Talk:Dante (Devil May Cry)/Archive 1

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This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Contents 1 So I rewrote the whole thing 2 Neutrality 3 Interests and Hobbies 4 Guest Appearances 5 Voice? 6 Last name 7 voice actors 8 Immortal or not 9 The more power line 10 What, no pictures? 11 Ebony and Ivory, Luce and Ombra, info moved to here, pages redirected 12 infinite ammo for his guns 13 Powers section cleaned up 14 Upcoming anime 15 The pic 16 In-universe and references 17 Encyclopedic tone and other general messyness 18 Defining the messiness 19 Overhauling 20 In-Universe review again 21 Peer Review 22 No action on peer review, so... 23 Lead image 24 Reference tag

So I rewrote the whole thing

Anyway, I figured I'd expand on the character a bit. I've broken it three sections, one a biography of sorts, the second a list of his abilities and the weaponry he uses (as the game is an action game and such things are important to the subject), and the third because I wanted to basically. I think each one is valid; if you want to make major changes, explanation here would be welcome.

Neutrality

I'm not sure that the comments you made about DMC2 are appropriate in the context of an encyclopedia. Although I personally agree with you, not everyone will, and besides the game does have some positive attributes (for example the ability to modify the 'style' of DT using the amulet is an interesting innovation). I think that this section should be fleshed out and the clear bias removed. Also because you advocate not buying the game, this is negative endorsement and therefore against Wikipedia policy... I can't quote specifics from the policy but I'm sure this is not allowed. Aside from this, I found the rest of the article to be well-written and also nicely-structured... A good job overall, but for that one throwaway comment! 7Munkys 14:10, 29 July 2005 (UTC)

Interests and Hobbies

I really think the Interests and Hobbies section should be removed. Most of the points there are pure speculation. None of them are actual facts at all. The person who made that only points out possibilities on why he has or does this.

I guess you could be right, besides, that info is hardly relevant about him. (Alexlayer 20:30, 26 November 2006 (UTC))

Guest Appearances

Hello there,

I've just added a section for Dante's appearances in other videogames. They may only be minor appearances, but I feel they reflect Dante's popularity and importance as a videogame character.

Cheers,

--LongHairStu 22:18, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

Voice?

Does anybody know who does the voice for Dante in each game? Is it a different person for each game, or what? Cheers in advance. Dragonfly888 23:05, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

Last name

What's the source on the last name Bollea?

voice actors

I added the voice actors from all the games, and I just read the preview of the new DMC novel from Tokyo pop it looks like Dante's (and Enzo Ferino's) past might get filled in a little of course that’s assuming that the main character Tony is really Dante but until the book is released in June it's anyone's guess but read for yourself [1]. But like I said it all just a speculation

Immortal or not

Is there a definate anwser to Dante and Vergil's mortality

It is extremely hard to kill them by normal means. They can regenerate their limbs but it likely sresses them greatly. When Dante fought Virgil for the first time in DMC3, the reason Dante was hurt so much is do to the fact that the Yamato (Virgil's sword) is a devil arm meaning it is prime for killing demons/devils. When Lady shoots Dante in the head this is minor damage. -- Psi edit 17:50, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

The more power line

That voice is not dante's, does anyone mind if i edit it?

What, no pictures?

At the very least, the page should include one of the standard shots from the first game. The other character pages for the Devil May Cry series have them (Vergil and Sparda). Personally, I'd like to see one shot from each of his game appearances; DMC 1-2-3-4, Viewtiful Joe, and Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne. --Boradis 02:57, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, guess I'll do what I can (Alexlayer 03:34, 17 November 2006 (UTC))

Done, I uploaded and added some images, they are all rightfully used, with licensing and source. Now the article looks nice ^_^ (Alexlayer 04:30, 17 November 2006 (UTC))

Awesome! Great job. I just cleaned up the DMC4 page to get rid of the "Wikipedia quality standards" tag. At the moment, all the DMC-related pages are looking pretty frickin' sweet. --Boradis 07:14, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

Ebony and Ivory, Luce and Ombra, info moved to here, pages redirected

As their pages were tagged as orphans (with few or no pages linking to them, indicating their low utility as separate pages) I incorporated their information here and redirected their pages. The guns are really extensions of Dante's character rather than something separate enough to warrant their own Wikipedia entries. I added a note that they are called Luce and Ombra when the player selects the "Legendary Dark Knight" costume, but no more really needs to be said as their only distinction is a different name. --Boradis 00:22, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

infinite ammo for his guns

Under the "magic guns" wikipedia article it states Dante's guns never run out of bullets due to converting the magic in the air to ammunition. Also, I remember reading a message board one time where a person asked the question and someone mentioned in some artile, promotional material, or something that the guns embody the power of heaven and hell each respecitivly and as long as one fires right after the other they are kept in perfect balacne. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Seekquaze (talk • contribs) 06:13, 14 December 2006 (UTC).

• We need a specific and official explanation from Capcom, and if you could track it down you'd answer a question that's clung to this series since the first game. But remember that other Wikipedia articles or your personal memories of message board discussions don't qualify as official. --Boradis 19:32, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Powers section cleaned up

I just totally rewrote it, and by keeping to the facts it comes in it at two paragraphs. Perhaps we can remove the cleanup tag now, but I'll let others decide that. --Boradis 23:44, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Upcoming anime

With the TV series coming out some time in 2007, I'm wondering what would be the procedure for including information about Dante from the show. Would it make sense (when the series debuts) to create a separate article for the animated Dante, or as sub-sections of this page? I know I'm early in raising this topic, but it's going to come up and it's better to plan ahead. --Boradis 20:07, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

I say a seperate article. Adding the Anime Dante info to this article would make it twice (or maybe more) as long. Not that it matters toi the subject, but I have a feeling the Anime is going to fail anyway, because of how hard it would be to draw certain battles with some Bosses. That's just me though.--KojiDude ^{(Contributions)} 05:13, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

I added the sparse info currently available on the anime to this page (with citations!), in the interest of noting all of Dante's major appearances. When there is more information on the show, I'll spin it off into a page of its own, but for the time being it's brief enough to keep here. --Boradis 20:17, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

The pic

This pic of dante is kinda bad(i.e. no face). any better ones?Quatreryukami 20:01, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

I'll see what I can do —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Alexlayer (talk • contribs) 20:15, 22 January 2007 (UTC).

good pic. thxQuatreryukami 16:20, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

In-universe and references

I think it should be OK to remove these two tags from the top now. A lot of rewriting has been done that keeps it clear this is a work of fiction and not real (Wikipedia:Manual of Style (writing about fiction)), so I think "In-universe" is no longer a problem. The references have been noted, when they aren't the actual games themselves (Wikipedia:Citing sources), so I think that's fixed. If no one objects within a few days, I'll remove them. Or feel free to do so yourself if you concur. --Boradis 20:24, 23 January 2007 (UTC) (typo edited out by me --Boradis 20:27, 23 January 2007 (UTC))

It's still a pretty flawed article in my opinion. You have to do better than just saying "this events occurred in Game A" and then proceed reiterate the plot. The lead feels more like a character bio from a fansite than the leading paragraph of an encyclopedic article and there's very little attempt to cover the character from a real world perspective.

Some random suggestions.

• Write a new lead. One that's more encyclopedic and provides a brief overview of the character from the real world, rather than something that reads like a character description from an instruction manual.

• Drop the usage of acronyms (DMC) and informal titles (Devil May Cry 1) completely. Again, this is okay for a fansite, but not an encyclopedia.

• Reduce the amount of plot summary in the article. Dante is the central character in the series, so describing everything he does in each game will basically resort to just providing plot summaries of the game. There's no need for that here. Eliminate the game-by-game sections and just provide a comprehensive section that covers all of Dante's in-game appearances. I would suggest to do the same with the "guest appearances".

• Drop some of the more inuniverse sections like "Ebony and Ivory", "Interests" and "Powers".

• I would also suggest to cover the games and manga/novel separately, since the manga and novel are offshot products of the games. A primary section for video games and a second section for literature.

• Look for references (i.e: developer interviews, sourcebooks, ect.).

There are more things to fix, those are just the first things to come in mind. I would recommend reading Link (The Legend of Zelda) and Solid Snake as examples of featured articles dedicated to game characters. Jonny2x4 03:24, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Great suggestions, and after gladly comparing this page to those I have some further thoughts.

• I agree on the "Interests" section, but the Link page also includes sections on Skills and Dexterity (he's left-handed apparently, whoo), so I don't agree on the "Powers" section, and "Ebony and Ivory" could stay (or be rolled into Powers) if we chop it down to about 3-4 sentences (like Link's "Skills" section).
  • Dante's guns and powers are something that could be described as part of Dante's characters, rather than devoting an entire section to them. Besides, I don't see how Ebony and Ivory are as revelant to the character as say, Force Edge/Sparda.
    • IMO, E&I are more relevant to his character than that sword -- in truth, Dante barely uses it. The character uses Force Edge only briefly at the beginning of the first game, then briefly uses the Sparda sword at the very end. In the third game, the DMC1 and LDK costumes appear to use the Force Edge, but it's only a different "costume" for the Rebellion, no gameplay changes. Vergil uses FE far more, as he has it all through his DMC3:SE path, and Trish uses Sparda all through her path in DMC2. The guns however are the only weapons Dante's used in every appearance in every medium (as I pointed out at the top of their section) and the "high time" mechanic, for which those guns are essential, is pretty much what defined the character and gameplay.

• On the recaps, the Link page and the Solid Snake page both include brief summaries of each game appearance, so I think they should stay, although much shorter. I've also tried to keep the summaries focused on his character development, as opposed to where he went and who he fought and so on. (And honestly, I'm reluctant to just chop out a lot of the work of other editors and replace it with mine. I don't want to be a dick [2].)
  • Which is pretty much what I've suggested. There's a big difference between being a dick and being bold. Sometimes, you have to get rid of other editors' input if they don't fit into the overall scope of the article.

• On the abbreviations, the Solid Snake page makes use of them also, so I think they're not out of line here (typing (and reading) "Devil May Cry" over and over gets tiresome), though they would also be reduced greatly by further cutting of verbiage overall.
  • Where? Outside the infobox, the Solid Snake page always make use of the game's title, or at the very least the subtitle, instead of using "MGS" all the time. Same thing with Link.

• • • Well, yeah, now. But then I see it was you who just removed the other instance of it from Snake's page. ;) I do agree though, seriously.

• Most of the references are to the games themselves, as we've found that the english-language game manuals are untrustworthy at best, and some of their character info in them is made up whole cloth (calling Force Edge "Woozy" in the first game manual, for instance). And there aren't many (if any) english-language bonus guidebooks or whatever, of the canonical official type released in Japan -- I haven't seen one for sale anyhow. So our main sources of info are the games, and what magazine articles that can be tracked down or are linked to online.

• • You sure about that? Capcom has been using translations of the Japanese manuals, as opposed to doing different stuff, in the English localizations of their games since the late 90s (as far as RE3). The manual seems to imply that Woozy is more of a nickname for the Force Edge than a legit name for the sword. I don't see how the manuals cannot be reliable.

• • • Good point, and thanks. Still, there's not much else besides the games and their brief little manuals available in english. The nickname "Woozy" was never uttered in the games though, so I think it's discountable.

• • At the very least, try to cite in-game quotes for references.

• • • Sure, makes sense. LankyBugger did that for the DMC2 page.

Anyhow, I totally agree on the lead, and I'm gonna chop it down now. Perhaps you could pitch in on the editing, since what you suggest is going to take some work. --Boradis 07:04, 25 January 2007 (UTC) (fixed my "dick" link --Boradis 18:28, 25 January 2007 (UTC))

• • I working on a few Resident Evil articles and cleaning up the Ninja Gaiden characters, but I'll definitely take stab at Dante later.Jonny2x4 21:08, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

• • • Thanks, the other couple of guys who have been helping out (particularly on the Characters page, and I was really pleased with the results there) have been less active the last couple weeks. And the DMC pages are in need of more experienced eyes and hands on them. I'd appreciate any help. --Boradis 02:05, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Encyclopedic tone and other general messyness

I read through the talk page beforehand, and decided to edit sections of the article. I made many changes regarding the page's encyclopedic tone and general content issues. I hope they were appropriate. Please tell me if it wasn't necessary or if someone else feels they had a better plan of action.

The edits I made, outside of general typos or grammatical errors are as follows:

-Rewrote the section on "Powers" (now re-named: "Abilities")- I compared the "powers" section on the article to the article on Link. In that article, a section named "Skills" served the same purpose as "powers" but it was incredibly concise, covered the areas in needed to cover, and was easy to understand for someone who's never played Zelda before. I tried to mimic that style, although my rewritten section was longer due to having to include devil trigger.

-Removed a part of the section on Ebony and Ivory regarding the ability "High-time."- Whatever may be Dante's "signature attack" has not been confirmed by reliable sources nor is it apparently obvious in-game, to my knowledge.

-Edited and rewrote parts of the "Appearances" section- The plot summary for DMC1 was consice and well done, but I felt some information could've been further compressed while not taking away important information. I also edited the other parts of the "Appearances" section accordingly, except for the piece regarding Devil May Cry 3. It had no plot summary. Speaking of which, I am now beginning to question if plot summaries are what are needed for an "Appearances" section. If they are unnecessary, then I apologize for those edits regarding the "Appearances" section. Anyhow, the summary for DMC3 had no summary at all, with which I provided one. I re-edited it and shrunk it down several times the best I could, but I still feel it is a bit long. Also, I have not played Devil May Cry 2, so I could not provide a summary.

-Moved the section regarding allusions to The Divine Comedy- I thought it was more important to have the "Origin" section following the lead, rather than this section. It kind of felt like something more important than trivia but less important than other sections, so I placed it after the "Origin", "Appearances", "Abilities", and "Ebony and Ivory" sections of the article but before the "Other Appearances" and "Voice Actors" sections.

I am a fresh-from-the-oven new user. I actually joined right in the middle of making all of these edits to the article. I am sorry I didn't notify everyone before editing and will do so in the future.The "New" Door 03:06, 28 January 2007 (UTC)The "New" Door 28 January

I've done some further tightening of your generally excellent contributions. My only quibble would be over the "Abilities" section, as it is now one paragraph about his normal state -- which is how the character is seen about 95 percent of the time -- and three paragraphs about Devil Trigger, which accounts for (maybe) the other five percent. And honestly, what needs to be said about DT other than it increases his speed, adds regeneration, and absorbs powers from the current devil arm? I think his usual strength, speed, leaping and infinite ammo (which are always present) should take precedence. --Boradis 23:54, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

• • Thank you, I do agree with you over the Abilities section, I felt it was a bit long winded before. However, I disgress the statement that Lady reloads her weaponry in cutscene only, as during the boss fight with he, I very much remember her ocassionally stopping to reload her pistol. You can change it back if I'm actually wrong, although I should probably load up the game and just see for myself...too lazy, I'll trust your judgement. I also changed phrase "absorbs the power of his melee weapon" to "augment the abilities of his equipped devil arm (melee weapon." This could be debateable, but I don't think he really absorbs the power, gameplay-wise, but strengthens and adds extra gimmicks to the weapon's abilities.

• • Thank you for also tightening his DMC3 summary, although DMC2 still needs a proper bio synapsis.

• • That all said and done, do you think it is okay to remove any of the tags now? --The "New" Door 17:44, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

• • • See above for the discussion on that, Jonny2x4 had some valid points that we haven't fully addressed yet. I still want/need to consolidate the long "Major appearances" section into a more concise summary, similar to that of Link (Legend of Zelda) and Solid Snake. The plot summaries on those pages are extremely concise. --Boradis 18:36, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

• • • Also, I do think saying he absorbs powers from his devil arms is the most accurate. Consider when using either Nevan or Alastor he channels their lightning abilities through his body, and gains the power of flight. In the third game, Devil Triggering with Rebellion enables him to glide, and Cerberus grants him even greater running speed. And Devil Triggering while using the awakened Sparda sword turns him into Sparda. --Boradis 18:45, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

• I still disgress the "absorbs" or "augments" argument, but I won't start an edit war over it. Over more important matters, I think if the Appearances section really needs to be cut down (I see what you mean after looking at Snake's article) then I greatly suggest moving the mini-sections about the Novels, Manga, and upcoming Anime to an entirely new section, while also cutting them down as well. I think it's safe to remove the uncylopedic tone tag once this whole Appearances business is fixed up. (Although I think the section about Lady reloading her guns was much more formal the way I edited it before rather than "who is also a gunslinger." It isn't entirely important right now, though.) For right now, I definitely think the sources tag can be removed, unless I missed something.--The "New" Door 20:22, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

• • I agree about "gunslinger" and didn't add it, it's a peacock term in my book. There's a difference between formal and simple as well, and it's best when descriptions are both. I think people too often confuse "formal" with "verbose," and that's not true. I'll change that bit back to the way I had it: "However, in Devil May Cry 3, the character Lady is shown needing to reload." It doesn't need to say "when her ammo runs out" (which would be less wordy than "upon exhausting her ammunition") because when else is she going to reload? It doesn't need to say "gunslinger" since, duh, she's reloading a gun, and we don't need to "zazz" things up.

I agree about moving the manga, novels and anime to another section, but I do think it belongs on the page as it charts the character's interpretations and growth. --Boradis 04:57, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

• I like the work done on the "Other Appearances" section, although I didn't think it needed editing. It didn't seem to significantly hurt the article or make it any better. I agree with you. I forgot that encyclopedic doesn't mean "shove Webster's Thesaurus up their ass." :) Forgive me. As for finally removing the tags, I think the tag regarding citing sources could be removed now. I still can't find anywhere that doesn't have a citation where needed, but perhaps my eyes aren't as acute as some others. However, I still think we can remove that tag. I want to move the Novel / Manga / Anime section into the "Other Appearances" section, but I need to find a way to splice it and keep it concise.--The "New" Door 00:04, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

I apologize for reassembling almost the entire article, but I noticed quite a bit of messiness and I was asked to fix this article up by another member since they felt that I did an excellent job on the Dragon Ball related articles. I must admit, I know next to nothing about this series and the character, but I think I added stuff to this article and (for the most part) assembled it in the desired "encyclopedic" format. It's not much, but it's pointed in the right direction now. Feel free to revert, do whatever. But I believe the set up now is close to the Wikipedia encyclopedic format.--Majinvegeta 21:14, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

I just reverted it. Bring something like this up here first, and when there's a consensus make the changes. If you've got a better plan for the article's structure, awesome. How about we go one section at a time? --Boradis 01:01, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

I am not entirely sure that would work, I mean it has been tagged for months and nobody does nothing until somebody tries to fix the messines on it; it has been almost a month since last time it was cleaned up, after that all the work for article upgrade dissapeared, if such a thing is going to be done we need compromise from all of us now don't just revert it, leave it in shambles and just go do something to actually help the article's problem. Or do you prefer to leave it sounding unprofesional with lines such as red-clad siver-haired devil-hunter these sound amateurish and are out of encyclopedic tone. -Dark Dragon Flame 01:43, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm not saying "don't touch it," I'm saying CONSENSUS BEFOREHAND, or at the very least some notification first. Wait. Discuss. That's the responsible way to rework an article. I won't re-revert it though, and it still needs much more work to get close to Good Article standards. It would be great if someone who has worked on a Featured Article on another videogame, and is knowledgable in DMC, would rework this whole thing. --Boradis 04:41, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Re-wording is the first step. I agree with Dark Dragon Flame, and I don't blame the tag for being there. This article sounds amaturish, and doing one section at a time is painstaking and just takes too long. eg. We redid the ENTIRE Son Goku article (Dragon Ball Z), which was MUCH longer than this one (about 4-5 times), in only a week and a half. People kept talking about making it better, shorter, less confusing, but everyone kept discussing and nobody would take the initiative, so one day when I had time, I practically chopped it in half without notifying anyone. A few people were pissed, but most of them were happy and followed my example, and the entire article was redone quickly and effectively. I'm just saying that discussion is fine, but experimentation with different versions is the key if you're truly to get anywhere. Contribute as much as you can without notice, and then if through consensus you decide that the older version is better, then reverting can happen. This way you get it done quickly, and there's no harm in that. --Majinvegeta 05:54, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Announcing one's intentions beforehand doesn't prevent you from then following through on them. The only reason to NOT make an announcement is to avoid discussion or review of one's ideas. There's no other advantage, since you could have chopped the Goku page in half even after announcing your plan. --Boradis 07:41, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Ok we can all agree to discuss big changes before hand right? let's keep the page we have now and start working from here, after all we all have the same goal, to make the article better no matter if we have different points of view we must always keep a cool head. -Dark Dragon Flame 07:50, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Defining the messiness

I just re-re-re-re-read the article top to bottom, and I don't see any problem with the language used. Peacock terms are gone, spelling is correct, redundancies are minimal. What I think we need is more cites for information, and some general tightening. I never have gotten around to consolidating the game appearances section, so I'll try and tackle that next. Honestly, I think that's the source of most people's impression of "messiness." --Boradis 20:41, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

The thing that made it look messed in the first place was the order of the sections, by now that is solved along the "Peacock terms" but it definetily needs more citations. -Dark Dragon Flame 21:40, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

It still suffers from the same problem as before, in the sense that it mainly references the fiction itself and cites the plot of each game/book/whatever, rather than providing a real world viewpoint of the character. It makes no mention of real world information, such as the character designer or the fact that Dante was modeled after the title character of Space Adventure Cobra. The new lead is even worse than the one I wrote since it doesn't even give a basic description of the character.Jonny2x4 01:23, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

I've heard about "Cobra" a few times. As well as people saying Dante's really Chris Redfield, InuYasha, or Vash the Stampede. If you've got a cite that Cobra was in Hideki Kamiya's mind when creating Dante, awesome. Don't know what your problem with the lead is, since it's all real-world information. Nothing about his backstory or the fictional history of the "Sparda Universe." Know what, let's just pick a Good or Featured article on another videogame character and just duplicate its structure and content priorities, and call it done. Seriously. Wikipedia isn't for our own creativity, it's for information, period. --Boradis 03:52, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

It's actually better at least the structure is more organized, besides that is not that different. If you have the proper citations for that info add it there's a need for such information here. -Dark Dragon Flame 01:32, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Also adding links to other articles reduces the size of this one. That way, if people want to find out more about Devil May Cry 3 or whatever, they can simply click on the link to the Devil May Cry 3 article (if there is one), and all the info is there. Citations are always good. And Jonny2x4, if you want to add a basic description of the character to the appearence section, I see no problem with you doing that. And I also agree; with me knowing very little about Dante, the descrition of him is very vague. I also believe that we could find a different picture then the main picture that we have now, its very dark and it's hard to see him.--Majinvegeta 01:45, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

As I said above, let's just duplicate the logic and layout of a featured article on another video character. No need to reinvent the wheel. We've got three choices of what to emulate according to the video game portal: Bulbasaur, Torchic, and Link. In other words, Dante has to measure up to two Pokemon and an elf in tights. Here's the featured article version of Link, but somehow I just can't bring myself to try and model Dante's page after Bulbasaur. (Link link tweaked) --Boradis 07:50, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

As a member of WikiProject Zelda I have worked with Link in the past and I really like how it looked the page was even featured so I think the elfs win this one, there's no way I'm rewriting it after Bulbasaur at least Link knows how to use a sword. -Dark Dragon Flame 04:28, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Overhauling

So I'm taking my own advice and A) announcing a big revision before I make it, and B) modeling the revision on the Featured Article version of Link (Legend of Zelda). I'm going to rework the "Games", "Other media", and "Guest appearances" sections into an overall "Appearances" section. I'll break it up similar to the Link page, but rather than going by year, as with the prolific Zelda series, it will be one paragraph on each of the four games, a brief mention of "Deadshot", then "Non Devil May Cry appearances", "Cameo appearances" (which is what the "SNK vs. Capcom: Card Fighter DS" appearance was), and "Other media" which is where the novels, manga and anime will be listed.

Then I have a radical proposal which, while a bit extreme, will satisfy hardcore Wikipedians: I think we should wholesale delete all "facts" for which a reference is not currently provided. And since that means an awful lot of facts that fans of the series take for granted, I'd like MajinVegeta to give insight on this. She understands making a page encyclopedic, but has little knowledge of this series. She'll have a better idea of what should be questioned than those who have the fan mindset. For instance, a bunch of the mentions of Dante's age don't have cites, but fans might just nod and think, "that sounds about right." Then after that, we need to start assembling sources for cites. 1UP.com and IGN.com are both good starting points for interviews with Capcom, but we should also Google the names of the creators together with Dante to find information that's a little more obscure. I'm not just going to do this bit on my own though, it's how I think it should be done. But if no one objects, I'll get out the pruning sheers and go to town.

On a minor note, another thing about the Link page that might make it seem more "serious" to a casual reader is the dominance of text over pictures. I know it was I who called for pictures here a while back (look further up this page for that post) but perhaps we've gone too far in the other direction now. I suggest pulling the novel, manga, anime, SMT:III and Viewtiful Joe pics first. I hesitate on this though because Alexlayer has done a lot of work tracking them down and properly adding them with copyright information.

Anyhow, that's what I'm doing and thinking. --Boradis 01:50, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Just a little question when you talk about Link's article having text dominance over pictures you are talking about the featured version right? cause the version we have right now I removed 12 uneeded pictures about a week ago but it still has a little too many, about the rest it sounds right I don't know how some people will react about taking out the citation less facts but I like the idea. -Dark Dragon Flame 04:21, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Yup, the Featured Version. No point in emulating any other version, since it's the featured one that hit all the right notes and got reviewed. --Boradis 05:20, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Regarding the un-cited facts, they don't belong in Wikipedia anyhow. No senior Wikipedian would argue with gutting this article down to absolute bare-bones information with just release dates, sales figures, creative credits and nothing else -- as long as all the information was cited. But I think those actually involved here would prefer to find a middle road and keep all the information that's useful and interesting to new and veteran players of the games, AND have it all be verifiable. Honestly, "messiness" is a distant second to verifiability here and no one, myself included, has taken much action on that front. We all need to step up our game on that front, and it's going to be more actual work than tidying the layout. --Boradis 19:15, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Next up: I'm going to move information about the creation of Dante from the Devil May Cry page to here for a new "Conception and creation" section, again modeled after the [Featured Article version of Link]. It will likely be far briefer than Link's section however, but I do have cites for what it will say from interviews with Shinji Mikami in 2001 when the first game was released. --Boradis 19:35, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Now, I'm going to roll "Appearance", "Origin", "Abilities", and "Literary roots" into one section called "Characteristics", just like on Link's page. --Boradis 23:49, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

In-Universe review again

So at this point I'm thinking the article might be able to lose the In-Universe tag (which was added by an anonymous user, making contacting them for input unreliable). A known vandal yanked it off the page the other day, and I replaced it. But are we sufficiently out-of-universe now to remove the tag? Thoughts? --Boradis 20:28, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Oops, my mistake. It wasn't anonymous, it was Jonny2x4. What do you think? --Boradis 20:36, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Peer Review

Per a suggestion by Jonny2x4, I'm putting this article up for a peer review. I would have requested an assessment as he actually suggested, but the process for attaining an A-rating is not active right now. See this page. --Boradis 03:36, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

No action on peer review, so...

... I'll just sign up for an assessment. --Boradis 10:26, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Assessment can't do anything for you. I try to keep up on assessments, but I have no time for a peer review. Once I do, this article is surely on my list. --User:Krator (t c) 19:29, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Great! Thanks! I thought maybe it was too low a priority for those involved in peer reviews. --Boradis 23:53, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Lead image

Great. Do we have an uploaded image of Dante that is completely properly tagged? --Boradis 09:43, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Let me see, mmm... yes! There's still one I uploaded that hasn't yet been deleted because of being orphaned. --Alexlayer 16:39, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Cool. But is it in fact totally properly tagged? I admit to knowing basically nothing about the whole image approval process, but I do know that if this one isn't totally kosher it will get removed too. --Boradis 00:02, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, I think it is. I don't know the WHOLE process, but it has the licensing and source, which I add to all the images I upload. Besides, this image has been before in the article until someone changed it with a similar one with white background, but THAT image wasn't properly tagged and ended up deleted. This image we're using again has been there for a long time, so I think we can rely on it. --Alexlayer 01:18, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Cool, plus the lead image on this page is extremely dark, its a cool image, just difficult to see him. Anyone agree? --Majinvegeta 19:12, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, but then again that's the feel of the game maybe one without background would be better. --DDF 19:16, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, before the actual one, I had added this image which I thought it was cool, but I decided to remove it after someone complained about it saying that the face could not be seen clearly. However, if there're votes for this picture, it can always be uploaded again. --Alexlayer 04:08, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Reference tag

I just added a bunch of in game references so I removed it, the article still needs some refs but this tag is no longer needed. As a side note I finally came up with a reference for the Soul Calibur information here [3]--凶 23:17, 4 April 2007 (UTC)