[game_preservation] Game developers memorial page?

[Captain Commando]

Henry,

I can see what I can do about the wiki, though I think I'd need some help
from Andrew Armstrong on getting the thing going (this and I really need to
finish my Masters in one month!).

A memorial wiki would also likely have connections with a game credits wiki
- if we are remembering game developers, we should have a list of all the
games they worked on. Right now, I usually just get all my credits
information from Mobygames, but they're not very complete, so I usually have
to dig up information from places like Wikipedia, Mamend, Gamend, and the
like. Of course, we shouldn't be concerned about listing EVERYTHING somebody
has done; a few major works will do and then link to his entry on the
credits wiki. Now that I think of it, it could also be cross-linked with the
preservation wiki for things like interviews.

I'm thinking a large part of building this wiki will come from community
support. There's a lot of guys out there who know a lot more people than I
do. Once the page starts going, we can encourage other developers to
contribute what they know. One good way of coordinating all of this would be
to contact the individual IGDA chapters, as they funnel a lot of local
information. We've also got contacts in Japan who should be able to provide
information on that side of the world. If we get this wiki brought up at
monthly meetings, then we can have people discussing it and contributing
names and information.

Other than this, I think basic information like name, year of birth,
(birthday?), year of death, some games they worked with (and what they did,
even if it's something basic like 'programmer'). Then we can provide
appropriate cross-links to other information, like bios, information on the
games, interviews, etc. and maybe include a short blurb in the wiki entry
itself.

Personally, I think if you helped work on a game then you should be eligible
for the list. I don't know if we want to keep this with videogames, but I
also think it wouldn't hurt to add board and card game developers, as well
as guys like Ron Knerr. Of course, we could also continue to expand this to
include game theorists (Huizinga, Callois), though at a certain point things
could start to get unwieldy so it's going to come to a question of what's
feasible and what really fits. I mean, you don't have to be a game developer
to have done something beneficial for games.

-Devin

On Jan 21, 2008 4:00 PM, Henry Lowood <lowood at stanford.edu> wrote:


>  Devin,

>

> This is a superb idea.  I doubt anyone will have anything negative to say

> about the idea; the only issue is really how we implement it?  Any thoughts

> on that?  Devin, would you be willing to take the lead?  Andrew Armstrong is

> the wiki editor for the SIG, and I'm sure he would be willing to provide

> guidance.   Also, the group should probably agree on a rough format or

> perhaps a procedure for getting appropriate names on the page.

>

> Henry

>



-- 
The sleep of Reason produces monsters.

"Until next time..."
Captain Commando
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