This Manual of Style will serve to keep certain elements of the Xenosaga Wiki uniform, to prevent great changes in tone or perspective from article to article. It will be effective immediately, though it will be officially ratified by community consensus at a later date. It will be basic at first but will hopefully grow to more specificity over time.
For information on the most basic writing techniques and styles, which are also used on Wikia, see Wikipedia's Manual of Style.
Layouts[]
All article types have (or will have) specific standardized layouts (i.e. Ships, locations, or games) They will entail what sections each article can have. These are guidelines but all articles must contain some form of each section under each of these specific titles.
Character articles[]
The basic layout for a character article is:
- Title
- Intro
- Biography
- Background
- External Links
- Categories
Headings[]
All articles with these specific sections must have headings and these will be standardized for specific types of articles.
Headings are created by placing two "=" signs on each side of a phrase, to create a main heading.
Like this:
===This is a heading===
This is a heading[]
Adding more "=" signs on each side of the text creates a subheading, which will further organize and break up the text. By adding a number of sections, a table of context will automatically be generated. One whhich automatically number each section and organizes them by importance in internet searches.
- Headings will always start with a capital letter, with the exception of if it starts with "chaos," while all other words shall begin with a lowercase letter unless such a word is a name or place.
- No links in headings.
- Try not to overuse subheadings.
Writing[]
- “I believe the road to hell is paved with adverbs” -- Stephen King
We now come to the meat of an article: the words themselves. When you're editing wikis, you're both academic and artist. You have to be accurate, but you also have to be interesting. Neither one can dominate; you have to skillfully balance both.
Keep your writing concise. Don't use two words where one will do. Keeping your writing simple will make it easy to understand and easy to expand on. Use complete sentences whenever possible. When you write, use grammar as a toolbox: know the rules, but only break them on purpose.
Check your spelling and grammar. Do not use 'u' in place of 'you' or '2' in place of 'to'. Write the way you would for a class paper or a newspaper article.
Keep all of the topics you cover within the scope of the article. What that means is, you don't need to give a detailed history of humans on the page about Winston Churchill. Consider the article's title as your point of origin and write from that perspective. Make use of the wiki's ability to link to more detailed articles or external sources for more information.
Write from an impersonal perspective.' Do not use "I." For example, do not write, "Hellscream was a fervent member of the Horde. He served both the Old and New Horde, as far as I know." Avoid drawing attention to the author (yourself) as much as possible.
Be bold. If you know something is wrong, correct it. If you think you could word something better, write it. If an article has a glaring deficiency, fill it. Even if your first attempt isn't golden, you can fix it later or someone else will come along and fix it for you. Don't be afraid to screw up.
Perspective[]
In-universe (IU)[]
If a subject is described as in-universe, it means that it is from the Xenogears or Xenosaga universes and not the real world. Characters, for example, are in-universe, but the voice actors who portray them are out-of-universe.
Out-of-universe (OOU)[]
Out-of-Universe refers to when an article should be written from a real life point of view. These include voice actors, crew members, or games. Articles about such material should be written from an out-of-universe perspective but should be noted as such with a future template.