Wikisource:WikiProject Video Games/Help page draft

There are a few different mediums which may present the option for transcribing components of a video game into text, primarily spoken or text dialogue, text used to tell the story or setting, HUDs, menu screens, etc.

Copyright
Please ensure that the video game you are wanting to transcribe text from is in the public domain or under an otherwise free license in the United States. Please be extra careful to ensure that the game's data (such as text, images, music, etc.) is freely licensed as well as the code (logic used to dictate how the game runs).

Gameplay video
A video game should be proofread based on a complete gameplay video that is uploaded to Wikimedia Commons. This gameplay video should show every transcribable element in the game, thus providing evidence to readers that such text appears during gameplay. The video should start from the very first instance of the game running, on an empty save file (if applicable) to better ensure accuracy in presentation. Please ensure that you include all transcribable elements in your video in visible form, so that you will not have to rerecord the entire gameplay video from scratch later.

Proofreading
After such a gameplay video is recorded and uploaded, the process for proofreading here at Wikisource is very similar to how we proofread films. An Index page should be created for the gameplay video, having a page for each timestamp in which text to be transcribed appears on screen.

Please refer to the key above to tell which of the Template:ft sub-templates should be used to wrap each bit of text.

Transclusion
Transcluded text should generally be structured to appear in chronological order; the structure should be based on what order the player will tend to see certain text. The text should be sectioned or subpaged out based on what area of the game it is in. For example, if there is one piece of storyline text in Level 1, and another piece of it in Level 2, those should go to the "Level 1" and "Level 2" sections/subpages respectively.

Sections should become subpages when the main transclusion page becomes lengthy enough to make separate pages necessary.

Showing things in completely chronological order is not always possible, since some bits of text, like a Game Over screen or a pause menu, could appear in virtually any part of the gameplay of most games. In cases like this, we should have sections for these specific elements (i.e. a "Pause menu" section and a "Game Over screen" section) that are sorted before all the levels in which they are to appear.

More proofreading guidelines
Even HUDs should be transcribed. But, in the case of a constantly changing number appearing on screen (for example, life counters, health counters, numbers of points, etc.), only the default value should be included in the transcription (f.x. "000000 POINTS" or "LIVES x 4").

If the name of the player character is arbitrarily chosen at the beginning of the game, only the default name should appear in the transcription, in text that refers to the player by name. For example, if you can type whatever name you want, but the default name is "PLAYER" if no name is chosen, then some text referring to the player might say "SORRY, PLAYER, BUT I CAN'T HELP YOU" for example. If an arbitrary name must be chosen and there is no default option available, choose a basic name that makes sense in context, such as "PLAYER".

In some cases, different text will be produced from different choices made by the player, such as if a character asks the player a yes-or-no question. In this scenario, the "Yes" and "No" scenarios should get their own L3 headers within the individual sections they're in. The "Yes" and "No" options themselves in the transcribed question's text would link to these specific subsections.

If images appear as text in the game, such as an image of the R1 button being placed in context, that image should be uploaded to Commons and used as an image during transcription, instead of a text placeholder. So, instead of "Press R1 to shoot." the transcription should say "Press to shoot." for example.