing/writing/grammar and small details. You should be prepared for that; it's not personal, everyone just really wants articles to be the very best they can be.
"It released for" is odd phrasing; usually you'd say "It was released for" since it didn't release itself
"expressed significant frustration and apathy towards its high difficulty, inconsistent checkpoints, and imprecise controls" - I'm not sure that "expressed significant apathy" really works here? I get reviewers got frustrated/upset/discouraged, and then just stopped caring as a result, but without the context it reads weird
I know it just came out, but it reads off to have a long sentence of details for Downpour followed by "it exists" for The Watcher; they should be similar in detail
The "screens shown individually" is called a flip-screen, which may be worth linking (had to find that link for Animal Well a few months ago)
"When throwing an item, the slugcat will prioritize its right hand, and can swap the items' places." - I don't understand this sentence or the significance of the hand; can you carry two items at a time? Only two, or more? Is "carrying things" the inventory system, or is there an inventory as well?
"the worm creature that directs the player towards nearby food and story-related events" - wait, so there is a story? Nothing in this section explains more than the setup; it sounds like there shouldn't be a plot section, but you may need a couple sentences to describe the shape of the story (like, what happens at the end of the game? Is there an end?). Actually, I see that there used to be a plot section but you removed it; I don't know if that was justified or not but I do see an awful lot of "story" in that version that's now just not mentioned at all, even obliquely.
Like with the lede, you have two paragraphs on Downpour and one sentence on The Watcher. Needs expansion.
"He had played few games with little industry experience" - "He had played few games and had little industry experience", but also, what is "little"?
What exactly did James Therrien do? The dev section reads like Jakobsson was a solo developer, but there was also this other guy and it's not clear when he joined the project and why. Oh, you say what he did like 3 paragraphs later (though not when he joined); that first sentence needs to be up when you first mention him.
"Primate wrote Rain World's soundtrack, handled the indie studio's business,[14] and designed levels, becoming his first experience in directly developing gameplay." - grammar: "Primate wrote... becoming his first experience". Should just be "and designed levels. It was his first experience directly developing gameplay."
"Primate felt that "Arcade bleeps and bloops" - don't need to capitalize arcade
I'm not doing a deep dive on copyediting (not least because I'm not great at it), but I'd expect people at FAC to criticize some of the sentence construction. For example, "Regarding the new game modes, Marrero intended for the Challenge mode to teach players the game's mechanics." - the first phrase isn't really needed, you can jump in without the "regarding" transition. Prior to nomination, I'd recommend taking a pass and doing your best to pare back individual sentences; there's a lot that isn't wrong, but is just unnecessary/additional wording that can be removed to leave a cleaner flow. Another example: "ported Rain World to the Nintendo Switch platform" - platform isn't needed. It's just one word, but they add up over the course of the article.
Again, the Watcher dev section needs more detail
"Paste Magazine and Eurogamer compared its savage, survival elements to Tokyo Jungle (2012)." - This seems out of place? This is a little summary paragraph, but this sentence seems over-specific to two reviews for that.
Minor note: when quoting a sentence fragment at the end of the sentence, don't include the period inside the quote. 'throwing mechanics to a "bizarre legal document".', not 'throwing mechanics to a "bizarre legal document."' (MOS:LQ)
The reception section as a whole is pretty long for me personally, though there's nothing in particular I'd take out; it may be worth working on to reduce wordiness though in case other reviewers also feel the same.
as always, need more Watcher reception.
I love all the free-use pictures/gifs! File:Rain World animation - Mimic (shortened and resized).gif needs to link to the original source gif, though, since that's the one with the ORES ticket attached
You're guaranteed to get pushback about some of these youtube video cites, so have your defense ready for why they count as RSs

Hope this helps! --Pres N 15:26, 25 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Duly noted
Done
Removed the apathy part
I assume you're talking about the DLCs mention in the lead. I did my best adding stuff from sources for what little I have for Watcher in the body, which I'll talk about more below.
Linked
Rephrased. Mentioning the throwing mechanics is significant since RPS went on a whole rant about how confusing the throwing mechanics are (a bizarre legal document).
Czar encouraged me to either cut down or merge the plot to the gameplay section proportionate to how sources cover it. The most frustrating thing while searching through sources other than watching how critics slandered this game^[Humor] was how they didn't cover the story at all. Considering how none of them talked about it (except for the setup) than I believed the article should also have nothing covering it, except the setup. How exactly should I exactly explain the story then?
There've been barely any sources covering The Watcher, even on day of release. The ones I do have barely have any meaningful content I could add regarding the actual gameplay, so unfortunately, I cannot see how I can expand further.
Not sure how that could be confusing, but I've rephrased it to He had played few games without industry experience. Would that work?
I'll have more time later to rework this aspect. I've added a new sentence to the beginning of the dev section for now.

Looks like I gotta go sleep and stuff. I'll come back to pass through the rest of this later. Thanks for all of this @PresN. Tarlby ^{(t) (c)} 04:26, 26 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Finished your stuff regarding the James Therrien stuff.
Done
Done
Duly noted. I'll try to deal with that.
There've been barely any sources covering The Watcher, even on day of release. The ones I do have barely have any meaningful content especially regarding the development, so unfortunately, I cannot see how I can expand further.
Not sure how I didn't think of this. Moved down.
Dealt with that.
I'll be thinking of that, though I'm generally afraid of violating the comprehensiveness criteria when removing anything.
There is zero Watcher reception!
I'll try to figure out how to do that. I don't edit Commons that much, lol.
Duly noted. They should all be primary sources.

Questions:

Should I say Paste Magazine or just Paste? I've seen other articles just say Paste, but I'm not sure if it'd be an improvement.
Should the video citations (primary sources) be removed if there is already a secondary source? I've heard of this before, but I'm afraid of removing them if the article loses the status of being "well-researched".
What do you think of the bottom link I put in Further Reading? The YouTube video is not a reliable source on its own, but has some original interview content by Jakobsson and Primate.
Should I also italicize Rain World in quotes when they don't do so? E.g., Polygon doesn't italicize it in the quotebox I used of them.

Again, thank you for all of your help @PresN! Tarlby ^{(t) (c)} 23:08, 27 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think that the plot section should be as long as the gameplay section, for sure, but "proportionate" isn't the same thing as "do not include". I do think you need to cover what the plot is, even if you don't go into elaborate detail.
"He had played few games without industry experience" - this still says that the games didn't have industry experience, rather than that he didn't have industry experience.
I understand that sourcing is an issue, but I do think it's a problem that there's a second DLC that's "bigger than the original game" but the article gives essentially no information about what's in it. If there's no dev info or reception then that's what it is (though I think in the initial paragraph of reception where you give overviews of how the base game and Downpour were received you should be explicit that The Watcher didn't get any reviews rather than just leaving it conspicuously missing.)
It seems to just call itself Paste, and the article is at Paste (magazine), so, just Paste.
I think it's fine to have video citations of interviews, as long as what you're citing is the devs' words
I think it's fine to include or cite, as long as it's the devs' words that you're citing, not the discussion by the non-RS
Yes, italicize Rain World in quotes even if the source doesn't. --Pres N 13:55, 30 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Should be mostly dealt with now. Tarlby ^{(t) (c)} 16:49, 2 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Fathoms Below

Do you need to wikilink to the term "cat" in the lead? People usually know what cats are. See MOS:OL
"The slugcat traverses through the decaying remnants of an industrialized ancient civilization as it searches for its lost family." You could remove "decaying" and "lost" to tighten the prose. My first FA peer-review (located here had a reviewer link to relevant copyediting essays that might come in handy especially since you would be a first-time nominee and my first nom would have failed if I hadn't received some help with the prose from a friendly editor.
In more recent FACs that I've done the reviewers suggested listing the proper names of relevant media in Italics for the sources. So all instances of Rain World and Rain World: Downpour should be italicized in the sources.
Not sure if you've seen this other essay yet, but I'd securely recommend checking out User:TheJoebro64/How to write a dope video game article
I think the material about the simulated ecosystem and the exact gameplay should be a part of the first paragraph of the lead, while the second paragraph should begin with "Rain World was in development for six years…"
Is the term PC referring to Windows? The term could refer to Windows, macOS, or other systems so I think you should be more precise here
"but expressed significant frustration towards its high difficulty…" Change to "but who criticized towards the difficulty; checkpoint system, and controls…"
More coming later, this is just a small start. Fathoms Below (talk) 21:39, 18 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Unlinked
Done, will read
Done
Will read
Done, with some adjustments
Two sources for Downpour and Watcher quite literally says "PC" and no other source clarifiies, so I'm not sure if I can make it more specific.
Either the sleep deprivation is getting to me or you made a typo, so I put but criticized its difficulty, checkpoint system, and controls.

Tarlby ^{(t) (c)} 21:10, 26 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your replies! PC seems fine I suppose. Working on some follow-up comments now. I'll focus on the Gameplay and Development sections, but a question before I move on: is an entire section dedicated to the plot really necessary? You could always combine it as a subsection of Gameplay, like what happened at the game Katana Zero where an entire section was instead integrated into gameplay under the subsection "Story and dialogue". Fathoms Below (talk) 17:02, 10 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That makes sense. I've made the plot a subsection now! Tarlby ^{(t) (c)} 04:12, 12 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I made some edits to the development section to remove a bit of redundancy such as the term "in-game world". Since this is the gameplay section, I think the reader would understand that the world is located in-game.
If you're looking for an essay that might help a little with copyediting, maybe WP:REDEX would be useful?
"penetrating other creatures is the only way it can receive food" I think you meant "piercing" the creatures with spears.
"prone to freezing" Freezing in place due to shock? Due to ice? I think a bit of clarification may be needed there.
Does the Watcher slug cat do anything special? If so that might be worth talking about.
In development, I think you can remove the wikilink for graphic designer, I think most people will know what one of those is.
Same as the above with some other commonly understood terms such as wikilinks for YouTube, exchange student, subway, and perhaps Internet forum?
Since this will be your first FAC, someone will have to spot-check the sources to ensure text-source accuracy. I recommend going over most of the sources and making sure that everything is correctly cited. It's okay if a couple of errors slip through the cracks and are noticed at FAC, I've had a few mistakes happen to me before but I try to make sure that everything is fixed. Most first-time FAC nominators end up making a few mistakes. Fathoms Below (talk) 23:48, 13 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the essay, copyedits, and sourcing advice. I've done all of your requests except for the Watcher one. TLDR: The sources don't talk about it. Of the sources I have, only PC Gamer has anything close to discussing their gimmicks: In Rain World: The Watcher, you become Nightcat, AKA The Watcher, a new and adorable slugcat with its own (new, adorable) gimmick—finding mysterious echoes of itself, which will require you to check out all kinds of new places on the map. I know exactly what they're talking about, since I played the game, but PCG speaks in such a cryptic way that they basically give no information for me to use. Tarlby ^{(t) (c)} 00:04, 17 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That makes sense. Vacant0 was able to give some comments below, and in the meantime I'll look over the rest of the Development section, Release, and Reception. Fathoms Below (talk) 16:38, 18 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Fathoms Below When do you think you can drop the rest of the comments? Tarlby ^{(t) (c)} 05:17, 30 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"The designer brushes recurring, cloned elements, such as plants and chains, onto the map, as well as combining and processing shadows" Does designer mean Jakobsson himself or the design program?

"Although, while the creatures of Rain World are animals like the slugcat, the torrential rain was designed to represent "oblivion incarnate", a threat no creature could survive against." I don't think you need although.

"totally biblical wrath-of-god vibe" You could also remove totally

"Another major content update was planned for release later in 2017. The update slated to include the local multiplayer arena mode, featuring over 50 new rooms, and the Monk and Hunter, which make the game easier and harder, respectively." How about planned instead of slated

"On March 28 of that year, a DLC was officially announced, to be published by Akupara Games" You could remove everything after published, as since Akupara was the new publisher from then on there is no need to mention who is publishing the DLC imo.

"Reception on The Watcher is minimal, so this article does not cover it." You can remove this. Also, if it was well received according to the two sources, this sentence would contradict the earlier statement. Either the Watcher was well received or too minimal for it to be covered.

"Some critics fondly recalled serendipitous in-game encounters as they learned the game environment's unwritten rules" Remove serendipitous and change to "the game’s unwritten rules" Fathoms Below (talk) 15:58, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Vacant0

I randomly stumbled upon this video game PR which seems to have been open for more than 2 months now. Considering that you plan on bringing this to FAC, here are some of my recommendations:

The two videos in the Gameplay section do not have a caption. In this section, we generally have a gameplay image - but if you think that these two videos showcase the gameplay better, then I won't have any objections to keeping them in the article. Just make sure to add a caption that'll describe the videos the best.
Italicise Downpour in the image in the Downloadable content section.
Another thing that I've noticed is that there is an overuse of quotes, particularly box quotes. There's sandwiching in the Development and Reception sections. Some at FAC might ask you to remove box quotes from the article alltogether (I've seen this even at DYK and GAN), therefore I'd suggest to at least fix the sandwiching in those sections (remove one of the quotes in the Development and Reception sections).
Some references use title case, some don't. You can either choose to change them all to title case via a simple script (User:ZKang123/TitleCaseConverter.js) or to sentence case manually. This is something that you should address now, otherwise someone will mention that at FAC.
Regarding the reliability of references, most of them seem to be okay though I have a few objections - GameOctane (ref 8), GAU Studios (ref 29), Six One Indie (ref 31), Dubl day (ref 35), GAU Studios (ref 37), NobleGames (ref 42). Considering that these references all come from YouTube, the reliability of said videos is tied to the status of the video publishers on Wikipedia (e.g. if a video by IGN, which is a reliable source according to Wikipedia, is used in an article, it can be kept because of IGN's status as a reliable source). Game Rant should be removed from the article because it is not a high-quality source.

I do not plan giving the article a read at PR, but once you get the article at FAC, make sure to ping me and you'll get a thorough prose review. I'd also suggest pinging the GA reviewer and other PR reviewers to see if they'd be willing to review the article again. If you encounter the lack of reviewers at FAC, I'd suggest asking editors on the WP:VG talk page or Discord. Vacant0 (talk • contribs) 15:59, 18 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for these points.

I've added captions to both videos. The videos are freely licensed, so I'd prefer keeping them.
Italicized.
I've removed a few box quotes including the sandwich ones, but I've kept the others I feel add some worthy information.
Thanks for the script. I'll switch the refs to title case.
All of the citations you've mentioned (including Game Rant) are interviews and should be treated as primary sources.

I'll keep in mind you offer for later. Thank you! Tarlby ^{(t) (c)} 17:01, 18 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the reply. I get it that they're interviews, but a source reviewer could still suggest removing them. I'd not recommend doing that now though. That's up to the source reviewer to decide. Vacant0 (talk • contribs) 18:43, 18 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]