Need for Speed Wiki
Register
Advertisement
Need for Speed Wiki
Site-logo
Manual of Style
Shortcut:
NFS:MoS

The Manual of Style (MoS) is an editing compendium for the desired style, quality, and content of the Need for Speed Wiki.

All editors are required to follow the guide outlined below, but under the assumption that users have a general knowledge of editing for a wiki project or are aware of the content involved for creating wiki articles.

All articles that fail to meet the standards set out by the Manual of Style must be marked with a {{Cleanup}} template. These articles will be placed into the Article Cleanup category for future correction.

If you want to discuss certain topics of the Manual of Style, or feel like something should be added, please contact an admin by leaving a message on their message wall.

General

Language

Language
  • Point of View: All articles must be written in third person.
  • Spelling: All articles must contain British English spelling. New articles may be written with American English spelling, but existing articles should use British English.
  • Other Languages: Any language other than English should not be used unless they are game terms.
  • Tense: All game events should be treated as current events, as all Need for Speed titles can be played or viewed at any time. As such, make sure to avoid past tense, even when describing older game titles. Past tense may only be used for chronicling events within games.
  • Redirects: Redirects should not be created. A direct link to the correct article should always be used.

Formatting

Formatting
  • Capitalisation: Use capital letters for title cases and trademark names. If a trademark (e.g. quattro) uses lower cases, it should also be used. All caps should be avoided.
  • Italics: Italics should be used for game titles as they are major art publications.
  • Boldface: Only use boldface for the first occurrence of the title in an article and to highlight text on lists. It shouldn't be used for emphasising in articles, it should rather be reflected by your choice of words.
  • Linking: Each article of the Need for Speed Wiki must be linked to all other relevant articles.
    • Do not link a subject multiple times within a shorter article section. In a later section, you may link the subject again so that readers do not need to scroll up the page.
    • Linking should also be done for articles that haven't been created yet.
    • Red links should not be removed, as they show intent for further articles to be created and could be created by other users.
    • Piped links should be used for links with long names that do not need the entire name to be mentioned (e.g. [[Need for Speed (2015)/Drift Train|Drift Train]] instead of [[Need for Speed (2015)/Drift Train]]). Avoid entirely rewriting a link name to not mess with the search engine, unless a corresponding redirect page exists.
  • Abbreviations: As our articles are not limited by space like paper books, there's generally no reason for us to use abbreviations unless one the following criteria is met:
    • Unit symbols (e.g. SI units)
    • Names that are commonly referred to as such (e.g. BMW)
    • Abbreviations that would improve article presentation (e.g. table headers)
    • Miscellaneous shortenings (e.g. etc.)

Articles

Titles

Titles
  • Always use a game title prefix for overview articles and all respective subpages. It should always look like this: Need for Speed (2015)/Events. Further subpages from subpages should not use two prefixes as the article name would get too big. In this case, only use the game title prefix again.
    • It is not necessary to add prefixes to car, character and event articles. If an event name is shared by two titles, add the prefix after the title in brackets.

Content

Content
  • Relevance: Every edit and media must be relevant to the Need for Speed series.
  • Barred Content: Articles are for canon content, and as such, the following is not allowed in articles:
    • Opinions
    • Advertisements
    • Speculative content
    • "Game Theory" content
    • Information about third-party hacks and game modifications
    • Article duplicates
    • Polls
  • Trivia: Trivial information must be written or put under a "Trivia" headline.
  • User Tests: Experimentation and testing should not be performed in articles, but in a user's own personal Sandbox page.

Referencing

Referencing
  • Referencing is important as it keeps content credible, accurate, and trustworthy. Information added to the wiki should be verifiable, as is expected from any encyclopedia. Content that doesn't have an adequate reference will be removed. The following must always be followed by a reference:
    • Content regarding a product that has not yet been released
    • Content regarding a product that is scarce or purposely region-locked
    • Questionable or rumoured content
      • Development differences including pre-release content
      • Information that cannot be observed during normal gameplay
    • Real world based content
    • Quotes from characters, in-game menus, etc.
  • Allowed references:
    • Publisher website or social media feed
    • Developer website or social media feed
    • Manufacturer website or social media feed
    • Sponsor website or social media feed
    • Credible vehicle encyclopedia websites
    • Official Strategy Guides
    • Game industry news sites such as Kotaku, Joystiq or Gamasutra
    • Development Staff forum posts
    • Clear and high quality YouTube content
    • Images expressing aspect or point of reference
    • Well researched third-party or fan forum threads
  • Barred references:
    • Forum posts by non-development team members that lack sufficient credibility (fan theories, headcanon)
    • Images highlighting mod, bug, exploit or usage of 'hacks'
    • Doctored images
    • External websites without a credible information source
    • Purposely click-bait or satirical YouTube content
  • References can be added by placing <ref>websiteofreference.co.uk</ref> next to the statement and <references> at the base of the article.
    • To improve navigation, add the type of reference and the subject of it:
      • Example: <ref>Article: businesswire.com (2019) ''Need for Speed Heat Arrives on November 8th, Burning All Limits'' Available at: [https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190814005427/en/Speed-Heat-Arrives-November-8th-Burning-Limits https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190814005427/en/Speed-Heat-Arrives-November-8th-Burning-Limits]</ref>

Categories

Categories
  • Every article must be linked with a category. To do so, simply insert [[Category:Name of category]] at the bottom of the article or use the category bar on the right editing console.
  • Naming: Category names must be capitalised and contain as few words as possible so that articles with a high number of categories won't look cluttered up. Some categories may already exist and be ready for usage, or similar categories may be used in other articles and can be used as a guide for new categories.
    • Example: Events in Need for Speed: Carbon -> Events (Carbon)
  • Sorting: All categories must be sorted in a logical order instead of being randomly placed after another.

Media

Naming

Naming
  • All uploaded content must have an effective name to allow for easier searching and to keep related content together.
    • Content for articles is named in a specific manner to better arrange game specific images and images relating to particular elements of a game.
    • An example of this is "File:NFSHE_ActivitiesMap_DriftZones_Day.jpg" as it highlights the game, activity category, what the image is, activity type, and the timeframe the image relates to.
  • Users that upload a personal image for either their signature templates or their user page, but must include their username in the image filename.
  • Content for or personal user use is named differently to differentiate content meant for Need for Speed and content meant for user pages.
    • A example of this is "File:LeMansRacer_MercMcLarenSLR722001.jpg" as it highlights the username, describes the content shown in the image and highlights that it should not be used in an article.

Audio

Audio
  • Allowed Content: The following is a list of everything that may be uploaded in audio format:
    • In-game vehicle sounds
    • In-game narrations and character speech
  • Quality: All audio files must be in good quality (proper volume, no contortions) and reasonable length. You may only upload in ogg format.

Images

Images
  • Relevance: Images for articles should not be purely decorative and must be relevant to the article they appear within, as well as highlight the subject.
  • Barred Images: The following images are not allowed as well as those highlighted by Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Image_use_policy Wikipedia's Image Policy:
    • Images taken with a physical camera
    • Images with a watermark
    • Images of degraded quality (too dark, too small, blurry, hidden, etc.)
    • Images taken at poor graphic settings (PC titles)
    • Images with the intent of advertising (Fan websites, modification sites, social network sites or "clan" sites.
    • Note: Images depicting pre-release content from upcoming titles are exempt from this rule, as they are used as references.
  • Recommended Quality: All images on the Need for Speed Wiki should meet the following quality standards whenever possible:
    • Images relating to games released during or after 2005 must be in a Wikipedia:Display_aspect_ratio#16:9 widescreen format (16:9).
    • Releases before 2005 may be either in a widescreen (16:9) or Wikipedia:4:3#4:3_standard standard (4:3) format.
    • Handheld device releases are exempt but must match device resolution.
    • All images should be at least 1280x720 (0.9 Mpx) resolution.
      • Icons must be of a square resolution - 32x32, 64x64, etc.
    • All images must be of a square pixel aspect ratio.
    • Larger images should be in a .jpg format to reduce bandwidth usage.
    • Larger images may be in a .png format as long as their file size isn't excessively large.
    • Icon images must be in a .png format with a transparent background (alpha channel).
    • Images that have been uploaded but not have not been placed into an article or user page will be deleted, unless they are linked.


Advertisement