Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Grand Theft Auto series storyline

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus (Liberatore, 2006). 17:34, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Grand Theft Auto series storyline

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some original research, content better suited for a fansite, not appropriate for an encyclopedia. WP:NOT--Philo 07:20, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

• And oh yeah...um 'original research?' You better rephrase that, cause otherwise it sound retarded saying its not appropriate.-Ganfon
• Comment' What's original research about it? Every event seems to be taken directly from the games, making it nothing more than a thorough plot outline. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 07:45, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
• I think Keep because it isn't really original research, it seems worthy to be in the encyclopedia, and I don't think it'd be easy merging it (it would make the article huge). --Alex ^{talk here} 10:41, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep or merge per Night Gyr. --CharlotteWebb 10:42, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
• Weak merge Or maybe move it to a grand theft auto wikia if there is one. Michael Billington (talk • contribs) 10:52, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
• Note: The first line of the article is not encyclopedic, the second one is self reference. The lead should be cleaned up to address this. - Mgm|^(talk) 12:43, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, I personally believe that it's ridiculous to consider deleteing this page. It is well put together and i don't see anything on the timeline that can't be proven as fact. It is also a great idea for an article as its interesting and informative. So i believe we should definetly Keep this article.--Greene01 —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Greene01 (talk • contribs).
• Merge Condense down to the key points and merge into GTA main article · XP · 14:54, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
• Merge per XP. —Scott5114↗ 17:12, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
• Merge per XP. Wildthing61476 18:17, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. A decent article containing too much information to be comfortably merged into Grand Theft Auto (series). Additionally this article is entirely spoilers and there's a good argument for keeping it separate from the main article about the series. VoiceOfReason 19:07, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
• Note: This debate has been added to the list of CVG deletions. Mitaphane _talk 21:16, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
• Weak Keep if improved The main flaw with this article is an apparent GTA3 onwards bias. If the article was more appropriately named, this wouldn't be a problem. Each statement needs to be sourced as to which game they came from. LinaMishima 01:08, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

• Keep and complete rewrite, per LinaMishima. The article has potential and could serve as the "plot and storyline" segment for all GTA games; it just isn't written in a manner that would be considered encyclopedic (list-only passages, in particular), and disregards pre-GTA III games and also GTA Advance. Also consider fairly good examples such as StarCraft storyline and Half-Life series storyline. The Half-Life series storyline article in particular was actually spawned from FAC comments on Half-Life 2 that its plot section is far too long for the parent article; thus, to me, a merge to respectable articles is not advisory and a specialized article is a better way to go to avoid needless rewriting in an event any of the GTA articles undergo an FAC nomination. ╫ ２５ ^{◀RingADing▶} 10:54, 30 August 2006 (UTC) ╫
  • Withdrawing vote for the time being, in the light of RandyWang's justification. ╫ ２５ ^{◀RingADing▶} 10:20, 1 September 2006 (UTC) ╫
• Keep. The article was really brought to life days ago and considered for deletion already? Give it some time and things will improve to your 'encyclopedic' needs. NSRegentPark 10:59, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
• Delete, as WP:NOT specifically mentions that Wikipedia is not a collection of plot summaries. This information should be merged into the respective articles, if anything, but since that information already appears to exist there I don't believe it needs an article unto itself. There's not really much scope for improvement here, since the storyline is best handled in the articles of the specific games. RandyWang (^chat/_patch) 12:03, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Comment I was about to agree with you until I read the article. It's not a plot summary at all, but a time line of the game. You shouldn't judge articles based on titles, but content. --Pinkkeith 16:31, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

• Keep because it's a valuable article for every GTA fan out there and it explains everything. But it's also interesting for no-GTA-players because they can learn how great GTA is with all the facts and stuff. ProSieben 15:55, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, but rewrite :) Dlohcierekim 17:23, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
• Delete as per RandyWang. We are not here to help GTA fans, rather, to help the uninitiated understand a particular topic. This article does not achieve that. I find these summaries hard to follow, and yet I've played two of the four games to completion! I honestly think this is far better covered by the paragraph-style summaries on each page. They tell who Ken Rosenberg is, and why Claude was betrayed, without introducing unproven details like Maria being Salvatore's wife. By all means move it to Grand Theft Auto Wiki, but it doesn't belong here. Garrett^Talk 21:22, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
• You obviously don't know what your talking about because your so called unproven fact has actually been proven. You may be interested to know that both Salvatore and Maria say that there married in Liberty City Stories. All real GTA fans know this. So next time do a little research before you call something unproven. And this is a great article which we should definetly KEEP--Greene01 user has already voted above, removing personal attacks.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Greene01 (talk • contribs).
  • I'm talking about proven as in references (either quoting dialogue or even just saying "as revealed in"), rather than it being true or not; it doesn't matter whether it's true, it needs proof and context to back it up. Your response only further reinforces my point: 99% of the 2001 section is drawn solely from GTAIII, but where the wife detail comes from isn't explained, similar to how Claude is called Claude without noting when this name was confirmed. If people who have played one or none of the games are to understand they need to know where the name Claude came from all of a sudden, and why Maria is married when not a word was said about it in GTAIII. Please refer to WP:NOT#Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information #7: "Plot summaries - ... articles should not act solely as a summary of the plot of a work of fiction, but should offer comprehensive, summarised plots in conjunction with sourced analysis ... within the article, or as part of a series of articles" It doesn't matter how wonderful or popular an article is, if it breaks these rules it goes bye-byes. And, for the record, readily stating someone can't be a "real" GTA fan simply because you misunderstood what they said is a quick route to offending them. Garrett^Talk 07:48, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
    • As ProSieben said below. Its unrealistic to have a link to every detail in order to prove them. This could be done but it would take a lengthy amount of time and the article would look ridiculous. I don't see other articles's with a link for every bit of info said. I don't want to get in an argument but what you said is unrealistic. I can assure you that everything in that article is proven fact. Take my word or not. It doesn't bother me. Im just telling you what i know to be true. Im sorry if i came across too offensive but thats just how i feel.--Greene01
      • Comment - I don't really have a dog in this fight, not being much of a GTA fan (I tend to get bored very early into the games), but it seems to me that your criticisms are a good argument for rewriting and editing this article, not deleting it. I'm gonna stick with my keep recommendation. VoiceOfReason 07:51, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

* Keep, but rewriteNoelleWiley 18:58, 31 August 2006 Note: user's only edits are to AFD's, registered 2 days ago. [1]

Comment Do you want to prove every detail that appears on that page? I think that's a bad idea and what I read was true. Or do you want to prove the fact that the St. Jefferson Credit Union completed it's work between 1998 and 2001? ProSieben 13:11, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

• Keep, but rewrite into a synopsis, so as to become similar to what other works of fiction do. See any popular fiction book article for reference. Altair 19:50, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

• Comment hey. im confused. could someone please tell me if this breaks the rule Garret said or not??? if it does why are you ppl all voting to keep it?? & if it doesnt why did he say that?? this article rocks but if it breaks that rule it cant stay. gta wiki is a good place for this if it cant.219.88.86.183 21:44, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

• alright, the title was changed very early for no particular reason, since then it has been changed back, and has gone over a bit of an overhaul. The reason the timeline was brought to life in the first place, was to sort out all the different references to the different games, within the games. All the GTA games in the GTA III era reference another game, and often it gets confusing. The timeline sorts out, what happened where and when. It's not so much a plot summery as it is a timeline sorting out the very confusing sequence of events.-Ganfon
  • I am responsible for changing the title. The initial justification for the renaming was that even with the older GTA games' far more simplistic storylines or the lack thereof, it is worth explaining this in brief and associating it with the expanded storyline of the series' later releases, but not by continuality. The next step is simply sectioning the games by canon and game titles, which would have avoided the confusion resulting from intertwined storylines. The present arrangement, however, with a single linear sequence of location and time, is sure to cause overlapping of all the canons and blur the distinction between the later GTA games and the earlier GTA games, while the GTA III-canon-only exclusivity doesn't invite expansion or proper writing.

    I understand your interest of providing a timeline of events in the canon, but the current format of the article is just restrictive and narrow in scope, hence my initial recommendation to have the entire article rewritten with a proper encyclopedia format (but with some designs elements based on the current revision). ╫ ２５ ^{◀RingADing▶} 09:58, 3 September 2006 (UTC) ╫

• Merge This article should be in the main GTA III page. Even if it doesn't get deleted, the article needs a serious rewrite. It should be in paragraph form instead of bullets. --Benjaminx 18:52, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
• Delete per Randy Wang ⇒ SWATJester ^Ready Aim _Fire! 03:28, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
• Merge. Michael 07:04, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
• I'd like to applogize to all for my bad, and heat of the moment comment I made earlier on this page. To be quite honest i made it in a fit of anger and actually forgot about it, had I remembered I would have taken it off right away. this is truly embarressing for me and WILL NOT happen ever again. Thank you. that being said I still think that the edits that have been made to the page have made it fit it's title and should remain as it's own article. In response to the thought of including the early GTA games, the timeline is of the recent games that are labled under the GTA III Era timeframe. The earlier games do not play in at all to the events described in the timeline, hence why they are not included. Thank you.Ganfon 14:57, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

• Comment. RandyWang's justification is valid. Given that the article was created from scratch and is not a result of an article split (otherwise categorizing it as a part of a series of articles) means that it cannot be exempted from the no-plot-summaries criterion in WP:NOT. In addition, the plot summaries in all GTA titles are already sufficient and yet short enough that it doesn't requires any sort of article split.

  On the other hand, it has been noticed that substantial amounts of plot summaries were provided in most of the series' character listings; making them hard to track, find and piece together in those pages. It would have been a good idea to move much of these information into a dedicated article, providing easy readability of detailed plot summaries. I have also picked up a long addition in Grand Theft Auto (series) [2] that contains the storyline in the entire series in the form of prose (although it needs work). Merging any of the abovementioned bodies of text into this article would technically categorize it as part of a GTA article series. ╫ ２５ ^{◀RingADing▶} 09:58, 3 September 2006 (UTC) ╫

• Keep, but cleanup to more encyclopedic style. --Cpt. Morgan (Reinoutr) 14:01, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
• Withdraw Vote, the article is a complete mess at this point. And I do agree with the points made above, the summaries on the main pages are sufficient enough. I also think there are better storyline pages on GameFAQs -- if you could, collaborate with the author somehow.NSRegentPark 22:48, 8 September 2006 (UTC)
• The article is not a complete mess. it got alot better (be nice if the title didnt keep getting changed for some reason) the title of 'timeline' suits it the best. Plain and simple. The article's edits have helped it alot, this page may be a mess, but the article itself is not.Ganfon 00:58, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
• Keep and cleanup. I fail to see how referring to the primary source is original research. Dread Lord CyberSkull ✎☠ 02:10, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
• Merge and condenseas necessary. Combination 23:06, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
• Merge and do a big tidy. It's basically a summary of everything that's happened in all three games, but bits are interesting. Something like a graphical repersentation would be good, but certainly not in the same level of detail. +Fin- 16:23, 12 September 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Like Cpt. Morgan (Reinoutr). Hołek ҉ 11:37, 16 September 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, condense as necessary. Enclopedic summary of events across a series of games. Kappa 04:44, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.