The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 16:41, 26 March 2007.

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Devil May Cry 2[edit]

There's no doubt in my mind that the Devil May Cry 2 article is close to, if not meets the requirements for Featured Article status. Having recently been promoted to Good Article class, as well as having addressed the concerns raised in the Peer Review, I feel there is no other path for me to take than to present this article for review as a Featured Article and address any and all concerns other editors may have.

Thanks in advance to anyone who comments. Cheers, Lankybugger 19:11, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Weak Oppose — some issues, including: Support, most issues addressed.

• Inline queries — I added several queries for statements that need clarification.

• The inline queries were removed; the only one not stated below involves this sentence: "In contrast to the rest of the gameplay, the style judging system used in the game has been cited as the hardest in the series to impress." Clarification or another word may be necessary; is the word "impress" referring to the style judging system, or the player?

• Reception section — a paragraph of positive criticism needs to be added to balance out all the negative. Also has some referencing issues (see below)
• References — they need to be formatted properly (author, date published, etc: try to fill out as much of Template:Cite web as possible). Additionally, GameFAQs is usually not considered a reliable source; try GameSpot instead, because their reviews are edited and not user submitted, which makes them automatically more reliable down the line. Also, don't cite GameFAQs user reviews. Cite professional reviews by, say, GameSpot, IGN, and so on. See the reception section for Final Fantasy VIII or Final Fantasy VII for a good model. Another questionable source is the wii60 fan forum review, because it is not a published review with an editorial team like IGN, GameSpot, GameRankings, etc. Both of those sources are being used to cite the "black sheep" comment, so perhaps you should just omit that and say something along the lines of "the game attracted negative criticism in comparison to the first game".
• Spoiler warnings — generally redundant for sections labeled as "plot" in my opinion, although this is entirely subjective and based on the main editors' preferences, and not the guideline or the reviewers' wishes.

Overall, a good start. Positives are succinctness, most bases covered (except audio — did the game have a soundtrack?), and lack of fancrufty subarticles. It will still need an hour of work or so to attain FA status. — Deckiller 19:59, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• • Comment After a bit of thought, I agree. The "Black Sheep" comment has been excised for now (though I'll add it back if I can find a more reputable source for it). Additionally the marketing section has been restored to make room for information regarding the release of the soundtrack, which will also cover the audio information. The Reception section is in the process of being updated to cover a more positive spin, and going through to take care of the citations and fill them in as much as possible is in progress as well. Cheers, Lankybugger 20:24, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Additional Comment The first inline question you raised has been addressed by rewriting the sentence. Cheers, Lankybugger 20:34, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Looks good. I stuck that part off earlier. — Deckiller 20:38, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Looks like I got everything. I've finished with formatting all the remaining references. Cheers, Lankybugger 04:10, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Support if considerations above are carried out. Dåvid Fuchs ^{(talk / frog blast the vent core!)} 20:04, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Weak oppose. Basically what Deckiller said. --- RockMFR 20:07, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Also, Image:Dmc2diesel.jpg needs a source (it has the copyright status and fair use rationale, but where did it come from?) --- RockMFR 20:08, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment Image:Dmc2diesel.jpg has been sourced. Cheers, Lankybugger 01:55, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment my restructuring of the "black sheep" comment was reverted by a user. My oppose will unfortunately stand until those two sources are replaced by more reliable ones, or the sentence is restructured to provide a general overview of reception and criticism. — Deckiller 20:13, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Support It's is rather surprising to see how an article about a game regarded by some as a "lowpoint in the series", is the best article about the series here, the nomination has my support although the article could have a few small changes to improve like tha addition of some pre production artwork, its format looks good and it's well referenced. -Dark Dragon Flame 00:09, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Support. Chensiyuan 01:05, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Support the prose is alright, well-referenced, and after the gameplay pics were added (since there weren't any in the GA nom), I can help this nom. I only suggest to do a table of reviews (included in most VG FA's), and use more of "publisher" in the ((cite web)) template. igordebraga ≠ 17:47, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Mostly Support. The Article is good, I can see minor work that could be done on it, other then that, I say: Yes. It's good to go! --Majinvegeta 22:52, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Support - Informative, well sourced, and well organized. -- The Hybrid 23:13, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Actually, I have one more consideration: do you think you could add a 'characters' section to join with the plot, maybe under a new major heading? I think it would help to keep the people straight in the summary. Just a thought. Dåvid Fuchs ^{(talk / frog blast the vent core!)} 23:16, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I didn't want to create a characters section as it's already done in the Characters in Devil May Cry page. Maybe more wikilinking? I don't think it links to Matier's entry in the current article. Cheers, Lankybugger 03:40, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Ok, scratch that then, I didn't see you had already linked to it as a See also bit. I mean, perhaps you could have Characters, a description, with the Main Article > character pointers, but that's just personal preference to me and doesn't affect my consideration one way or another. Dåvid Fuchs ^{(talk / frog blast the vent core!)} 15:16, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Support I like what I see. Manderiko 13:21, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Trivial stuff - This is mostly nitpicking, as the article is otherwise quite nice.
  • The development team is uncited.
  • For cite #1, IMDB is a lousy source, especially for game staff.
  • Describing the controls is a bit excessive; is this necessary? It hasn't been done in other video game FAs.
  • Does ref #26 support the entirety of the first paragraph of Development? That ref only seems to say that he was disappointed, not when he was informed or that CPS4 wasn't involved in the development of DMC2.
  • "Instead, the sequel was granted to Capcom Production Studio 1 and Hideaki Itsuno, the team responsible for Capcom VS SNK 2." Ref?
  • Ref #29 does not justify "Due to the focus of Devil May Cry 2's action on style," as it makes no mention of Capcom's reasoning.
  • Ref #35 does not justify "however, the game still received decent scores from professional reviewers." It's just a list of statistics, and that is an evaluative statement drawing a conclusion from those statistics. Additionally, the evaluation is a tad iffy; many of those publications listed on that page panned the game.
  • All of Reception attributes evaluative claims to "players," then backs this up with citations to professional reviews. I don't have a problem with the content or the cites, but wouldn't it be stylistically better to say that reviewers mentioned these concerns?

  These concerns shouldn't be a big deal to resolve. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 19:35, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • • To address your points in order...
      • Dev team is now cited.
      • IMDB ref has been switched to a Moby Games ref.
      • Controls have been shortened and instead described in a more general manner.
      • Yep. A little further down, Kamiya states that the first notice he got about Devil May Cry 2 getting a sequel was when someone from another team (presumably Itsuno from CPS1, though it's not stated) asked Kamiya for the original Devil May Cry design documents because he was doing the sequel.
      • So ref'd.
      • See (what is currently) Ref 30. It mentions that Capcom sought the partnership with Diesel, beginning with the lead "Given the Devil May Cry series' emphasis upon style above all else". I suppose I should move (what is currently) Ref 29 down so that both Refs support the paragraph as a whole.
      • I've reworded the comment from "decent" (which is POV) to "mixed" (which is accurate). I'm going to be adding a review table per igordebraga, so that can speak for itself.
      • So changed. Thanks again for taking the time to review the FAC, and if anything else catches your eye feel free to throw it out there for me to handle. Cheers, Lankybugger ○ speak ○ see ○ 22:57, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• ACK. If you add a review table, I'll just add it to my list of nitpicks. It's never necessary to have a review table; it's just a bunch of arbitrary numbers. If a review has something relevant to say, add the comment to the article and cite it. If it doesn't, we don't need its arbitrary number score. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 02:36, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • Fair enough. I was sort of iffy on the review table myself. I was about to add it when I realized that I hadn't covered the sales figures for the game. At four paragraphs (which I'll be reducing to three soonish) it's getting pretty bloated. I think I've covered the bases of most people's opinion. Cheers, Lankybugger ○ speak ○ see ○ 03:21, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Nitpicks mark 2 - Reception edition. Consider any of my nitpicks above resolved, unless I bring them up again. I'll number these for easy reference.
  1. "Many fans of Devil May Cry were disappointed with this sequel;[37] however, the game still received mixed scores from professional reviewers." - Um. What? The change to the second half of this sentence makes it make little sense. Perhaps a rephrase? Also, why are we citing a 1up review (ref #37) as "many fans"?
  2. "Chief among the complaints was that the difficulty was lower than it was in the original game." - Complaints from whom? You mentioned fans of DMC and reviewers in the previous sentence, and it isn't clear what this is referring to.
  3. "The combat system is considered less refined" - "Is considered to be" is almost always useless weasel wording. This is a circuitous way of making a claim without atributing it to anyone, and I'm sure it could be rephrased.
  4. In fact, the rest of the first paragraph suffers from this vague attribution, with lots of "reviewers felt" or vague/non-existent attributions. Dig in an attribute the claims to authors and publications; this is common practice in film and book articles. Make it more like the second paragraph (where PSextreme should be italicized, BTW), but attribute the review authors as well. "Matt Cassamassina of IGN felt..." instead of "Reviewers felt..."
  5. Put the ref at the end. Twice that I noticed (refs #41 and #45), you put the ref in the middle of a sentence when the whole sentence is being attributed to that ref. There's no good reason to do that.

  Getting there... - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 07:06, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Iffy Support. Even though the art is, in fact, a great article, with all point in peer review covered, there are still a lot of points left to be covered. We need more information and less cruft. If someone else has said this, this makes 2. I own the game, and I will work on the art furhter to improve it. Then, maybe, we can stay featured. Quatreryukami 03:04, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment in response to Deckiller...

Yes, I agree there is little cruft, but for FA shouldn't we go for NO cruft??? Although I agree with the rest of your statement

• Further Comments

I took a night to sleep on it, and have decided my cruft accusations were not correct. I am now retracting earlyer accusations and changing my vote to Full Support. I would cross out earlyer votes, but dont know how...Quatreryukami 17:47, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, there is hardly any cruft in this article. The plot synopsis is four relatively short paragraphs, and the gameplay covers the major aspects, from what I see. — Deckiller 03:07, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment Quatreryukami, could you point out the things you feel are crufty? I might be missing something, but nothing in the current version of the article strikes me as fancruft. Cheers, Lankybugger ○ speak ○ see ○ 03:21, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.