Talk:Ultimate Play the Game/Archive 1

Archive 1

5 Mar 2005

Should this not be merged with Rare? I notice that Ashby Computer Graphics redirects there. --Mmartins 16:52, 5 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Ok, I'm going to merge it into the larger article. The games list is already duplicated there anyway --Mmartins 09:41, 13 August 2005 (UTC)

Hmmm. Not sure that was a good idea. I think it would have been better to trim the list of games on the Rare page to those released by Rare (i.e. strip out the Ultimate ones), but add a link to the Ultimate page (and make Ultimate's evolution to Rare more obvious on the Ultimate page). They are separate trading names for good reason, so it made sense to keep them separate here too (although I entirely agree about the duplicate lists, etc.). I know you've already put some time into this, but would you object if I reverted to what there was before, but made the changes I've outlined above to the Rare and Ultimate pages? --Plumbago 09:24, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

Resurrected the page

Due to this page getting "merged" into Rare a while back, but the Rare article hardly even mentioning Ultimate now, I thought I'd bring this page back from the dead and make it a bit better. Still needs improving though... Miremare 18:47, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

C64 titles

I can't find an external source at the moment, but as I recall most of Ultimate's C64 titles were written by Firebird. With the exception of Imhotep (possibly one of the worst games ever!) all of the others share a common graphical style (although Outlaws otherwise shares very little with the rest). I'm sure a Google-trawl will find some appropriate confirmation. Cheers, --Plumbago 12:09, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

The Commodore conversions of Sabre Wulf, Underwurlde, and Nightshade were done by Firebird (with a big Firebird logo on the front of the box), and even credit the individuals responsible, but I'm pretty sure the Commodore originals didn't credit any external organisation or persons at all. However, my copy of Karnath is stashed away in the garage or attic somewhere so I can't really check... Miremare 16:25, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I think you're right. That definitely rings a bell, and would suggest in-house development instead. One of my mates had Karnath, etc., but I don't remember it (or any other Ultimate title for that matter; bar the exceptions above) saying who'd written it. Neither on the package nor in-game (although Imhotep might just have ...). An impasse. Is there any reason to suppose that Ultimate didn't have an in-house team working on C64 games? Karnath, etc., are certainly different stylistically from the Spectrum-based titles, but they share a focus on 3D environments and arcade adventures with the contemporary Filmation titles. Cheers, --Plumbago 16:35, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

I always assumed they were internally developed, but I don't know. I thought the same of Imhotep until I found the interview with the author on ultimate-wurlde.com. I'll add something about the authorship of all the games... Miremare 18:25, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Ultimate Play the Game logo.jpg

Image:Ultimate Play the Game logo.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in Wikipedia articles constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.BetacommandBot 16:22, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Done. Blimey, in looking for other companies with fair-use rationale for their logos I've come to the conclusion that Microsoft, Apple, and now Ultimate Play The Game are practically the only ones. So thank you very much, Mr. Bot, for pointing that out. Now go pick on someone less important like General Motors or Sony. :P Miremare 17:10, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Praise

This article has come a long way in a short time since its resurrection - informative, well-researched and well-cited. Congrats. :)

--Zagrebo 12:46, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Sabre wulf box.jpg

Image:Sabre wulf box.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot 16:34, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

First at £9.95?

User:Parhodes: Retro Gamer issue 20 (p.29) says: "Sabre Wulf was the first Spectrum game to abandon the traditional £5.50 price point, leaping to a then unimaginable £9.95". Do you have a source for the others being first? For the record I think you're right, but "verifiability, not truth", and all that... Miremare 18:28, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

The Hobbit was 14.95. So was Valhalla. Even for arcade style games, although many publishers stuck around 5.50, prices up to 6.95 were by no means uncommon (Penetrator, Ant Attack...) Paul Rhodes (talk) 08:56, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

PS: Infoseek at World Of Spectrum (http://www.worldofspectrum.org/infoseek.cgi) gives original prices in most of its listings, which appear mostly accurate (at least as reliable, I'd suggest, as an off-the-cuff comment in a magazine written twenty years later). For contemporaneous evidence, the Crash Living Guide (a poorly-camouflaged mail order catalogue, with prices) from Crash #1, Feb 1984, starts here : http://www.worldofspectrum.org/showmag.cgi?mag=Crash/Issue01/Pages/Crash0100045.jpg Paul Rhodes (talk) 09:36, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

At the risk of starting a Ronnie Hazlehurst war, I've reverted the text to remove the incorrect assertion. It is easily disproved (as I mention above, Hobbit and Valhalla were both 14.95, and if you want to be really pedantic about the exact price 9.95, there was Red Shift's Apocalypse for one). Paul Rhodes (talk) 02:04, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Ooops, I forgot about this. Anyway, it's the lack of a reference that's the problem, rather than the assertion itself, which as I said above I agree with. It seems to be a common misconception/misremembrance which should be mentioned, and I think the price hike was something the Stampers were questioned on in both of their interviews, as well as reliable sources claiming they were first to £9.95. It's probably more a case of them being the first high-profile software house to go £9.95 as standard, rather than the odd £15 release due to there being a full-size novel included like with The Hobbit and LOTR. Anyway, I'll have a look for some relevant sources and reword the part in question. Cheers, Miremare 14:39, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I think they may well have been first to £9.95 for an arcade-style game. I remember being surprised when it came out (not least as it was such a traditional and simplistic game - if Knight Lore had been the first at the new price, I doubt I'd have batted an eyelid!). The point is that there was already a class of 'prestige' game which came in big boxes and commanded higher prices - it's just they tended not to be scrolling sprite games. But this isn't an article about the history of Spectrum game prices, it's an article about Ultimate. So far as I can see, the Verifiability policy is about verifiability of text included in the article, not about providing citations in support of removal! To demand a citation in support of *not* making a demonstrably false statement doesn't make sense to me - unless it were a genuine matter of controversy that was of interest and relevant in itself, which I don't think this is.Paul Rhodes (talk) 13:01, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't mean a reference to support any removal, but to support the new wording. The previous wording "the first Spectrum game released at a recommended retail price of £9.95" was referenced to Retro Gamer, so another source is needed to support the new wording. I'd suggest something like:

"Ultimate is sometimes erroneously believed to have been the first Spectrum publisher to price their games at a recommended retail price of GB£9.95 with the release of Sabre Wulf in 1984, though other titles such as Melbourne House's The Hobbit and Legend's Valhalla had already approached the £15 mark by 1983."

The RG ref will do for the first one, and your Crash Living Guide one will probably do for the second, but the link's broken so I don't know. :P Miremare 18:46, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

My point was that I don't think you need to cite a reference to support the wording that's there now, and I really don't think it needs to say any more on the matter than it does already. Discussion of what people may or may not believe is tangential to the subject matter and if anywhere I'd say it belongs here, in the Talk page. Still, YMMV. That aside, the Crash scans are at ftp://ftp.worldofspectrum.org/pub/sinclair/magazines/; a later edition of the Living Guide, split over issues 3 and 4, can be found transcribed here: http://www.crashonline.org.uk/03/lguide.htm and here: http://www.crashonline.org.uk/04/lguide.htm Paul Rhodes (talk) 19:03, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

19 Mar 2008

Regarding the Ultimate C64 Arthur Pendragon adventures. These were created by a freelance team, Dave and Bob Thomas. Dave Thomas programmed the games and Bob did all the artwork. Dave now works for Hands On Mobile Inc. and Bob is a freelance web designer.

The vorlon (talk) 17:26, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Atic atac not mentioned?

uh... Atic atac is not mentioned in the "early history" section. if i remember correcty it has been a huge success and sold quite a lot. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dave4mame (talk • contribs) 09:47, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Lunar jetman trailer.gif

Image:Lunar jetman trailer.gif is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot 03:08, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

•  Done. Diego (talk) 23:35, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

Proposed merge with Filmation (game engine)

Filmation is not the subject of independent, sourced commentary. It can be adequately covered in the dev's article and can always split out summary style. – czar 22:25, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

What do you mean, filmation is not the subject of independent commentary? There were rivers of ink poured over the years about that technique in computing magazines, both in Ultimate games and those of the competition (the article already mentions Fairlight, The Great Escape, Batman and Head Over Heels). The graphics of every new 3D game were compared to Knight Lore and Alien 8 to detail how it improved on them, just like every FPS has been compared to Doom. Diego (talk) 23:32, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

The article is currently not sourced to reliable, secondary sources. Surely you won't have any issue finding articles that discuss Filmation in depth so as to warrant its own article apart from whatever can be covered in the context its developer (this article). If the technique is not covered in depth (significant coverage), it makes sense to cover it on another page, such as this one. – czar 23:39, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

There is a number of online references available from a quick search ([1],[2],[3], [4]) offering more than trivial coverage. As I said, most descriptions of the engine I'm aware of were available in specialized microcomputing magazines of the time. I'd have to dig out my parent's garage to find my old copies, but they definitely exist. Maybe a summary style section at this article, pointing to the other article as main, would be the right structure? Diego (talk) 12:20, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

There is a number of articles at online magazines also, in several languages: [5][6][7] [8] [9] [10]. They add up to a number of facts about the engine and its influence on later games, by several independent sources. Diego (talk) 13:19, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

... so one of your first links has a paragraph that describes the games that used it and its legacy, but the rest are all passing mentions! Surely not significant coverage and surely not enough to write a full article on this topic. Everything that needs to be said—what it is, what games used it, and how other games copied it—can be fully said in the parent article. Otherwise this article just becomes a coatrack for original research. (Also what makes root.cz a reliable source?) – czar 17:09, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

... so you're not listening to the argument I made? The links I have provided above are to show that there's presence online so that the engine has been talked about, but the bulk of reliable sources is to be found in offline sources like the Crash magazine article already listed as a source. Per WP:Verifiability and WP:GNG, the references do not need to be online to establish notability. Plus, there are links from articles by Retro Gamer or books like Rare - The Ultimate Story in the references for both articles (and how is this book and this book a "passing mention"? They spend several paragraphs analyzing the 3D technique and providing commentary on it). Diego (talk) 17:45, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

They don't need to be online but they need to exist—at the very least, a citation is necessary. Your first source discusses Filmation within the context of Knight Lore, as to say that it could be a section within the article (or within a parent topic. Your second source is the one I mentioned for having a paragraph that discusses its impact. Still, when both are summarized, there isn't enough to warrant a separate article, especially if it's going to sit an languish for another seven years without any references. – czar 18:04, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

If it would be helpful, I can reframe this. If you disagree on whether these links constitute significant coverage, that's fine—what's more important than arguing out the impasse is what comes next. The article content is completely unsourced right now (only sources are primary or unreliable sources) so I'm going to gut it unless it is expanded or merged. – czar 18:39, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

The sources do exist, and I've pointed the general direction to follow for obtaining them; compiling them takes time, though we are not in a rush. Given their existence, it is premature to want to get rid of the well-structured, well-written article on the basis of failed notability - give editors time to find those hard-to-access references, and wait to decide upon its existence until a discovery process has been taken care of.

I don't see anything in the article which stands out as unverifiable. Most content consist of objective descriptions of the graphics (verifiable with the games themselves) as well as a recollection of other games connected to the initial Filmation I technique, with references for them available at the related Isometric graphics in video games and pixel art. If you feel that the Filmation article absolutely must be merged elsewhere, that one would be a better target, since it has lots of more room for a larger section and it's more directly thematically connected to the history of the engine. Diego (talk) 20:13, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

I'm closing this via hat, as the initial request doenst' seem to have been raised correctly. I woulnd't be averse to it being raised again correctly, so it could be discussed more widely, but for the record - Oppose, for the notability reasons above, but also as Filmation was unique to a few Spectrum titles, and Ultimate produced many games for both the spectrum and other platforms - not all of which used Filmation. Chaheel Riens (talk) 12:29, 4 December 2015 (UTC)