Updating the No-Intro naming convention

General No-Intro related discussions.
KingMike
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by KingMike »

Right away I can think of the NES Mega Man games as examples of inconsistent titling. (also Ghost Lion/Legend of the Ghost Lion)
badinsults
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by badinsults »

Personally, I think the in-game title is probably the best way to go.
Gary_Oak
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by Gary_Oak »

Maybe it's not my place to say this but it would be nice to do something about the language tags in filenames.

If a game has just 2 or 3 different languages this is barely a problem but when it has over 6 of them, things can look rather unpleasant:

Super Mario Maker for Nintendo 3DS (USA) (En,Fr,Es) (Rev 2)
Agent Hugo - Roborumble (Europe) (En,Fr,De,Es,It,Nl,Pt,Sv,No,Da,Fi)

Personally, I don't see much use in including these tags in the filenames, unless of course, we were to have two games of the exact same region but with different languages:

This is an Example (Europe) (En,Fr,De)
This is an Example (Europe) (Es,It,Nl)

In my opinion, this is the only thing about the No-Intro naming convention that sticks out like a sore thumb. Also, I agree with Densetsu on the transcription stuff (words that use ã/á/à/ö = oe/ä = ae).
hking0036
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by hking0036 »

badinsults wrote:Personally, I think the in-game title is probably the best way to go.
I would agree on this, I'd do in-game title, and if not included then fall back to box art. Sometimes extra stuff can get included on one or the other, but the in-game one is the most easy to keep track of.
Densetsu
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by Densetsu »

@hking0036

Actually, that's a good argument - the in-game title is "always" accessible and I guess there are many cases where we don't have a box art.


@Gary_Oak

I see your point - there might be releases with 5-10 language tags and of course such titles can get rather long.
However, I personally prefer "accuracy" over "convenience".
I think before we had the first No-Intro naming convention, titles with multiple languages just included an "Mx" tag (x = number of languages).
Now if someone's only interested in games with English language, the exact/full list of contained languages might not matter to him/her.
But at least IMHO listing all languages is a "plus" in terms of preservation.

Regarding transcription:
Does this mean you don't support the idea of switching to UTF-8, so that we could represent many characters "directly" (without conversion)?


While speaking of languages...
There was a post on the "Latest Discussion" board on Dat-o-Matic in which someone pointed out that Canada has English and French as official languages... So I think it would be clearer and also some kind of "political correctness" to always include an "Fr" or "En" language tag with Canadian releases?
KingMike
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by KingMike »

From what I understand, it's only the province of Quebec where French is an official language.

I don't think French should be included unless it's actually used in the game (as games would usually be the same as the US releases, where English is the only certain language). Though it seems it was common for packaging to be written in both languages. (at least from what I've seen come across the border. Bilingual packaging may have been a minimum legal requirement, so I've heard)
Densetsu
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by Densetsu »

The Official Languages Act and you

Recognition for the equal status of English and French in Canada dates back to Confederation when the Constitution Act of 1867 recognized the use of both languages in Parliament and in federal courts.

Status for the two languages was reinforced by the first Official Languages Act of 1969 and the 1982 Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (the Charter), which declared English and French as Canada’s official languages and provided for th eir equality of status in Parliament and in the Government of Canada.

The Act was revised in 1988. It integrates and specifies the principles set out in the earlier legislation and the Charter and it provides for federal policies to put those principles into action. In 2005, Parts VII and X were modified to strengthen the commitment to official language minority communities and to foster linguistic duality.
Source: https://www.canada.ca/en/treasury-board ... d-you.html


Well, the question maybe would be:
Are all Canadian releases at least in English language?
(And if you like to do the comparison: Are all US games at least in English language?)

Of course only add "(Fr)" when French is actually used in a game.
So either it would be "Title (Canada) (Fr)" OR "Title (Canada) (En)" OR "Title (Canada) (En,Fr)".
Gary_Oak
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by Gary_Oak »

Densetsu wrote:@Gary_Oak

I see your point - there might be releases with 5-10 language tags and of course such titles can get rather long.
However, I personally prefer "accuracy" over "convenience".
I think before we had the first No-Intro naming convention, titles with multiple languages just included an "Mx" tag (x = number of languages).
Now if someone's only interested in games with English language, the exact/full list of contained languages might not matter to him/her.
But at least IMHO listing all languages is a "plus" in terms of preservation.

Regarding transcription:
Does this mean you don't support the idea of switching to UTF-8, so that we could represent many characters "directly" (without conversion)?
I do suppose it is useful considering you can know which game has the language you desire right on the go, I just wish we could figure a more elegant way of representing the language tags while keeping said "accuracy".

As for the transcription thing, I do also believe it would be best to represent many characters "directly" (without conversion).
PinkLouie
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by PinkLouie »

Languages tags are useful to filter games by language, for example, to separete games which have french language available, to search for them. A Link to The Past (Canada) is french only.

I Think, all (Asia) games should be marked as NTSC or PAL, and would be nice if they were considered too diferent region. Would be easier to organize in RC. Can't filter for language instead of region too. If non-english symbols are going to be used, it can make the games to be harder to be found in search.
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baldjared
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by baldjared »

Densetsu wrote:Are all Canadian releases at least in English language?
I can answer this one. I'm in Quebec. I had a copy of Kirby's Adventure on the NES that in game was only in French, don't remember the box, but want to say it was also only in French. I know that because if there was an option to change the language I would have definitely been playing it in English, but I played it in French. Picked it up for 5 bucks at Toys "R" Us near the end of the NES life, figured it was worth it either way. Most Canada releases have at least/just English in game, though. That one was more of an oddity.

The language laws have gotten progressively more aggressive against English in this province over the years. Back in the NES days you could find English only boxes. Now you want to sell stuff here it basically has to be bilingual or French only. There are exceptions to that, but I get the impression it's more that the language police, yes, they're a real thing, haven't caught wind of it.
KingMike
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by KingMike »

Kirby's Adventure has separate English and French releases in Canada.
(I own a box+cart of an English Canadian copy, though it was found in a US store, used.)
From what I recall, the French box had a black and yellow warning saying in French that the game is in French. The warning was missing on the English box, which still had both languages on it.
(otherwise the only way to tell the cart apart is by the serial code NES-KR-??? for English and NES-K5-CAN for French)

A Link to the Past for the SNES also had a Canadian French release. I was not aware of that until byuu collected a full North American SNES set (which he resold to fund his Japanese fullset).
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C. V. Reynolds
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by C. V. Reynolds »

I don't agree with a switch to title screen names. We would lose the way in which a game was marketed, which I believe is important. It would also be a loss of a less important little piece of data: Looking at the "cartridge label" before plugging in a game. I'm ready to go with whatever as long as we always remain consistent, however.

I'd like to address another issue: Revision tags. Currently No-Intro is inconsistent with this. Sometimes "Rev 1" is used. Other times "Rev A", which was the previously accepted convention. I'm in favor of switching back to "Rev A". However, it's most important to me to retain consistency in rules. I'm good with either as long as we remain consistent.
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Tauwasser
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by Tauwasser »

I second C. V. Reynold's push for consistency. I wasn't even aware this change was made until he edited one of my recent entries. I'm personally in favor of using whatever the official system manufacturer used and free-form for unlicensed 3rd-parties.
TideGear
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Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by TideGear »

Buddybenj wrote:A standard about how revisions should be done may be nice. Some consoles use (Rev A), (Rev B), etc. Some use (Rev 1), (Rev 2), etc. And some use (v1.00), (v1.01), etc. Is there any reason for the difference? If not, it seems like a consistent standard should be prescribed.
I'd like it if any rom that has a later rev (e.g. "Rev 1") was named something like "Rev 0" so we could tell that there's a later rev by looking at the first one.
PinkLouie
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Joined: 28 Mar 2017 00:51

Re: Updating the No-Intro naming convention

Post by PinkLouie »

What about tagging the language of Asian games? Some of them are in english, others in chinese... It is confusing. The same for unknown region.
Another ideia is to use different tags for simplified chinese and traditional chinese.
Last edited by PinkLouie on 16 May 2017 04:10, edited 1 time in total.
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