Wikipedia:Peer review/Dota 2/archive2

Dota 2

Previous peer review

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because I believe the article has come to an impasse in which it is time to strive for Featured Article status. I created the article and have approached it with scrutiny for nearly three years now, welcoming criticism and constructive contributions, with am emphasis upon the betterment of the page. At this point, I am hard pressed to find glaring issues, so I request that the community approach this in the same lieu of a FAC, letting it be heard what would be hypothetically necessary to make this a reality.

Thank you. DarthBotto _talk•cont 20:48, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

This isn't going to be hugely in depth as these are issues that arose from a skim read on the bus and what I had already been thinking, but here are my thoughts on a few things which need improving:

• Images - I feel there should be more than the 3 currently present, and the two gameplay screenshots desperately need updating. I did upload a newer version of the Dota 1/2 comparison image, but some users ended up reverting it to the old version for some reason or another. A nice addition to the article might be an image of the in-game map to show the general layout.

Looking again, the revert was to do with an overeager bot, and I have now reuploaded a more current version of the comparison image. Samwalton9 (talk) 22:05, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

• Gameplay section - There are 4 sources used in the section and large portions of it are entirely unsourced. It would be good to see more used here.
• Post-release - This section should be written better. As with most articles reviews are simply added to the end of the paragraph as they are published but now that most reviews seem to be out it's probably worth writing a summary paragraph or two on the aspects that were reviewed well/badly.

 Done - DarthBotto _talk•cont 01:45, 18 August 2013 (UTC)

• Professional competition - I think this could do with more mention of The International as there have been plenty of articles about it, especially regarding TI3, and they shouldn't just be limited to the TI article in my opinion. A paragraph dedicated to the tournament would fit in nicely I think.

I've now at least started a change in this direction. Samwalton9 (talk) 22:43, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

I'm happy to help with these points and will have a look at improving the article in the coming days. Samwalton9 (talk) 21:53, 15 August 2013 (UTC)

Quick comments by David Fuchs

• I think the article has most of the content it needs, but the devil is in the organizational details. Reading the lead, I'm really not sure what's supposed to be the highlights and why other things are being specifically called out in the lead. There's nothing on development there, and there's a lot of stats which, given their non-evergreen nature, I would not recommend specifically calling out there.
• Dota 2 combines the real-time strategy elements of a traditional top-down perspective, while also incorporating the leveling and itemization functions of a role-playing video game. This seems like a poor way to introduce the game to someone who's not played it. Things seem a little out of sorts too, as it details where the player teams are on the map before actually explaining the composition of the map.

 Done - DarthBotto _talk•cont 19:26, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

• If the gameplay section is only ref'd to those few refs, there should be at least be a citation at the end of each paragraph for clarity's sake.

 Done - DarthBotto _talk•cont 19:26, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

• To me the tournaments section doesn't really belong in the same section as the critical reception; I'd make the reception its own paragraph and then the tournaments another one at the end.

 Done - DarthBotto _talk•cont 18:27, 16 August 2013 (UTC)

• The prose is a big stumbling block; there's inconsistent tenses and awkward/unnecessarily complex sentence constructions that make reading through it difficult. When I have time I'll try and do a copyedit but I'd recommend trying to get a more dedicated person. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs^(talk) 13:32, 16 August 2013 (UTC)
  • Re: your comments on my talk page, I am indeed eying those. "It has received significant attention for Valve's world championship invitational tournament, The International, which repeatedly broke the record for having the largest prize pool in the history of electronic sports." sounds awkward, and doesn't really impart the important details--Valve holds large cash-prize tournaments, such as the International, and more general comments on its eSports presence. In the eSports section, definitely mention when The International and International 3 are the top prizes in eSports. Also, I believe you mean to say that Dota 2 has a steep learning curve; the lead actually states the opposite: with praise for the engaging and rewarding gameplay experience, at the expense of a steep learning curve.. "At the expense of" suggests the gameplay came with losing that learning curve. I believe "at the cost of a steep learning curve" would go towards what you mean. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs^(talk) 17:57, 17 August 2013 (UTC)
    • Thank you, it at actually flows a lot better and seems less superfluous without the mention of The International! Would you suggest I keep or heave-ho the following: "The game maintains the record for the most-played Steam title of all time, with its concurrent player base outmatching the top ten most-popular Steam games combined."? DarthBotto _talk•cont 18:10, 17 August 2013 (UTC)

I made some changes. Here are some of them as well as some proposed ones:

Lead

• A mention of the reception of the game's graphics and sound, and also any perceived flaws cited by multiple reviewers (negative reception of a specific element should not be expressed by one critic only, it should be included only if it represents the total feeling of the reviewers).

"Gameplay"

• Video gaming jargon (e.g. hero, boss) and terms found only in this game genre (e.g. lane) should be in quotation marks as they're not considered typical use of the language.
• Excessive gameplay details (e.g. "Allied heroes may also be denied if they are on critically low health and have a fatal spell applied to them", "which allows for a hero to instantly respawn if they are killed") should be omitted per WP:VG/GL and be substituted with a short general description. The source supporting the bit on Roshan's dropped items only mentions the Aegis, so it should be replaced with one mentioning that not only one item is dropped (there're two in total, Aegis and cheese).

Feel free to judge them mercilessly. Hula Hup (talk) 00:09, 25 August 2013 (UTC)

• The gameplay image's caption should be changed into something more specific, as the current one is very vague, I'm afraid. Maybe replaced... I don't know... If I come up with more ideas, I'll let you know. Hula Hup (talk) 01:23, 25 August 2013 (UTC)

The image previously had a bit about its context, but Nczempin removed it, saying that he didn't know how it was illustrated. I was going to revert his edit, but I decided that it was probably an opportunity to replace the image with a newer and more relevant one. I can fix anything with the article, but that image is a bit of a nuisance and I'm a little tripped up on what I can do to replace it. DarthBotto _talk•cont 00:08, 26 August 2013 (UTC)