Talk:Tempest 3000/GA1

GA Review

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Nominator: KGRAMR (talk · contribs) 23:11, 30 March 2024 (UTC)

Reviewer: Shooterwalker (talk · contribs) 18:50, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

I'll try to take this on. Look for something within a week, if not sooner. Shooterwalker (talk) 18:50, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Starting in the body of the article. We can come back to the lead once we finish a complete pass.

Gameplay

• "Like its predecessors, Tempest 3000 is a tube shooter game in which the player controls a claw-shaped blaster and the main objective is to survive through multiple levels, shooting enemies and obstacles that appear in a grid to score as many points as possible." -> "Following the gameplay of Tempest and Tempest 2000, Tempest 3000 is a tube shooter game where the player shoots enemies and obstacles as they appear from the center of the screen. The player controls a claw-shaped blaster, scoring points by hitting targets as they try to survive multiple levels."

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 15:30, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• " The player's blaster can shoot down enemies within a lane of the grid with rapid-fire and is" -> this seems like an unnecessary detail and has already roughly been said. You can just talk about the next part.

 Done -- I removed the line in question but kept the "Superzapper" paragraph. Roberth Martinez (talk) 15:30, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• "Power-ups appear by destroying enemies or enemy bullets and are collected for upgrades." -> "Players can collect power-ups and upgrades, which appear when enemies or their bullets are destroyed."

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 15:30, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• "The jump feature was replaced with a hover mode that allows the player's blaster to glide over the grid and its fuel limit is increased with power-ups." -> "Instead of a jump ability, the blaster can now spend fuel to hover and glide over the grid."

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 15:59, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• " Homing missiles can also be collected through power-ups and target enemies in two lanes of the grid, but not the lane in which the player's blaster fires" -> "A homing missile power-up allows the player to target enemies in two lanes of the grid."

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 15:59, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• "A bonus multiplier increases with power-ups to accumulate points, but resets to zero if a "Superzapper" is used." -> "The player can also improve their score multiplier by collecting certain power-ups, and using a "superzapper" resets the multiplier to zero."

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 15:59, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• " the player moves on to the next level, but must avoid crashing into or eliminate spikes on the playfield that can destroy the blaster" -> I don't see how these thoughts are related. Do the spikes appear between levels?

 Done -- I clarified what the spikes are. I forgot the spikes are left by defeated Spikers, which are enemies in both the OG Tempest and Tempest 2000. Roberth Martinez (talk) 16:15, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• " Collecting three warp tokens grants access to bonus rounds and the player skips two levels if they are successfully completed" -> " Collecting three warp tokens grants access to bonus rounds, and completing them will allow the player to skip two levels."

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 15:59, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• " half of which are procedurally generated after level 128" -> this is confusing. Do you mean the last half are all procedurally generated, or just half of levels 129-256?

 Done -- I clarified that the last half starting at 129 are all prodecurally genereated. Roberth Martinez (talk) 15:59, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• "...but the player can resume" -> ". The player can resume" (full stop)

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 15:59, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Development

• " he was asked to refocus his efforts back on Tempest" -> who asked?

So, here's the pagraph in question regarding that line: "Speaking of T3K-coding, I have been asked to steer my development work back in a Tempestuous direction, with a view to perhaps having some fetching new goodies running in time for E3 (where I shall actually be going, as it turns out - if you're coming, maybe I'll cya there)". From what i get reading at Minter's paragraph from his defunct personal website, it seems to imply that VM Labs was the one who asked him (since Minter helped with the Nuon hardware) and knowing that T3K was first shown at E3 1998, it makes senes but that's just my two cents... Roberth Martinez (talk) 16:51, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• " the remaining music " -> " the remaining songs"

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 15:38, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• " He described the platform as having been programmed "like a shader" due to the mathematics of each individual pixel and lack of hardware acceleration, which led to building instructions via software and having paging schemes without the code exceeding four kilobytes (4KBs) of RAM." -> this is a really dense and technical sentence. is there a way to say it more plainly?

 Done -- I tried making the paragraph more concise. Roberth Martinez (talk) 17:01, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• " and has since expressed being proud of the game" -> "and expressed pride his work."

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 15:38, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Let's pause there. The gameplay section needs a lot of work for grammar and clarity. But the development section is in really solid shape. Start with those, and we can get to the second half. Shooterwalker (talk) 01:35, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

@Shooterwalker:Done with the first pass! I'll wait for additional comments. Roberth Martinez (talk) 17:04, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

Off to a great start. We'll come back to the gameplay on the second pass, but I would suggest explaining how "the grid" works, since it comes up a few times. (Or find a way to describe it without being so jargony.) Moving on...

They are called webs in the game manual so, i'm going to change the grid word into that. Roberth Martinez (talk) 02:02, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

• Release
• The Nuon is a really unusual system, and even then, we should explain what it is. (I admit I've never heard of it.)

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 02:00, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

• " where it was announced that it would be one of the initial releases for Nuon" -> this is sort of redundant. You could cut it.

 Done -- I removed the line in question. Roberth Martinez (talk) 02:00, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

• "It was initially scheduled for release on November 14, 2000, but was later delayed to November 28, 2000" -> This is almost unnecessary, and definitely contradicts the next sentence that says it's actual release date.

 Done -- I removed the line in question. Roberth Martinez (talk) 02:00, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

• " one-of-a-kind edition called Tempest 3000: Flossie Edition" -> what was special about this one-of-a-kind edition?

 Done -- I explained what the Flossie edition is... it is very much what Minter is also best known for aside from this video games. Roberth Martinez (talk) 02:19, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

• This section is otherwise really well written. Just a few minor notes on redundancy and clarity.
• Reception
• "Tempest 3000 received generally favorable reception from critics." -> "Tempest 3000 received generally favorable reviews from critics."

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 02:26, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

• This section is also generally well written. I think the biggest improvement would be organization. The reviews are all sort of single statements that read well on their own, but doesn't flow in a way that gives me an overall impression. Is there a way to organize the different reviews so they thematically tie into each other? If you're looking for ideas, I can come up with some.

Sure! If you have any ideas to iprove this section further then i'm all for it. Roberth Martinez (talk) 02:26, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

• "new gameplay additions " -> "evolution of the series' gameplay"

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 02:26, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

• There are two statements here that could be separated from reviews -- the Ars Technica retrospective, and the Edge awards. Both of those have enough distance from reviews that they would be a good final (mini)-paragraph for this section.

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 02:26, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

• Lead
• The opening sentence is a little long and wordy. Maybe consider moving the release date, or making it its own separate sentence.

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 22:48, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• "The player controls a claw-shaped blaster and the goal is to survive multiple levels, shooting at enemies and obstacles appearing on a grid to score points." -> "The player controls a claw-shaped blaster, shooting at enemies and obstacles, scoring points, and surviving multiple levels."

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 22:48, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• Link "Nuon" and maybe give a little context for what it is. (Basically a DVD player with some video game features?)

It was linked at the first paragraph but i can give some context as to what the Nuon is somewhere in the head section. In essence, the Nuon was like the 3DO: a technology but for DVD with added features including the ability to play video games. Roberth Martinez (talk) 22:48, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• " Minter left Atari after completing Defender 2000 to work for VM Labs, a company founded ..." -> "In the late 1990s, Minter left Atari after completing Defender 2000 to work for VM Labs. The company was founded ...

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 22:48, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

• " He was asked to refocus" -> "VM Labs asked Minted to refocus"

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 22:48, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

That gives us our first full complete pass. If we get through all that, I think we will be close. The gameplay section still needs the most work, but we can get there. Shooterwalker (talk) 20:45, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

@Shooterwalker:Done with the second pass. I'll be on stand by for further comments. Roberth Martinez (talk) 02:26, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

Let's see if we can wrap this up, if not get close to it.

• Lead
• " The company was founded by Richard Miller with former Atari and Sony staff, and Minter helped with software design and the VLM-2 audio visualizer for the Nuon technology. VM Labs asked Minter to refocus his efforts on Tempest, allowing him to apply ideas for his particle effects system, but had difficulty taking advantage of the hardware due to its underpowered architecture." -> "After Minter designed an audio visualizer for the Nuon, VM Labs asked him to refocus his efforts on Tempest, which was challenging due to the limited power of the console's hardware."

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 13:48, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

• "It features remixed tracks from Tempest 2000 and original music by André Meyer, Ian Goddard, and James Grunke." -> cut this from the lead. It's a fine detail in the body.

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 13:48, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

• Body
• The gameplay section feels a little cluttered, like it jumps between a lot of topics. Not sure what I'd recommend to fix it, but it's good enough as is.
• " New enemies are also introduced," -> "The game also introduces new enemies to the series,"

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 13:48, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

• " Collecting three warp tokens grants access to bonus rounds, and completing them will allow the player to skip two levels" -> "The player can also collect three warp tokens to access a bonus round, and completing it allows the player to skip two levels."

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 13:48, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

• "(129-256)" -> you can remove this, as "last half" is clear now

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 13:48, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

• " for the Nuon technology" -> I feel like we can do a lot with a little more context. "for the Nuon DVD technology" or "for the Nuon game console".

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 14:13, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

• "VM Labs asked him to refocus his efforts on Tempest, " -> "VM Labs asked him to create Tempest for the Nuon"

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 14:13, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

• "... underpowered architecture. He described the platform as having been coded "like a shader" due to the mathematics of each individual pixel and the lack of hardware acceleration, which led him to program without the code exceeding four kilobytes (4KBs) of RAM." -> "underpowered architecture, forcing him to limit the game program to less than four kilobytes of RAM."

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 14:13, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

• " planning to be one of the initial releases for Nuon" -> cut this as redundant.

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 14:13, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

• " and was awarded to the winner Fard Muhammad" -> cut this as a minor detail, to improve flow

 Done -- Roberth Martinez (talk) 14:13, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

• There are three reviews that comment on the game's blur. I might bundle these together somewhere near the end of the reception section. e.g.: "The game's blurry visuals were criticized by several reviewers, including Syzygy, Electronic Gaming Monhtly, and Tips & Tricks."
• Pulling the blur comments out of the other sentences, I believe they would become easier to read by being shorter.

 Done -- I took your advice and placed the paragraph after the neXGam review. Roberth Martinez (talk) 14:13, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

I feel like that should get us most of the way there, if not all the way. Thanks again for your good work on this. Shooterwalker (talk) 04:09, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

@Shooterwalker:Done with the third pass! I'll await for further comments. Roberth Martinez (talk) 14:13, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

You did great. Happy to call this a good article. Congratulations on another job well done. Shooterwalker (talk) 01:14, 24 April 2024 (UTC)